Feature: 2COUNTRY4NASHVILLE at JJ's Grill Fort Smith

Two of my favorite things to do are listening to my talented friends play great music and eating delicious food in super cool restaurants. I mean....I have to treat myself sometimes, right? Of course, I do, and that is exactly what I did when 2Country4Nashville, made up of Jo-el and LeAnne Ulmer, played at JJ’s Grill Fort Smith last weekend. It was a perfect combination for a perfect Saturday night. 

2Country4Nashville is a husband/wife country duo that sing and play the good country music-the classics. I have known these performers for four years now, and I think their music is not only exceptional, but historically important. With Jo-el masterfully strumming it out on the guitar, LeAnne on the step base, flute and tambourine, and both supporting each other like a couple should, this duo covers it all-Johnny Cash, George Jones, Tammy Wynette, George Strait, Conway Twitty, and the list goes on. If you want to hear it, they can perform it, but more on them later.   

JJ’s Grill Fort Smith, 5400 Phoenix Ave #1, in Fort Smith, is the place to be for great food with a great atmosphere. It’s the perfect place to gather with friends and wind down from a hectic day. They have drinks, TVs almost every way you turn, music-either live or over the speakers, pool tables, and an outside patio. The restaurant floor staff is friendly, attentive, and everyone is beautiful! My particular waitress MaKayla made sure I had everything I needed in a timely manner and had these beautiful tattoos up and down her leg. She was a walking art exhibit. Manager Jameson was also constantly making rounds to check on all of the patrons. He even joined in with the song requests as the night progressed on.  

For my dining delight, I chose THE LEFTOVER. This scrumptious sandwich contained BBQ-soaked ribeye steak with grilled onions, American cheese, topped with a scoop of our homemade mac n' cheese, and served on Texas toast which runs you $12.49, and is well worth it. Never have I had such a flavorful creation that I thought was a masterpiece between two thick pieces of bread. I savored it. The BBQ-soaked ribeye steak was trimmed and juicy with sauce that was not too spicy or sweet—a perfect blend. The grilled onions were tender which made an exemplary companion with the meat. The questionable ingredient that had me intrigued was the scoop of mac n’ cheese, but goodness, the combinations of all the layers of food really surprised and delighted my taste buds.....and now that I’m thinking about it, I want another one.

As a side, I was debating between the Roadhouse spud and the sweet potato fries. I even had to weigh my pros and cons with MaKayla. Even though she leaned more towards the spud, because she isn’t a big fan of sweet potato fries (Hey! She's honest!), I still went with the sweet potato fries just because those are not as readily available at other restaurants....they should be, but they are not. The fries were fresh, warm enough but not too hot, and not greasy. I feel my doctor would have been proud of me, or at least until I poured out a glob of honey to dip them in. I chose a soda instead of one of their many alcoholic drinks. They have beers, wine, shots, frozen concoctions and mixed drinks for your consuming pleasure. If I wasn’t going to try and pay attention for this article, I would have definitely liked to have tried the Arkansas Attitude-- a JJ's original with malibu, peach schnapps, tuaca, pineapple, & grenadine, or the Caribbean Margarita-- The Rock's teramana reposado tequila, coconut rum, blue curacao, with sweet and sour & pineapple. I definitely need to go back again and try the Chicken Bacon Ranch Grilled Cheese-Grilled chicken breast on a cheddar & mozzarella grilled cheese, and  topped with crispy bacon and ranch and served with your choice of side; the Catfish Po'boy-Fried catfish served on a toasted hoagie with lettuce, tomatoes, and chipotle tartar sauce; or the Fried Egg Burger topped with American cheese and bacon. They all sound delicious to me! 

2C4N is living their best life traveling all over the US and beyond singing, playing, and meeting great people on their journeys. They recently went to Devils Tower, WY, for the Fourth of July, and are still currently in that area.  

BWW: You guys have been everywhere! 

LeAnne: We're on a seven-week tour. We've got shows in Wyoming and in and around South Dakota. 

Jo-el: Then we will head to Colorado, Texas and Louisiana. 

BWW: That’s smart booking your summer stuff up north. 

Jo-el: Oh yeah! Yeah! Yeah!  

BWW: Not on purpose at all. So, your career has been building and building and you guys are getting a following! 

LeAnne: Oh yeah. The place last night was packed out with people from many states. 

BWW: You were in Springdale? 

Jo-el: Springdale, Arkansas. 

LeAnne: And we have more coming in tonight. 

Jo-el: We have people from Texas, Missouri, all over. 

LeAnne: And we'll get to see them again when we go down to Texas next month. We pretty much got our year booked. 

BWW: I see you guys like to cruise. 

LeAnne: Yeah. We have a Veteran's Day cruise in November going out of Galveston, TX, to the Caribbean. We've already got almost 180 folks booked with us to go on that cruise, and then next year in June 2024, we're going to Alaska. Then the next year we've already planned on the 14-day cruise to Hawaii with all of our friends and fans, so that'll be awesome. 

BWW: Do you have to have so many booked? 

LeAnne: You have to have a minimum to have a group, but then you get your own lounge and do your own shows. 

Jo-el: We do shows for our group during sea days. 

LeAnne: We do private shows and private activities that we do together. We're not gonna do anymore contracts. For six years in the winter time, we worked for Carnival, and we actually lived on the ship for four to six months at a time, actually contracted through Carnival to entertain guests every single day, but at this stage of our life we're not quite willing to give up that much free time to go live on a ship. Even though it's super fun, we have super fun grandkids that love time with us too. So, we’ve decided to instead book our own cruises, because we met so many friends and fans through cruising and they loved a cruise, so it’s a great way for us to take a vacation together, a working vacation, and spend time with our friends. 

Jo-el: We do these little Fanboree weekends on a ship or on land. We did one in Pigeon Forge back in April, and it was just a big blast. We had a big huge cabin full of people... 

LeAnne: Rented a big lodge... 

Jo-el: And then we got another one planned for August in our hometown of Franklin, TN. We have shows booked around that, so everybody can come to a show each night. It's a lot of fun. 

LeAnne: That would be our first time back home since two years ago when we played the Ryman Auditorium. We headlined our own show at the Ryman Auditorium. 

Jo-el: That was crazy! 

LeAnne: A lot of these same folks came the entire weekend and supported us. 

BWW: What was it like performing at the Ryman? 

Jo-el and LeAnne: Magic! 

 Jo-el: It still seems like a dream walking out and seeing the stained glass windows up there and all the people. The coolest thing about it was I think we knew everybody there. 

LeAnne: It was amazing! 

Jo-el: We had them pull the house lights up. 

LeAnne: We asked the engineer to please turn the lights on so we could see everybody's faces, and then just to realize that so many of our country music heroes stood right there on that stage and played there, was just amazing. It was magical. That's all I can say about it. 

BWW: Just you guys? 

Jo-el: Yeah, just us. Well, we invited some friends of ours to come and do guest spots. We had a young man from Kentucky named Colonel Graven Gordon. We gave him his debut at The Ryman Auditorium. He came out and sang a song and then at the end, he came out and sang with us on a gospel song, which was a lot of fun. 

LeAnne: We had a real dear friend of ours -Manuel Cuevas- he actually designed our outfits. He designs outfits for all the stars including Johnny Cash, Porter Wagner... 

Jo-el: Marty Stuart 

LeAnne: Elvis Presley. So he designed our outfits, and we had the honor of having him introduce us on the stage at the Ryman. That was way cool. It was an amazing night. We can't believe it happened. We still we pinch ourselves when we think about it. 

BWW: So how did we build up to all of this? 

LeAnne: Lots of knocking on doors and lots of being told no. 

Jo-el: We started, I guess, about 16 years ago. Our first show wasn't even our show. I was playing with her cousin's son at a little market in town, and she got up and sang Jackson with us. Everybody went nuts for that, and we thought ‘hey this is pretty cool,’ so a few weeks later, we booked our own show and have just been doing it ever since. I think we did that for two or three years, and then that “Can You Duet” show came on TV on CMT, and LeAnne decided we were gonna try out for that, so we did. We made it through about two weeks of taping, made it to the top 50 couples, and got in front of the actual judges and sang our song for them. They liked, it but they said we were “too country.” So as we were leaving, LeAnne said, “so I guess we just wasted two weeks,’ and I said, “well we got a name out of it- we're Too Country For Nashville.” 

LeAnne: So that's when we got our name, but he changed it to the number two and the number four so it kind of makes a cute little logo, and that's been our name ever since. I gave up teaching eight years ago. I retired after 25 years of teaching elementary school. 

Jo-el: And I went from driving an 18-Wheeler over the road to driving a van with a pretty girl beside me. 

LeAnne: And we've never looked back. It's been amazing, and as long as we can continue doing this, our health stays good, our voices stay strong, and our love for it stays as strong, we'll keep doing it as long as we possibly can. 

BWW: That's wonderful. So, what's the big thing that you have going on for the summer besides going north? 

LeAnne: In August, we are doing a big benefit show in our hometown of Franklin, TN. It's called “A Vintage Affair: The Main Event.” This year's theme is called “Rhinestone Cowboy,” and they've asked us to put together an All-Star band with us running it. We are super honored to do that. It's a big deal in our hometown. 

Jo-el: It’s kind of crazy, you know. It's like the Bible says, “A prophet gets no respect in his hometown.” We don't play in our hometown much. We don’t get an opportunity to be asked to play in our hometown, so it is a big honor. Then we put this band together, and we got people that played with Loretta Lynn...a lot of stars- George Jones, Mel Tillis... 

LeAnne: Merle Haggard, Kid Rock...  

Jo-el: Buck Owens... 

LeAnne: Yeah, and they all agreed to play with us. 

Jo-el: It’s gonna be a big night, and that's based around that big Fanboree weekend I was telling you about. A lot of these people that are here tonight are gonna be there that weekend, and we got that show and like three other shows. In fact on Sunday, the last show we're going to do is a lunch show at the very market where we started our very first show, which was at that little market out in the country. 

LeAnne: So, it's going to come full circle all the way back to where it started, so that will be fun. 

BWW: Why did you guys choose the older country? 

Jo-el: Because it was getting shunned and thrown away in the trash. It's too good of music to be thrown away. Nashville seems to be like trying to hide it and throw it in the trash can. They've torn down everything that has to do with it in Nashville, and the only thing standing is The Ryman. 

LeAnne: Oh, thank goodness they saved The Ryman. They were going to tear that down. 

Jo-el: Music Row is pretty much gone, and all the stars are dying out. It's the only genre of music I've seen that they try to hide their past, you know. If you turn the FM radio on, you're not going to hear this kind of music anymore. When you turn Blues radio on, you hear everything from the old to new stuff. They are just throwing the older country away, and we were like, ‘it's too good of music to let it die,’ so we're just trying to keep it alive and further it. We're still writing our own music. We just came out with our own originals album last year, and yeah, there's a lot of people doing what we do. 

LeAnne: So, we just feel like it's, you know, that song “Who's Gonna Fill Their Shoes” by George Jones. There's not a lot out there trying to, so, you know, we want to do our best to keep their music. Those are our legendary heroes, and we're losing them more and more every year. We just want to make sure that we keep their music heard and alive. 

BWW: Have you met any of your heroes? 

Jo-el: We have... yeah. We've had the opportunity to meet and even perform with some. Jean Shepard- we were on a show with her and got to back her on some great songs.  

LeAnne: We opened for T. Graham Brown, Ronnie McDowell. We met Lynn Anderson and sang on stage with Lynn Anderson. Moe Bandy...  

Jo-el: Oh yeah, LeAnne sang a duet with Moe Bandy.. 

LeAnne: I did...on a cruise ship. It was awesome. Sadly, though, a lot of our country music heroes passed before we got to meet them. One of the coolest things that we've ever heard is when we spoke to Ray Price’s widow not too long after he passed away. We did a radio tribute show in his memory, and we interviewed her for our radio show. She said, “I just want you guys to know how much Ray enjoyed you two and that he knew you. He knew your music and he actually called you “the kids.” He would say ‘I'm so glad that the kids are keeping my music alive.’” 

Jo-el: I wish he were still around. I’d like somebody to call me a kid again. That would be nice. 

LeAnne: But we just keep playing. We'll play to two people, or we'll play to 2000 people. As long as there's somebody out there that loves what we're doing and loves the music, then that's good news for us. 

BWW: Do you have a bucket list place that you would like to play or for who you would like to play? 

Jo-el: Oh yeah, I mean the Ryman definitely was a bucket list. I'd love to do it again. I want to play the Surf Ballroom where Buddy Holly played his last show. I'm a big Buddy Holly fan. 

LeAnne: We're gonna play at the Shreveport Municipal Auditorium on November 4, which was where the original Louisiana Hayride was. We get to play on that stage with other performers.  

Jo-el: I was born in Shreveport, so it's kinda cool that I get to play in my birthplace. It will be my first time ever.  

LeAnne: And, of course, my ultimate dream would be to play on the stage of the Grand Ole Opry. I don't know if that will ever happen in our lifetime, but if it ever did, that would be a huge honor. 

BWW: Well, you have our vote. We think you guys are entertaining, immensely talented, and make the Classic Country community proud.  

For a more complete schedule for 2Country4Nashville, visit their website at https://2country4nashville.com, or follow them on Instagram or Facebook. 

To see what all is offered at my newest favorite restaurant in Fort Smith, check out their Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/JJsGrillFortSmith. 

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