MTSU Sidelines

Issue date: 11/29/07 Section: Features

Media Credit: TrailerChoir.com (From top right, clockwise) Mark "Butter" Fortney on vocals and guitar, Big Vinny "The Mack" Hickerson, a singer and dancer from Perry County, TN and Crystal Hoyt, a bombshell soul singer from Louisiana "that makes the whole band look better."

Do the words whiskey, duct tape and "bustubious" mean anything to you? Only after catching a performance from the one-of-a-kind band Trailer Choir can you begin to understand the connection.

Trailer Choir is an up-and-coming country band out of Nashville that will play a special homecoming performance at Bluesboro Bar and Grill this Thursday, Nov. 29 at 10:00 p.m.

Trailer Choir is a unique, fun-loving and energetic seven-piece band led by Mark "Butter" Fortney on vocals and guitar, Big Vinny "The Mack" Hickerson, a singer and dancer from Perry County, TN, who's got the "gyrations that shake the foundations," and Crystal Hoyt, a bombshell soul singer from Louisiana "that makes the whole band look better," according to their Web site.

Butter, originally from Ohio, first started playing guitar in high school and began dabbling in songwriting soon after. He came to MTSU because he knew he wanted to pursue a music career.

While at MTSU, Butter says he performed his music everywhere, from Bluesboro to Gentleman Jim's and frat parties, even during Happy Hour at the Holiday Inn.

After graduating from MTSU in 1997 with a major in Mass Communications and an emphasis in the music business, Butter worked at publishing companies and record labels for a few years before starting his own publishing company.

Of his experiences at MTSU, Butter cannot say enough. "MTSU is my life," he says. "Everything that I've become in my life today, MTSU was and is a continuing part of. I learned everything about the business, from copyright law to how to clean the tape machine. I'm very grateful for the education I received and the people I was able to work with there, both student sand teachers."

The members of Trailer Choir met about four years ago through Nashville's Muzik Mafia and everything just seemed to fall into place.

"The songs I was writing and performing just started catching on once I began working with Vinny and Crystal," says Butter. "Writing songs and being an entertainer was steering me down this path."

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