Stacy Beam

The Celebration Welcomes Stacy Beam Back for Year 3

// January 15th, 2009 // Uncategorized

NEW CD WILL HAVE YOU SWINGIN’ IN THE SADDLE

The Racking Horse Celebration welcomes Stacy Beam back for his third full year of rocking center ring with his unique organ music. And this year he’s bringing a new CD along with him.  A long time friend of the racking horse industry, Beam also brings a rich history and a family association that goes all the way back to the beginning of our industry.

“My Grandparents, “Coach” Harold and Nita Ann Bentley and Mamma and Daddy, Gary and Olethia Beam attended the very first Racking Horse Celebration back in 1970.  Dad rode “Star of Mack K” and won the Speed Racking class, so when I came along in 1974 and he was busy winning World Championship titles on Bentley’s Ace, I was really going to the Celebration since before I remember.  My sister-in-law, Sherrie Latham Beam won the very first class, lead line, at that first Celebration, and my brother, Steve has trained, shown and judged Racking horses professionally for years.

John McDonald was the first horse show organist I ever heard, and I remember buck dancing in the isle to his inimitable rendition of “The Orange Blossom Special,” Stacy recalls. “I’ve also taken many a turn in the saddle at the Celebration, and I wouldn’t take anything for those wonderful memories. It is an honor to play a part in a horseshow that I have enjoyed for so long.”

“People have been asking when I’ll have a new CD ready for a while now,” Beam says.  Well, it is ready, and I am excited to have “Swingin’ In The Saddle” available for sale at the Celebration.”  It is a compilation of fifteen of my favorite “swing tunes,” some I’ve grown up hearing at horse shows, and some that I think will become new classics for the horse show ring.”

“We also did something completely new this year.  My buddy, horse show announcer, Mark Farrar, and I got together and created some really cool and funny horse show themed ring tones that you’ll be able to download online at stacybeam.com.”

“The new CD draws influence from those smooth and soulful jazz rhythms that Mr. McDonald was known for as well as the bouncy groove that Larry Bright made famous among horse folks.”

“I like to think about the people who came to the horse show for the first time when I am playing at a show.  I want them to be just as entertained as someone who knows exactly what is going on and has been attending for years.”

Stacy Beam currently plays almost twenty horse shows a year from San Antonio, Texas to West Springfield, Massachusetts, a total of forty-five dates, for more than ten different breeds.  This is his first year to play for the prestigious, hundred year-old American Royal Saddle Horse Show in Kansas City, Missouri. The five-day, season closing show for the American Saddlebreds in November.