Benefit concert for Eastern Ky. flood victims raises $2 million

Chris Stapleton, who organized the concert, was its star.
(Photos by James Crisp for the Lexington Herald-Leader)

An all-star cast of country musicians from Eastern Kentucky raised $2 million last night at a concert for flood relief in the region, contributing critic Walter Tunis reports for the Lexington Herald-Leader.

Organized by Chris Stapleton, the "Kentucky Rising" concert at Rupp Arena also included Tyler Childers, Dwight Yoakam, Ricky Skaggs and Patty Loveless, the latter two not announced in advance. "It was an occasion where multiple generations of Eastern Kentucky artists gathered to honor their artistic and cultural heritage and, in the process, help out their neighbors in a time of unfathomable crisis," Tunis writes.

Tyler Childers was another headliner.

"On the surface, Yoakam’s performance – his first Rupp outing on over two decades – seemed devoted exclusively to the sleekness of the Bakersfield country sound of which he has so long been a torchbearer.  "Yet, more than any other artist playing Kentucky Rising, he offered the most detailed imagery of his Eastern Kentucky (specifically, Pikeville) roots . . . Stapleton’s concluding set was as solid as oak without the guests as it was with them. The inflection and, to a great degree, intent of his singing was used to color songs rich with vintage country narratives."

The concert had some touches of Western Kentucky, which has a separate coalfield that spawned one of the most popular coal songs. "With all performers and band members onstage in an assemblage worthy of The Band’s The Last Waltz, Stapleton and company performed 'Paradise' together on the evening after what would have been the 76th birthday of its late composer, John Prine," Tunis reports. (At Nashville's Ryman Auditorium that night, another great cast paid tribute to Prine, American Songwriter reports.)

The recovery from the flood has been slow, and the impact is felt every day. "A 97-year-old Letcher County woman who received national attention in July for a photo of her surrounded by water in her home when flooding devastated Eastern Kentucky has died," the Herald-Leader's Valarie Honeycutt Spears reports. "Missy Amburgey Crovetti said her grandmother Mae Amburgey died Saturday, not fully aware that a photo of her sitting on a bed surrounded by four feet of water in her Letcher County home, had gone viral and brought her national attention. 'I believe she died of a broken heart,' said Crovetti, noting her grandmother missed her home. Amburgey had been staying in Alabama with her son for about a week, unable to return to her flood-ravaged home."

Mae Amburgey in her flooded home

(Photo by Gregory Amburgey)