ProRodeo Sports News - Nov. 22, 2019

Music director is a mainstay at Wrangler NFR IN HIS WORDS BENJE BENDELE

R ight now (Nov. 13), we’re in Las Vegas doing rehearsals with the announcers to get ready for the NFR. I go home tomorrow, and I’ll be back in the studio until Thanksgiving before we have to leave for the NFR. All year long, everybody has heard what I’ve done. When I get to the NFR, I want new, fresh stuff to introduce to people.

I learned a lot fromMr. Barnes and his family, as well. But it got to where the phone wasn’t ringing to announce, it was ringing to provide a sound system. I had bought a sound system as an announcer. They (rodeos) were calling me because they wanted the sound system; they already had an announcer. I was like, well, if it’s going to pay the bills then that’s what I’m going to I remember those early years (1990-91). There were already guys playing music. When I went in there and did it, I threw in sound effects, played “Another One Bites the Dust” when a guy was thrown off, played dance beats when a cowboy was getting ready. My goal is to have everybody tapping their toes, clapping their hands or tapping their arm on the armrest of their seat to keep that blood flowing. As I’m getting older and the numbers (of selections to the Finals) are climbing, it’s a better honor each year. I was more excited this year to get it than I was the first year. When I started doing this there wasn’t anybody else doing it. There’s more of a challenge to do better, to be better, to stay on top of my game with updated music, what’s current but keep in touch with what yesteryear had to offer. I still use some of the old tunes to appease the older generation. But as we move into the future we have to think about younger fans and what appeals to the younger- type music genre that’s going on right now. do. I made a career choice to start playing music.

Benje Bendele was selected to make his 19th consecutive appearance as the music director at the Wrangler National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas, Dec. 5-14. Before Bendele’s first time in 2001, the NFR had a band providing music. The 52-year-old from Dublin, Texas, provides not only music but plenty of sound effects, too. A former member of the PRCA Board of Directors, Bendele has been involved with rodeo in some capacity for more than three decades, attempting to be a contestant, moving on to being an announcer, providing sound systems and eventually becoming a music director. Like any talented professional, Bendele has changed with the times, evolving with the music, technology and whatever it takes to keep the fans coming back to the rodeo.

What scared me to death at the beginning of changing technologically was going digital. I bought my first digital console, and it sat in the box for a year before I took it out. I didn’t want to bust it out at a rodeo and I didn’t have time to set it up at home because I wasn’t home. I was finally able to pull it out and start playing with it and get in tune with the digital world of mixing consoles. Once I got into it and got it going, I kicked myself in the rear that I didn’t open the box as soon as I got it. It was one of those funny moments where I was like, ‘Gosh, this ain’t so bad.’ I started out as a rodeo announcer. I joined the PRCA and went to work for Bob Barnes and Barnes Rodeo. Back then there weren’t a bunch of music directors, there were just bands or a few people playing music. I was also working for Bad Company Rodeo and Mack Altizer. I got my training in music fromMack. I owe him a great debt of gratitude for all the things he taught me. With his ideas and my ideas, I evolved into what we’re doing today.

MGMRESORTS.COM/NFR

ProRodeo Sports News 11/22/2019

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