SEQUIM — It’s a kind of flashback, only better.
Pat Roberts spent a decade as a touring musician, traveling with the likes of Merle Haggard, Charley Pride and Johnny Cash.
But in 1981, he switched gears and became a concert promoter, working shows all over the United States and Canada.
A friend from the past called Roberts one day about two years ago. They went to lunch — and three other guys Roberts knew showed up, too.
These were his bandmates from way back when. Their question: How about a reunion show?
Roberts hesitated. “They had more guts than I did,” he said in an interview last week.
But he worked up guts of his own. I’ll do a concert on two conditions, he told his companions: If we can have a really big band and if we play good, old-fashioned country, rock and folk music.
Roberts, 66, got both wishes. He’s the singer in a band featuring those four guys plus other friends and relatives: an ensemble called, naturally, Family of Friends. They’ve been giving concerts, many of them fundraisers for Puget Sound area nonprofits, for 18 months now.
A 16-piece version of Family of Friends will come over to Sequim for a single show at Olympic Theatre Arts, 414 N. Sequim Ave., at 2 p.m. Saturday. Tickets are $15 and proceeds will benefit OTA, while reservations can be made via 360-683-7326 or www.OlympicTheatreArts.org.
The lineup: Roberts and his brother Robbie, his cousins Jerry, Joey and Matt; his daughter Jerri and an assortment of friends and former bandmates including Bill Wolfe, Melanie Leigh, Gary Edward, Aaron Linburg, Kathi Jenness, Dave Darragh, Mike Byrd and Jesse McLean. Also appearing is Bill Walters, a musician Pat Roberts has known since high school in Seattle’s Rainier Beach.
While most of the band members live in the Puget Sound metropolitan area, several have Peninsula ties. Wolfe is pastor at the New Life Church in Port Townsend; Jerry, Joey and Matt Roberts graduated from Port Angeles High School.
A Family of Friends set offers country and western plus folk, rock and gospel songs given a country treatment.
That means a Johnny Cash medley; Haggard’s “Mama Tried;” Roy Orbison’s “Oh, Pretty Woman” and the folk song “Jamaica Farewell.” The players also like to bring in some Everly Brothers and a yodeling song such as “I Want to Be a Cowboy’s Sweetheart.”
For Saturday’s show, Roberts is adding one more musician from Port Townsend: fiddler Jon Parry.
“He’s just an incredible player,” Roberts said.
He’s as impressed with Jenness, who is Walters’ daughter. She was brought on board as a backup singer — but Roberts soon learned she’s a trained cellist.
Along with his own daughter Jerri Roberts, Jenness brings Family of Friends’ median age way down. The men are in the 60s neighborhood while the daughters are in their 20s.
There’s one song featuring Jenness’ cello, added Pat Roberts, that is perfect for this band: Roy Clark’s “Yesterday When I Was Young.”
