Troubadour Triumph: Clifton wins Best Singer-Songwriter Award & People’s Choice as Moe Bandy headlines and judges Bosque Arts Center’s 10th Annual Texas Troubadour at the Bosque Arts Center
CLIFTON – “Long ago, in a distant Bosque Arts Center board meeting, Judi Boston asked for funds to create a new event…a music festival, a live concert evening with a celebrity headliner judge, and a contest to promote the art of country music singer/songwriters,” the slide show informed the audience.
And for the past 10 years, the BAC’s Texas Troubadour Songwriter Classic has drawn singer/songwriters from across the nation to perform in the Tin Building Theatre, being judged by the likes of legends Marty Haggard, Janie Fricke and Michael Martin Murphey.
Celebrating the Texas Troubadour’s 10th anniversary milestone, award-winning country singer Moe Bandy served as judge, while special surprise guests and downright funny Minnie Pearl and Maxine had the avid country music fans audience laughing out loud with their homegrown, hillbilly humor.
A commemorative slide show with 10 years of memories showed the progression of the singer/songwriter contest over the years. And without a doubt, it can be said, “It’s bigger and better than ever.”
“I want to say one thing,” Bandy said about judging the contest. “This was hard to do, because there was a lot of good talent, and I really appreciate these folks. I know how they’re feeling, because I’ve been there – it might have been a few years back. I’ve got to say, I didn’t hear anybody that was near bad; they were all great. And it was really a rough decision to make.
“I’m going to announce the winners, and I am so proud for them. But y’all stick around, because I have a show all warmed up back there.” While many in the audience came to see Bandy in concert, they thoroughly enjoyed the Texas Troubadour part of the evening. And Bandy went on to say he was happy to see the amount of young people getting into country music.
To a full house of nearly 300 people on Saturday, Nov. 11, Bandy announced Zac Clifton to be the 2023 winner of the $1,500 Texas Troubadour Award for his songs “Have you seen my Crown?” his Royal Crown in the local honky tonk, and “The Little Things in Life,” written during the COVID-19 pandemic, when many people realized that many things we take for granted are the most precious things in life. Clifton also won the singer/songwriter classic in 2019.
In the past two years, traditional country singer Clifton has focused more on Country Gospel and to ministry through his music. He was not sure that choosing his gospel song “Who Would Have Thought” would resonate with the audience.
“Close your eyes, and I hope it touches you,” Clifton said before his last song. His diverse choices paid off, because the young singer/songwriter from Cleburne also received the evening’s $500 People’s Choice Award.“I just don’t know what to say,” as he humbly received congratulations from his fans. “It feels good as a songwriter, that people enjoy your songs.”
The $1,000 Song of the Year award was posthumously awarded to Curtis Allen. His family was present to accept the award for his “It May Be Your Last.”
Recognizing Veterans Day, the evening began with Brian Barrett – the only finalist in the Troubadour’s 10-year history to sweep all three award categories in 2017 – offering a tribute to the nation’s veterans with his original song “That Uniform” after the presentation of the colors. In his prayer, he asked to “remember their service and their sacrifice.”
This year’s six singer/songwriter finalists were selected from the entries received this summer. The talented newcomers as well as returning contestants each got the opportunity to perform two songs. Out of the six, Kris Tiscareno and Clifton were asked to perform an additional song for the judge to solidify his final decision.
Returning 2022 People’s Choice winner Tiscareno first performed two soulful songs about missing someone after being on the road a while in “I Wanna Go Home Now,” and “Keep Falling,” about memories of a love lost and the realization “there’s no future in the past.” His poetic, somewhat melancholy lines paint a soft-pastel picture of longing and heartache, and felt reminiscent of the late 1960s, early 1970s songs from the poetic folk singers.
Tiscareno encore song, while still had melancholy lines like “I know I can’t go back, but please let me dream,” it also had the more light-hearted line, “Some SOB in a SUV took away a moment to dream.”
The evening opened with two-time People’s Choice winner Phillip Wildman, accompanied by his daughter Cara on a bodhrán Irish drum, which added a horsey “clippety-clop” rhythm to the songs. A talented singer songwriter from Dorchester, Wildman’s musical influences travel from Broadway to Western Swing with a lot of old-time country along the way.
Because of Wildman’s incredibly quick wit and catchy melodies, companies have used his jingles for advertising and promotion. The duo presented “Game Warden Blues,” inspired by Wildman’s friend, a game warden with many crazy hunting stories to tell. And “My favorite time is when my baby’s out of town,” not the great country song about infidelity as you would think, but of weekends away from home with his wife, not without her.
First-timer Kassie Wilson came with her husband Ben, who forms the group Goldpine from Nashville. From Kerrville Folk Fest main stage and 30A Songwriters Festival to listening rooms throughout the United States, the duo offers their own brand of “straight-from-the-heart” Americana to audiences large and small, while winning the 2022 Rocky Mountain Songwriter Contest. For the Texas Troubadour, they selected “My Favorite Parts of You,” remembering Kassie’s mother, and “Thinking About Love,” whether we really understand it.
Newcomer Libby Mosley of Midlothian uses music to cope with and express her feelings. That evening, she chose “Honky Tonk Queen” to show her “easy-goin’, good lookin’” side, and for the ladies in the house because “most always its songs about guys who go to the honky tonk.” Her second song “Broken” about heartbreak showed her more fragile side.
Winner of the 2022 Song of the Year, Chip Boyd made his debut on the Tin Building Theater stage, bringing with him his step brother Lance on electric guitar. Boyd combines the traditions of a lyric-focused word smith and fireside storyteller, transporting the listener in space and time. “Run Billy Run” took the audience to “somewhere in South Texas,” probably Del Rio where Chip and Lance grew up together. In “It’s A Miracle,” Boyd expresses his gratitude to God for sending down an angel to be his wife and mother of their two boys.
Much to the audience’s delight in the evening’s post-contest concert, Bandy played many of his signature songs of yesteryear, from like “Hank Williams, You Wrote My Life,” “Too Old To Die Young,” “Good Ol’ Boys,” “Barstool Mountain,” “Someday Soon,” “Mind your Own Business,” “Cowboys Ain’t Supposed to Cry,” “Rodeo Romeo” about his brother and fellow bull rider Mike, and “Bandy, the Rodeo Clown.”
Bandy also played a medley of songs he passed up that became great hits, like “If You’re Going to Play in Texas,” “Amarillo by Morning,” All My Exes Live in Texas,” and “He Stopped Loving Her Today.” And his jokes in between songs were also a great hit, good for a good laugh.
Also a former bull rider, Bandy remains considered America’s All-Time Country Music Artist and Texas’ King of the Honky Tonk, inducted into the Texas Country Music Association Hall in the Class of 2023, along with the late rodeo icons Cleo Hearn and Boots O’Neal, the Texas Ranger Division of the Department of Public Safety; and the San Antonio Stock Show & Rodeo. Bandy also received the TCMA’s first Moe Bandy Icon Award, established in his name on Nov. 12 at Billy Bob’s in Fort Worth.
Photos by SIMONE WICHERS-VOSS
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thanks for the nice reply to my card and bringing this version of your magazine to my attention. I actually have time to read casually now . Sorry to hear about losing your dogs, thats rough. Rochelle lost Rip this last summer as well..She’ll never get over losing him. Y’all take care. I still have place in Jonesboro area. Wyatt lives there. I have been in Ruidoso since June. Avoided summer heat. Staying busy working on cabin and neighbors houses. I’ll be in Bosque county again in January..I’ll try to catch up with you then. Merry Christmas. Larry