Dateline: August 4, 2003

Last month I spotlighted Tracy Byrd; this month I will feature Mark Chesnutt, a guy who worked his career up to national status from long nights spent playing local honky tonks.

When you stop and think about Mark's career you will no doubt realize that he has been around for such a long time compared to today's "come and go" artists and it is no doubt because he knows what really counts to fans of country music - the music itself. He doesn't concern himself with glitz and glamor because behind it all you have to have true talent and abilities.

Those talents and abilities were honed with the help of his father, Bob, who sang and enjoyed country music and he sang Merle Haggard songs in bars in his hometown of Beaumont, Texas. Mark's visit to Nashville at the tender age of seventeen marked the first time he recorded songs and released a few singles with some regional success.

After word started spreading about the young