Old Crow Medicine Show coming to The Mahaiwe

Old Crow Medicine Show has been making merry music since 1998. While students at Ithaca College in upstate New York, the band recorded, toured, and discovered gold in a discarded musical idea.

As legend has it, co-founder Chris Fuqua gave lead singer and fiddle player Ketch Secor a bootleg of a Bob Dylan song sketch. Secor took the chorus and added verses with themes of traveling that reflected his homesickness for the south. The resulting “Wagon Wheel” became the band’s biggest hit, going gold and eventually platinum in 2013.

When asked why the song continues to resonate to this day, mandolin player and multi-instrumentalist Cory Younts said, “It’s simple, easy to learn, and pleasing to the ear. It’s everyone’s favorite campfire song. Ketch knew it was gonna be a big hit when he wrote it, and that it was gonna go for miles and miles.”

The band got a big break while busking outside of a pharmacy in Boone, North Carolina in 2000 when they were discovered by legendary blind bluegrass musician Doc Watson who invited them to perform at his annual Merlefest music festival, changing their lives forever.

As a result of their performance, the band was invited to play Nashville’s Grand Ole Opry where they were embraced and mentored by Marty Stuart, who invited them to tour and open for country music legends Merle Haggard and Dolly Parton.

In 2004, they recorded their eponymous album “O.C.M.S.” produced by David Rawlings, musical partner of Gillian Welch. Younts recalls how it was the right time for the band’s brand of music.

“Old Crow was starting to make a name for themselves in Nashville around the time of the Cohen Brothers’ film ‘Oh Brother Where Art Thou?’ I was a fan and would go to as many shows as I could. Gil and Dave would be there too. They’re wonderful people. They have Woodland Studios in Nashville.”

In December 2024, the band celebrated 25 years of the album with a performance on NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert series. Today, they are one of the bigger Americana acts, and on reflection, Younts believes they helped start the genre.

“I remember when everybody thought we were just making country music. I think we’re one of the first bands to start that whole sound and category (of Americana),” he said.

Old Crow Medicine Show will bring their unique brand of Americana to the Berkshires in late April. Audiences can expect an energetic and highly entertaining show.

“We’re very high energy with a lot of humor. All of us rotate instruments throughout the night; everybody plays probably six instruments. It’s entertaining, comical, good old ruckus busking music,” Younts said.

Come see for yourself at the Mahaiwe Theater in Great Barrington, Massachusetts on Friday, April 25.