The Wilders
 Kansas City's unique hillbilly stringband The Wilders were formed in 1996. Led by singer, guitarist and country wisecracker, Ike Sheldon, the band grounds itself firmly in the early formative years of recorded country music.
Featured in each performance are the hard driving old time fiddle tunes presided over by multi-award-winning fiddler, Betse Ellis. Her infectious fiddling is often the cause of spontaneous dancing by both the audience and the band!
The Wilders' playlist is peppered with original country, bluegrass and hillbilly songs, and includes many of the classic country favorites heard in the early days of the Grand Ol' Opry radio show.
The finishing touch for the band's sound is produced by the slippery dobro, chugging clawhammer banjo and plunky mandolin of jack-of-all-trades, Phil Wade. While Sheldon and Ellis handle the bulk of the vocal chores, the whole group can sometimes be heard harmonizing on a beautiful old gospel tune.
Like Hank Williams and Lefty Frizzell, each tune has all the swinging electricity found in the originals without plugging in a single instrument.
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