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Show scheduled for Saturday, July 1

Manchester native Jason Petty will be bringing his Hank Williams Sr. tribute show to the Bell Buckle Banquet Hall Saturday July, 1 for a celebration of Hank Williams’ 100th birthday.

Presented by On Fire Concerts, the show will feature songs and stories from the life of County music’s first superstar.

“I call it a musical narrative,” Petty said. “I have got a steel guitar player, fiddle player and myself on acoustic guitar.”

Petty tells the story of Williams, an Alabama native born Sept. 17, 1923 who rose to fame during the late 1940s with his hit songs like “Hey Good Lookin’,” “I’m So Lonesome I could Cry,” and “Your Cheatin’ Heart.” By the time of his death on New Year’s Day 1953, Williams had become the face of country music.

“I tell the stories of Hank Williams from how he got interested in music, learned to play music to him becoming a huge superstar to his problems in his marriage and his problems with alcohol, which of course led to his early demise and ultimately his death,” Petty said. “Then we go on to talk about the impact of his music all the while I am basically telling stories from the people I got who were there.”

Petty began his career performing as Hank Williams for the Opryland USA theme park in Nashville just after college where he performed in a show impersonating different country music stars.

“One of the people they wanted me to impersonate Hank Williams Sr.,”he said. “I knew a little about him and I had heard a few of his songs… so I did a quick dive into him and did that for a few years.”

In 1996, Petty won a role playing the elder Williams in a musical titled “Lost Highway.”

“That was a full blown theatrical musical that we did for two years at the Ryman auditorium in Nashville and then suddenly we were on a world tour,” Petty said.

After making back to the states, “Lost Highway” went to New York for an Off-Broadway run that lasted for about one-year.

When the show wrapped, Petty decided it was time to write a script for a Hank Williams story of his own.

“When I was at the Ryman I got to know everybody who knew Hank Williams,” Petty said. “All the band members and the Grand Ole Opry stars all wanted to tell me their Hank Stories, so I started writing those stories down and after Lost Highway got finished with its run I decided to write my own show and that is what I have for basically the last 20 years.”

Petty said that even 100 years after his birth and 70 years after his early death, fans still enjoy hearing Hank Williams songs.

“I get young people from the audience who come up to me and say ‘I had no idea what an impact he made,’” Petty said. “That is the most important part, and the most important part about Hank was his honesty. He was truthful.”

“He got one piece of musical advice when he was young, which was write about what you know,” he added. “Audiences are smart and they can spot a fake a mile away.”

For more information or to purchase tickets, visit www.onfireconcerts.com.