The 14th Annual Mesquite Western Roundup featuring cowboy music and poetry is scheduled for this weekend. The Roundup kicks off on Friday, Feb. 21 at 7:00 pm, then continues on Saturday, Feb. 22 at 1 pm with another performance at 7 pm. All shows will be held at the Mesquite Community Theatre, 150 North Yucca Street
The event will include pre-show entertainment by local musical group Strings ’n’ Things. Jeff Hoyt, a sometime standup comic from Oregon, will return as the Master of Ceremonies.
Traditional western music will be provided by singers David Anderson and his daughter Jenny Anderson. Both are lauded as regional favorites and will journey down from Utah for the show.
The Mesquite Western Poets, who hale from different states throughout the West, will perform some of the old favorites as well as a few of their own works.
Farrel Bott was born in Utah and still spends much of the year on horseback.
Marleen Bussma was originally from North Dakota and has won several cowboy poetry awards including the Will Rogers Medallion.
Mark Kerr is a North Dakota farmer and horseman who writes both western songs and poetry.
Lee Kimberlin is a Colorado cowboy who has performed in Mesquite since the first show.
Jim Parsons grew up in Oklahoma and his experience as a horse packer is memorialized in his latest book, Paniolo Man.
Hap Stuart is a rancher from Wyoming who writes his own “true” poetry.
Russ Westwood is from Utah and won the Cowboy Poetry Championship Buckle in Abilene, Kansas.
Brice Wilson was born in Utah and writes from his experience on the Mountain Valley Ranch.
This event is presented by the Mesquite Arts Council and the Mesquite Western Poets. Tickets for the event are $10.00 per person general admission and may be purchased in advance at the Mesquite Fine Arts Gallery, Front Porch Flowers and Gifts in Mesquite, and Mesquite Veterinary Clinic. They may also be purchased online anytime at www.mctnv.com or at the theatre box office one hour before the show. It is recommended that tickets are purchased early to insure availability. For additional formation visit the website at www.mesquitewesternpoetry.com.
1 thought on “Cowboy Poetry returns to Mesquite this weekend”
Old as he is, Vic Anderson just might be the Headliner/performer you need for your next Cowboy Poetry and Music Gathering. YUP, he’s been around a while and done some things. He knows what it’s like to stick his hand in the riggin’ on a bareback bronc and feel the hide shiver when he sits down on it. He may have run that bronc off the mountains. He has driven a team of horses, hitched to a bobsled with the first load of 60 bales in 40 degree below weather, feeding a thousand head of cows. Vic spent a summer in Yellowstone National Park, driving stagecoach and wagons through herds of buffalo, loaded with guests at the Roosevelt Ranch, to a steak dinner, where he entertained them. He’s had his harm stuck, shoulder deep in a heifer, lying on a straw covered dirt floor, turning the calf or straightening a leg so the calf could make an entrance into this world. Vic’s hands have been rope burned, smashed, twisted, sprained and maimed, but he can still make beautiful cowboy music with his guitar, his voice, his yodeling and possibly the most beautiful whistling you have ever heard, to a song that can bring tears to your eyes, or make you laugh out loud. Perhaps you’d like to hear a cowboy poem. Vic has poems about feeding cattle, riding the high country and buying false teeth from the Police Gazette. You have kids programs?? Vic is sensational with kids. His song FLY, written for kids, reached no.1 on the internet where it stayed there for 5 weeks. He can teach them to whistle, twirl a rope, tell them why cowboys wear spurs, maybe, just maybe he can teach them a little cowboy history and they won’t know they are being taught. Stories, Ask Vic about the time he and another cowboy roped a bear. How he and a different cowboy caught a deer by the horns and wished they hadn’t. How about the day he was bucked off the same horse about a dozen times…….please don’t mention that it was a sheep herders horse.
Vic is a member of the Lazy B Wranglers the only one who was with the original group and the NEW Lazy B Wranglers. He has performed at several cowboy gatherings including: your Cochise Cowboy Poetry and Music Gathering, Cody, WY, Lewistown MT., Durango and Golden, CO, White Sulphur Springs, MT, Estes Park, CO, the Equine Expo in Esne, Germany, the Maple Creek Gathering in Canada and others.