John Mueller's Tribute to Roger Miller

JOHN MUELLER'S TRIBUTE TO ROGER MILLER

"KING OF THE ROAD"

The McPherson Opera House

McPherson, KS

© Lydia Lowe 9/29/2012

John Mueller's Tribute to Roger Miller . . The songs of Roger Miller are part of country western history and for some reason the vast majority of his songs have lost favor with the country music fans of today.   Miller’s songs and sense of humor live on in John Mueller’s tribute to Roger Miller, entitled King of the Road.  Mueller doesn’t do the campy bit of pretending to be Roger Miller, he just sings the songs.

The show opened with video from the 1960’s, which featured commercials along with various information about that era setting the stage, so to speak, getting the audience to focus their attention way back to the times that Roger Miller lived and recorded in.  

Mueller sang all of Miller’s hits as well as a few that the audience didn’t know.   Of course, no Roger Miller concert would be complete without his trademark song, “King of the Road”.  Mueller also told jokes and stories about Miller, and related history about Miller’s career.  

The concert was low-key and the audience knew the words to most of the music.  Mueller has a good voice and was excited about his show.  He did a good job with the material.  There were some interesting parts to the show that I haven’t seen at other shows.  But I don’t think the audience left there wanting more.  I heard several people say that they weren’t sure what the point of the show was.  So, I’m not sure if Miller’s songs were just not sophisticated enough for today’s audiences to hold their attention or if Mueller just wasn’t able to pull it off for some reason.  Clearly, he is enthusiastic about his subject and has put together an interesting show that has a lot of unique aspects.  But for whatever reason, the audience just wasn’t feeling it.