From: JerryMotley@aol.com
Date: October 01, 2003
Thanks for mentioning Bert Rivera. I played lead guitar in Bert's Band the "Night Riders" from about 1976 to about 1984. Bert is a great musician. Burt played in Hank Thompson's Brazos Valley Boys (another great western swing band) for about 10 years. This was during the time the Brazos Valley Boys were voted in as the best band in the land by the Country Music Assoc. Burt Rivera is a great steel player and musician and a terrific mentor. He taught all of us in the Night Riders a whole lot of musicianship. We all treated him with a great amount of respect. I try to go see Bert play when he is playing around Austin every chance I get.. I did just have the opportunity to set in with Bert at a club down near Lockhart. Always a blast to get up and play in Bert's band. Bert always has a great band, Rick McRae of George Strait's band was playing guitar that night. As I played Rick's guitar, Rick picked up his fiddle. What fun we had playing all those old great swing tunes. Thanks everyone for your comments, sure glad I found this forum. And thank you all for helping to keep western swing alive and well.