Ricky Skaggs

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On a night off from recording his latest CD, Ricky Skaggs & Kentucky Thunder Live, he was playing games. The bluegrass/country singer was a contestant on Wheel of Fortune for Country Music Stars Week.</div> <bR> <div> Mr. Skaggs taped the show, which will air in February, on Jan. 9 with Brenda Lee and Joe Nichols at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville. Although he didn't win (Mr. Nichols took home the dough), he was given $10,000 to donate to his favorite charities, Feed the Children and Samaritan's Purse.</div> <bR> <div> Playing a game show the night before finishing a CD (while also fighting a cold) might seem like a rigorous schedule to some, but it's nothing new for Mr. Skaggs. It takes hard work to earn eight Grammy Awards, eight Country Music Association Awards and eight Academy of Country Music Awards. And, at the age of 48, Mr. Skaggs doesn't seem to be losing any steam.</div> <bR> <div> He'll be playing two concerts Saturday at Thalian Hall, and he is participating in The Three Pickers alongside living legends Earl Scruggs and Doc Watson. The PBS special will air next year.</div> <bR> <div> He also is the executive music producer/music consultant for the soundtrack to an upcoming Disney animated feature, My Peoples, scheduled for release in 2005.</div> <bR> <div> With so much going on in his career, it's a surprise that Mr. Skaggs had time to talk. But he talked a lot as he drove to Georgetown, a mastering house in Tennessee where he would be adding the final touches to his 21st release. Ricky Skaggs & Kentucky Thunder Live will be Mr. Skaggs' first all-bluegrass live recording. The album will include 15 songs (plus additional spoken tracks), including two new instrumentals and three songs never recorded before (but performed live). The live tracks were recorded at the Charleston Music Hall in November in South Carolina. The CD is slated for release on March 25.</div> <bR> <div> "These albums last forever, not just my lifetime but my children's lifetime," Mr. Skaggs said on his way to edit the talking segments that will appear on the live record. "So it's important to me to make a good product. And when I put Skaggs Family Records on it, I want it to be the kind of quality that I'm proud of and the kind of quality that people have come to expect from my records."</div> <bR> <div> Mr. Skaggs wanted listeners to get the complete concert experience with this album – which for Mr. Skaggs means including a spoken word or two.</div> <bR> <div> "A lot of times I talk about my childhood and how I grew up and just funny things that happened to me or stories about my mom and dad," Mr. Skaggs said. "I think there's a story on there about my mother's fried chicken and how my mother and dad met for the first time. I say, 'She was just a beautiful mountain woman from Kentucky,' and someone in the audience goes, 'Wow,' and I say, 'Yeah, that's what my dad said the first time he met her.' I thought, man, I got to keep that on there. That was so natural. Just little things like that."</div> <bR> <div> A Christian, Mr. Skaggs feels that spreading the good word is part of his duty. In fact, he was awarded the American Inspir-ations Award in November by the Presidential Prayer Team, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization whose specific purpose is to encourage prayer for the President.</div> <bR> <div> "It's part of the calling to at least do a few songs in the show that give people some hope," Mr. Skaggs said. "There's so much hurt in this world and … music is such a great healing balm and a great way to forget your troubles. But sometimes forgetting your troubles means you're just ignoring it, getting away from it. Maybe you're going to a concert thinking you're not going to hear anything but music. But you may walk away from there with an answer to a problem that you're carrying around with you that you didn't think you were going to hear about."</div> <bR> <div> Mr. Skaggs anticipates the first single from Ricky Skaggs & Kentucky Thunder Live to be Simple Life, a happy, summery song about a common man and down-to-earth dad who loves his kids.</div> <bR> <div> "When we did it the first night before a completely new audience ... when we got to the end of the chorus, they just erupted in applause," Mr. Skaggs said. "I knew right there that we really had something special, that it really was a powerful song."</div> <bR> <div> Born and raised in Kentucky, Mr. Skaggs began singing when he was 3 years old. His dad bought him his first mandolin when he was 5.</div> <bR> <div> At 22, Mr. Skaggs went to work with Emmylou Harris. After that, he moved to Nashville to try to get a country record deal, which he inked with Epic in 1981.</div> <bR> <div> In 1996, Ricky returned to his bluegrass roots. He went into the studio to record a bluegrass album because everything he had to sell on the road was country. Fans would approach sales tables asking for a bluegrass CD, but none was available. So Mr. Skaggs recorded Bluegrass Rules!, his first bluegrass CD, on his own label, Skaggs Family Records, which he began in 1997.</div> <bR> <div> <B>A bit of 'History'</b></div> <bR> <div> Ricky Skaggs & Kentucky Thunder Live follows the Grammy-nominated History of the Future, which released Sept. 11, 2001.</div> <bR> <div> "Just the fact that all that happened was a sad time for America," Mr. Skaggs said. "When I was flying home that day, and I saw all this happen, I never one time said 'Oh my God, this is going to hurt the sales of my record.'... I said, 'There's some sort of message in this.' I mean, for a record named History of the Future to be released on 9-11, there was a prophetic word in there. There was something to be said, not just to me, but to America and to the world. Is this the history of our future?"</div> <bR> <div> For more information, log on to www.skaggsfamilyrecords.com</div> <bR> <div> <B>DISCOGRAPHY</b></div> <div> Country</div> <bR> <div> ‘Waiting for the Sun to Shine,’ 1981</div> <div> ‘Highways and Heartaches,’ 1982</div> <div> ‘Don't Cheat in Our Hometown,’ 1983</div> <div> ‘Country Boy,’ 1984</div> <div> ‘Favorite Country Songs,’ 1985</div> <div> ‘Live in London,’ 1985</div> <div> ‘Love's Gonna Get Ya!,’ 1986</div> <div> ‘Comin' Home to Stay,’ 1988</div> <div> ‘Kentucky Thunder,’ 1988</div> <div> ‘My Father's Son,’ 1989</div> <div> ‘Ricky Skaggs Portrait,’ 1992</div> <div> ‘Super Hits,’ 1993</div> <div> ‘Solid Ground,’ 1995</div> <div> ‘Life Is a Journey,’ 1997</div> <bR> <div> Bluegrass</div> <bR> <div> ‘Bluegrass Rules!,’ 1997</div> <div> ‘Ancient Tones,’ 1999</div> <div> ‘Big Mon (Ricky Skaggs & Friends),’ 2000</div> <div> ‘History of the Future,’ 2001</div> <bR> <div> Gospel</div> <bR> <div> ‘Soldier of the Cross,’ 1999</div> <bR> <div> NO. 1 SINGLES</div> <div> ‘Cryin' My Heart Out Over You,’ 1981</div> <div> ‘I Don't Care,’ 1982</div> <div> ‘Heartbroke,’ 1982</div> <div> ‘I Wouldn't Change You If I Could,’ 1982</div> <div> ‘Highway 40 Blues,’ 1983</div> <div> ‘You've Got a Lover,’ 1983</div> <div> ‘Don't Cheat in our Hometown,’ 1983</div> <div> ‘Country Boy,’ 1984</div> <div> ‘Honey (Open That Door),’ 1984</div> <div> ‘Cajun Moon,’ 1984</div> <div> ‘Lovin' Only Me,’ 1989</div> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>