Tucson's Angel Charity kicks up dust in first-ever country concert

When you think fundraiser for Angel Charity for Children you think of dress-up-fancy Angel Ball, not dress-down cowboy chic.

But on Wednesday, April 26, hundreds of folks in jeans and not-a-speck-of-dirt-on-’em cowboy hats loosely filled Fox Tucson Theatre for Angel Charity’s “Rock the Fox,” the organization’s first-ever country concert with headliner Elle King and Texas country singer-songwriter Madeline Edwards.

Instead of polite conversation over cocktails and hors d’oeuvres as a precursor to dinner, dancing and silent auctions, “Rock the Fox” featured artist merch booths and a table with volunteers offering to bling up cowboy hats.

The obligatory raffle wasn’t dinner for two at a foothills restaurant; it was an acoustic guitar signed by King, who told the audience she didn’t think she had ever been to Tucson before Wednesday, although she does make it to Scottsdale to visit her famous actor father Rob Schneider.

While the focus of the evening surely was on raising money to support Angel Charity’s beneficiaries including Steele Children’s Research Center, the spotlight was on King making her full-frontal leap from pop and alternative rock music to country.

Country has always been foreshadowed in King’s music, from her pop-rocking “Ex’s & Oh’s” to the blues-rockin’ singalong “Chain Smokin, Hard Drinkin, Woman.” King’s smoky mezzo was built for country, a little rough around the edges with sass and grit best suited to sing about drinking, smoking, heartbreaks and settling the score.

Her 90-minute concert drew equally from her pop and alternative rock catalogue and her months-old country debut “Come Get Your Wife” and illustrated her country trajectory, from “Tulsa,” a song that she makes clear is not about the city in Oklahoma (“But if you spell it back to front you gonna know what I mean.”) to the bluesy “Good for Nothing Woman.”

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“Out Yonder” extolled the virtue of taking “your front-page, two-faced, petty-a** drama/And leave it out, leave it out, leave it out yonder,” setting the table for a spirited cover of Charlie Daniel’s Southern rocker “Long Haired Country Boy” that allowed her four-piece band to flex its musical prowess.

King showed us that country is not a passing phase of her musical journey or a pitstop between pop albums. Her longtime instrument of choice, banjo, should have been the first clue years ago.

On Wednesday, she also played mandolin on several songs, telling stories along the way as she sipped from a pink coffee cup that likely was not filled with coffee. She raised the cup to the audience, many of whom reciprocated with raised cups of adult beverages, when she sang her cover of Mack Allen Smith’s “I’m Not Drunk, I’m Just Drinking.”

The alternative country singer Edwards opened the show with a couple songs off her debut Warner Nashville album “Crashland” including the sassy “Mama, Dolly, Jesus,” a song that let’s her critics know that if you aren’t her mom, Dolly Parton or Jesus, she could care less what you think of her.

King brought Edwards on stage to help her close the show with her early roots-rocker “America’s Sweetheart” and her hit off “Come Get Your Wife,” King’s feisty “Drunk (And I Don’t Wanna Go Home).” Edwards sang the parts that Miranda Lambert sang on the duet that topped the charts in 2022.

Angel Charity for Children will be back in fancy dress-up mode for its annual ball on Dec. 9 at The Westin La Paloma Resort & Spa. For details, visit angelcharity.org.