Friday night lights

The red dirt and hard country music of Jason Boland and the Stragglers, featuring the fiddle playing of Nick Worley and the Stoney LaRue band — in a purple-blue haze — inspire the dance steps of MerleAnn and Chance Raichart of Benkelman, during Friday night concerts at the 2018 Red Willow County Fair in McCook. Hundreds of Straggler, LaRue and Cleverly fans crowded the stage moved from the open-air arena to the Alice Arena because of the threat of rain, which didn’t materialize. However, if the concerts had remained outside, the buzz of the mosquitoes may have been an unwelcome accompaniment.