POP MUSIC REVIEWS : Stanley Delivers Sans Stars at Coach House

The presence of more than a dozen country stars contributed much to Ralph Stanley’s latest album, “Saturday Night, Sunday Morning.”

But befitting the humble origins of his bluegrass music, the songs, not personalities, were at center stage on Monday when Stanley and the Clinch Mountain Boys played the Coach House, sans all-star support.

So although Ralph and Carter Stanley’s “Wonderful World Outside” went without the achingly soulful reading George Jones gave it in the studio, singer-guitarist Kenneth Davis delivered a forlorn rendition of this prison-cell lament as successful in its own way as the album’s.

At 67, Stanley is still in robust voice, sandpaper-raspy as ever. In fact, he sounded more secure throughout the two-hour show than he sometimes does on “Saturday Night.”

Likewise, his banjo playing sounded as fleet as it did in his recordings from 30 years or more ago. If anything has changed, it is his unusual (for the genre) vocal melisma, which he used to great effect, twisting syllables and subtly shifting vocal timbre two and three times in a single note.

When you can do that, who needs stars?