Asleep at the Wheel
After a three-night stand at the Charles H. Morris Center in 2015, Asleep at the Wheel returns to play the opening weekend of SMF’s 30th anniversary season!
With 10 Grammy Awards and more than 25 albums to their name, Asleep at the Wheel has maintained their reputation as a giant of Texas swing since the early 1970s, with no sign of slowing down anytime soon. Held together over their storied history by frontman Ray Benson and featuring eight to 11 musicians at any given time, the band’s alumni roster is well over 100 members, and includes an impressive list of artists who have gone on to perform with the likes of Bob Dylan, Van Morrison and Lyle Lovett. In reviving the freewheeling, eclectic sensibility of Western swing godfather Bob Wills—what Benson describes as “jazz with a cowboy hat”—the musicianship of Asleep at the Wheel makes them a standard bearer in the genre.
With 10 Grammy Awards and more than 25 albums to their name, Asleep at the Wheel has maintained their reputation as a giant of Texas swing since the early 1970s, with no sign of slowing down anytime soon. Held together over their storied history by frontman Ray Benson and featuring eight to 11 musicians at any given time, the band’s alumni roster is well over 100 members, and includes an impressive list of artists who have gone on to perform with the likes of Bob Dylan, Van Morrison and Lyle Lovett. In reviving the freewheeling, eclectic sensibility of Western swing godfather Bob Wills—what Benson describes as “jazz with a cowboy hat”—the musicianship of Asleep at the Wheel makes them a standard bearer in the genre.
