POP MUSIC : Country Cashes In : Randy, Reba, Dolly and Ricky light up the Strip’s marquees as once-wary Las Vegas warms up to country music

“I used to play clubs that could have fit inside this room . . . bar, stage and all,” says country star Randy Travis, smiling as he gazes across the living room of his spacious Ben-Hur suite at Bally’s.

“I remember a place called the Fuzzy Duck that could probably fit over in that corner. It was so small we had to walk through the audience to get to the stage.”

The North Carolina native played the Fuzzy Duck so long ago that he can’t even remember what state it was in, but Travis, 33, does recall years ago when the odds of most country artists headlining the top Las Vegas showrooms were as remote as hitting the payoff on a million-dollar slot machine.

The concern among hotel executives for years: Country music, with its blue-collar image, wouldn’t attract the high rollers needed to keep the casino bosses smiling. Besides, one biting joke went in the late ‘70s, hotel cleaning bills would go up because of all the cow manure that would rub off country fans’ boots.

No one is joking about country now.

Like Travis, who has sold an estimated 16 million records since the days in the mid-’80s when he washed dishes between sets in a Nashville club, country music has come a long way.

From Travis’ suite you could see the Las Vegas Strip below--and so many country names on the marquees that Las Vegas looked like the West’s equivalent of Branson, the Missouri town that has become a showroom mecca for country:

* Reba McEntire headlining across the street at Caesars Palace

* Dolly Parton at the Mirage

* Brooks & Dunn at the Sahara

* Ricky Van Shelton and Lorrie Morgan at the Las Vegas Hilton

* And Travis himself at Bally’s.

In addition, the Charlie Daniels Band was headlining downtown at the Golden Nugget. Among the other artists who have played top Vegas showrooms this month: Willie Nelson, Wynonna Judd, Merle Haggard, Conway Twitty and Tanya Tucker. Billy Ray Cyrus headlines Bally’s Tuesday through Saturday.

Country’s showroom hold here these days is so strong, in fact, that the Desert Inn billboard promoting a Frank Sinatra and Don Rickles engagement looks like a quaint museum piece--a reflection of another Vegas age.

The reason for the country concentration this month is the city’s hosting of the National Finals Rodeo. The World Series of professional rodeo, the 10-day competition draws an estimated 30,000 rodeo--and mostly country music--fans to town.

But the outlook here is for more country artists on a year-round basis.

“As Las Vegas evolved over the years into more of a mass, family marketing destination, the notion of ‘high roller’ changed,” said Thomas Willer, vice president of marketing at the Las Vegas Hilton.

“The focus (in the showroom) is now simply on what is popular, what is fun, what is exciting--and if you touch the right bases on those hot buttons, you’ll bring in your fair share of what is called high rollers. Right now, country is touching those buttons and I think we’ll see more country artists appearing here.”

Joel Fischman, vice president of entertainment at Bally’s, agrees. “We feel country is a significant and integral part of our overall musical (package) . . . and that it will continue to grow as a (showroom force) in Las Vegas.”

Lorrie Morgan, daughter of late country star George Morgan and one of the few female country singers ever to have a million-selling album, couldn’t be happier about the growing acceptance here.

“As soon as we got here last night, we drove down the Strip and saw all the names on the marquees . . . Randy, Reba, Dolly, Ricky and me. It was such a thrill,” says Morgan, 32.

“For years, country music in Vegas was kinda like country music in New York. It seemed like something that was off-limits, but now they are starting to listen to a lot of country music in New York and you can see what is happening now in Vegas. It’s just one more step for all of us.”

I f you build it, he will come.

Herb McDonald, executive director of the nonprofit Las Vegas Events organization, shakes his head knowingly at the mention of that famous line from “Field of Dreams,” the 1989 movie about baseball and believing in your dreams.

“Sure, I identified with that when I saw the movie,” he says. Only McDonald’s vision involved the rodeo, not baseball.

McDonald’s job is to lure special events to Las Vegas to help pump up the local economy--and he set his sights a decade ago on the National Rodeo Finals, which had been held for 20 years in Oklahoma City.

McDonald courted rodeo officials for three years with boasts about bigger rodeo prize money, cheaper hotel rooms, better climate and more exciting night life than Oklahoma City could provide--and his dream came true on Dec. 7, 1985. That’s when the NRF moved to the 17,170-seat Thomas and Mack Center, the home of UNLV’s Runnin’ Rebels basketball team.

More a Nat King Cole fan than a Garth Brooks or Randy Travis fan, the Las Vegas Events executive knew that the rodeo finals could have a big impact on the showrooms if they opened themselves to country music.

Country acts had played hotels on the Vegas Strip for years, but it was generally artists who had established enough mainstream visibility or “heat” to attract a crossover pop-country crowd. The list included Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash, Kenny Rogers, Dolly Parton, George Strait, Clint Black, the Oak Ridge Boys and Eddie Rabbitt.

But their success didn’t erase the country stigma in Las Vegas. For most country artists, the showrooms remained off-limits in 1985.

Even though December was generally a slow month for Vegas showrooms in the mid-’80s, executives were slow to claim their share of the estimated $25 million that the rodeo crowd contributes annually to the local economy, McDonald says.

“Only one showroom took a chance on a country act during the rodeo week that first year, but they did phenomenal business and soon all the copycats started booking country in December,” he says, sitting in his temporary office in a mobile trailer outside the Thomas and Mack Center.

“Now there are so many country acts around town, you might say Nashville moves here for a week,” he adds, a smile of satisfaction on his face.

But Jim Halsey, one of country music’s most successful agents in the ‘70s and ‘80s, feels showrooms are still too conservative in their country booking.

“Vegas is just scratching the surface when it comes to country,” says Halsey, who booked dozens of country acts--from Roy Clark and Merle Haggard to the Oak Ridge Boys--in Vegas before selling his agency to William Morris in 1990. “All they need to do is look at Branson to see the potential. This could be the West Coast center for country.”

H.C. Rowe, director of entertainment operations for the downtown Golden Nugget Hotel, confirms Las Vegas showrooms were slow to pick up on a country music boom that has been powered in recent years by the rise of Garth Brooks and a whole flock of young stars.

“I remember talking to different agents in Nashville who were trying get their new country acts--acts who were selling out arenas across the country--and there just wasn’t any interest here until a couple of years ago,” says Rowe, who has aggressively pursued country acts.

One of those frustrated agents was Kevin Neal, who works with the Buddy Lee Agency, whose roster includes Garth Brooks, Willie Nelson and Ricky Van Shelton.

“The problem isn’t just educating entertainment directors about the impact of country music, but educating their bosses, and that’s been a slow process,” says Neal.

“One of the things that has helped us get our message across was all the newspaper and magazine articles about how hot country was. The executives read a story in Forbes about, say, Garth Brooks and realize now that it might make sense to book him.”

Neal emphasizes the “now” because Vegas overlooked Brooks the first time around.

The Buddy Lee Agency booked Brooks into the Desert Inn in January, 1991, just when the singer was about to begin an unprecedented sales spurt that made him the commercial toast of country and pop.

The engagement was a smash, recalls Gary Moss, director of programming at KWNR, one of Las Vegas’ three country radio stations.

“We had just changed our format from adult contemporary to country and I knew we made the right decision the night I saw Garth at the Desert Inn,” he says in his office, a few blocks from the Thomas and Mack Center.

“The audience went crazy . . . and you had a lot of young people there, which you didn’t see at one time in country. Some of these fans were no more than 13 or 14, but they were mesmerized. They knew the words to every song. I could tell right then country could be a big hit in the showrooms here.”

Moss was right about his format. The station, which had been No. 18 in the FM ratings with the old format, went to No. 2 within 18 months--and No. 1 in the 25-54 demographics. KWNR, with its slogan New Country, is still No. 2 in Las Vegas radio ratings behind KFMS (also country).

But that Desert Inn engagement didn’t connect as solidly with showroom executives, Buddy Lee agent Neal recalls.

“After that week, we tried to get Garth booked back in Vegas during rodeo week and I was amazed because no one jumped on him--no one made what we felt was a reasonable offer.”

Almost 30 million sales later for Brooks, the hotels would love to book him, but he hasn’t returned to Vegas since that 1991 appearance.

One reason for his absence: He’s making so much money playing arena shows--as much as $200,000 a night--that it doesn’t make sense financially for him to play a Las Vegas showroom, where the top headliners are generally paid between $30,000 and $60,000 a night, sources say.

The Lee Agency did score big this month, however, with the Ricky Van Shelton-Lorrie Morgan package, which did sold-out business for four nights.

The engagement was important because neither Van Shelton nor Morgan, despite six million-selling albums between them, has achieved near the mainstream pop exposure of a Brooks, Clint Black or Dolly Parton--which is one reason it took them so long to get a headline showroom booking.

Their success, however, should guarantee them a return appearance long before next rodeo season, believes Sol Saffian, who also works for the Buddy Lee Agency.

“The reality is country music is now the true pop music of America,” Saffian says. “It’s something everyone can listen to. People who don’t want to listen to rap or heavy-metal . . . and the black music of the Motown era no longer really exists, except for three or four artists.

“Forgetting Vegas for a moment, the grosses for country shows have been huge everywhere. Garth Brooks went on sale in L.A. the other day--for two shows at the Forum and it sold out in 30 minutes. You understand what I’m saying?”

One reason country is so attractive now to hotel showrooms is demographics--the same wide age spread that KWNR’s Gary Moss saw reflected in the audience at the Garth Brooks show in 1991.

Country used to be chiefly a 35-and-up sound, but--thanks to artists such as Brooks and Alan Jackson--the fastest-growing market for the music is now 18- to 34-year-olds.

That’s good news for Las Vegas because showrooms are eager for contemporary acts to attract the younger customers now being drawn to the city. According to the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, 31% of all Vegas visitors are under 40 and 14% under 30.

While contemporary pop or rock acts could also appeal to those demographics, pop and rock acts have traditionally shied away from Vegas showrooms. The Las Vegas Hilton’s Thomas Willer believes many of those acts cling to the anti-Vegas attitudes of the ‘60s when playing Vegas was considered over the hill or unhip.

“There are pop and rock acts--including some whose days as a top record seller have passed--who could make millions of dollars here,” says Willer. “I tell them this is a great place to play . . . you stay in a suite, go down to the showroom in an elevator, have a wonderful dressing room, do your show in an intimate showroom with the best sound systems in the world and then you go back to your room in an elevator. But they just say, ‘Vegas isn’t for me.’ “Country acts, however, can reach some of the same audience and they will come. It’s a great new talent pool . . . and that’s one reason you are going to see more of them here.”

At Bally’s, a couple in their late 30s race through the lobby. They’ve just come from the rodeo and they’re on their way to catch Randy Travis’ 10:30 p.m. show in the Celebrity Room--not at all fazed by the $40-plus price tag on the tickets.

“We’ve gone to a different show every night we’ve been in town,” says Wilma Tyler, a Dallas store clerk. “Where else could you get this close to the stars? Most arenas, you’d be stuck in back and have to look at the stage with binoculars. Here, you can almost reach up and touch them.”

Earlier, in his suite, Travis worried that all this push on country music in Las Vegas may lead to oversaturation.

“There is so much interest in country music that we could reach a burn-out,” he says. “When we started working the summer (amphitheaters) up north a few years ago, the schedule included all kinds of things: rock acts, some Vegas-type acts as well as country acts.

“But all at once, people perceived country to be hot and now you see those places loaded with country shows and there is only so many entertainment dollars. The same thing could happen here, too, if they try to shove country down people’s throats.”

Still, Travis is pleased by the music’s wider acceptance--a situation he helped build with hits such as “On the Other Hand” and “Forever and Ever, Amen” that restored artistic integrity and tradition to the music.

“To tell you the truth, Vegas wasn’t something I even thought about when I was getting started,” says Travis, who plays here two or three times a year. “Playing Opry meant a lot more to me. That was my real dream. I have a lot of respect for people like Frank Sinatra, but it wasn’t what I grew up loving.”

Pausing as he looks through the window at the Strip below, he adds, “But it does make you feel good to see how the music has passed a lot of boundaries that most people thought it would never, ever pass.”

Across the Strip at the Hilton, Ricky Van Shelton, a 40-year-old Virginia native, echoed his remarks.

“Vegas was a different world for me, too,” he says, sitting in the dressing room once occupied by his biggest musical hero, Elvis Presley.

“When I opened for Reba at Caesars once, I thought the audience was going to be real tame . . . just sitting back and listening, but they were great . . . whooping and hollering. In some ways, once you walk on that stage, though, this could be Madison, Wis. They are country music fans and they want to have a good time. The same with me.”