Saturday 7 May 2011 saw my crew and me visit Harold’s Corral in Cave Creek, Arizona to attend a David Allan Coe concert. Sure I came to enjoy the music and take photographs, but I also came to be with good friends, feed my face (oh my the filet mignon and lobsters were GREAT!), and listen to some great country music.
Bottom line: Harold’s is a fun place with great food and a wonderful place to do concerts. We’ll be back.
For photographers, I brought my Canon 7D and the Canon 28-135mm lens. The lighting was concert lighting. Some was interesting; some was quite a challenge. Glad I shot in raw because as soon as I imported the photos into Adobe Lightroom, I converted the white balance to tungsten. I was shooting pretty high ISO of 1600, but the Canon 7D can certainly handle it. In years past, an ISO that high would be very very grainy. What would I do differently if I shoot again in that venue? Bring an off camera flash! I have both the Canon 580ex and 430ex to allow for lower ISO and sharper images.
We were delighted with David Allan Coe’s warmup band called Young Country. Ted and the guys were as nice as can be. They like beer, so they can’t be all bad! They were actually quite good. Visit their website at http://youngcountryband.com/ I also found their Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/pages/Young-Country-Fans If they come to a venue near you, go. You won’t be disappointed.
The headliner, of course, was David Allan Coe. According to Wikipedia, 72-year-old David Allan Coe is an American outlaw country music singer who achieved popularity in the 1970s and 1980s. He has written and performed over 280 original songs throughout his career. As a singer, his biggest hits were "Mona Lisa Lost Her Smile," "The Ride," " You Never Even Called Me by My Name," "She Used to Love Me a Lot," and "Long Haired Redneck." His best-known compositions are the #1 successes "Would You Lay With Me (in a Field of Stone)," which was covered by Tanya Tucker; and “Take This Job and Shove It," which was later covered by Johnny Paycheck that was later a hit movie (both Coe and Paycheck had minor parts in the film).
Happy Shooting,
Jim Patterson
Photos of the concert from my photos on Flickr:
