Darrell Scott

Superlatives surround Darrell Scott: hit song writer, monster picker, amazing voice. I still find it amazing that an artist of so many talents is so relatively unknown. Scott's 2008 album American Hymns was full of tastfully done covers of everything from Guy Clark ("Old Time Feeling") to Paul Simon ("American Tune"), a truly joyous celebration of late 20th-century American song, yet it probably sold fewer albums than Tim McGraw's latest album sold its first hour on the shelves. Such is the plight of artists who refuse to sell out to the hit-machine dreams of the Clear Channel soap-sellers and major-label money sharks who buy and sell artists' dreams and souls like they were rolls of toilet paper. Like fellow Nashvegan Mark Germino, somewhere along the way Scott figured out that artistic integrity is not something you let some company or executive give you, rather something you make and keep for yourself. Scott would rather be home cooking than out on the road, so he only tours about 50 days per year. That means he doesn't get down our way much. Do yourself a favor: See this man play and sing. There's no one else quite like him.