Chances are when you read this story, The Oak Ridge Boys will be playing their music at The Mansion Theatre in Branson, on a bus to who knows where, or spending a few days at home in Nashville.

Life for one of the most successful country bands of all time – members of the country music and gospel music halls of fame – has been and will be for the foreseeable future spent playing gigs, riding on the tour bus or kicking back a couple days a week at home.

A normal week for the boys is spent playing two or three days in small venues on their way to a big venue, then playing their way back to their bus parking lot in Nashville. Aside from a Christmas break, that goes on all year long.

One of those stops for the band that made Elvira famous comes up Saturday in Steelville, where they play the Meramec Music Theatre in a cozy little place that feels a lot like home.

“We’ve been to Steelville many times and gave our Christmas show there before,” says Duane Allen, lead singer. “We have played in Steelville since our gospel days. It’s a pleasure to work there, and the people are always excited to see us. It’s an exciting show because the people get into our songs. Some of them sing every song we do.”

The Oak Ridge Boys have been singing together for 44 years, singing for the first time in concert in 1973. Allen, William Lee Golden, Richard Sterban and Joe Bonsall have been bringing down the house ever since, with hits like Ya’ll Come Back Saloon, Elvira, Thank God for Kids, American Made and Dream On. They have 12 gold, three platinum and one double platinum album, more than a dozen No. 1 singles and 30 Top 10 hits.

So why are the legendary Oak Ridge Boys playing in Steelville, Missouri these days? At ages ranging from 69 to 78 with a mega career behind them, why are they playing at all?

“We don’t even practice anymore,” says Allen, who took an hour out of his busy schedule last week to take part in this interview.

Lord willing, the band plays on

The predecessor of The Oak Ridge Boys, the Oak Ridge Quartet, started in 1943, the year Allen was born. Before that the group was named the Georgia Clodhoppers, based in Knoxville, Tennessee. Prior to World War II, the Clodhoppers would go to Oak Ridge, where scientists were making components of the atomic bomb, and the fans there started calling them the Oak Ridge Quartet. After the atomic bomb and the war, the group moved to Nashville and joined the Grand Ole Opry, part of the Friday night all-gospel singings on WSM radio.

Allen and Golden became a part of the Oak Ridge Quartet in the 1960s, then eventually joined with Sterban and Bonsall to form The Oak Ridge Boys. The rest is country music history, and the history seems to have a future.

Allen says a few years ago he tried to come up with a business model that would put The Oak Ridge Boys in retirement, but he “ran up against a brick wall.”

So, on they go.

“I got to Step Two and I couldn’t even get it in focus,” Allen remembers. “I couldn’t even think about it. I finally decided that look, I’m a praying man, and I prayed for divine guidance. I do that for everything we do, before we do it. I asked God to give me divine direction. I don’t ask him to open the door for me, I will go open the door myself. But if He will just show me where that door is, I will open it and go through it and keep going. And so, I finally just decided I can’t think this through myself, I need divine direction. I said God almighty, I trust you to tell me when it’s enough. And until the day you tell me that and show me that in some sign, I’m going to keep working.”

The Oak Ridge Boys perform multiple live shows weekly. Wednesday of last week they were in Minot, North Dakota; Thursday in Regina, Saskatchewan; Friday in Greenough, Montana and Saturday in Sheridan, Wyoming. They are scheduled to be in Branson Wednesday, then Steelville Saturday.

Some of those places will fill hundreds of seats, some thousands. The size of the crowd doesn’t matter to any of The Oak Ridge Boys, Allen said. They have played live before five U.S. presidents and in huge arenas that made them rich men. His favorite concert, though, says a lot about why they are still playing today.

The Oak Ridge Boys used to perform for the Children’s Miracle Network. They did a live, televised show at the Fox Theatre in St. Louis with the Osmonds in the mid ‘80s. Once the show was over, the Oak Ridge Boys went to a children’s hospital to visit.

They were taken in one room where a boy laid in a hospital bed. He was totally paralyzed, except he could blink. The nurses said if he likes what you are doing, he will blink faster. A video crew went into the room, too, and The Oak Ridge Boys sang Elvira.

“When we started singing Elvira, his eyelids opened and closed so fast it was like a super-fast windshield wiper on your car,” said Allen. “We got into the chorus of Elvira and it got to me. The cameras were rolling for television. If you watched closely you’d see I wasn’t in the picture for a time. I ducked out, went outside in the hall and got myself together while Joe was singing the second verse. I wiped the tears from my eyes and got composed so I could get back into the room.

“I just never have been to any concert that took me any higher than that one did. It (a standing ovation) is natural, that young man had no way of moving anything except his eyelids. When he responded to us, I’d never had anyone respond to us like that. And it got to my heart. That was probably the greatest concert I’d been to. Size of the crowd does not matter to me, it’s whether we do our job or not. God gave us a light, and it’s up to us to shine it right.”

Giddy up oom poppa oom poppa mow mow

Elvira has been The Oak Ridge Boys’ biggest hit. It hit the top of the country and pop music charts, selling two and a half million singles. That was 1981, and the song was also named Country Music Association Single of the Year.

In early 1966, before The Oak Ridge Boys, Duane Allen was in the historic, 12-story Noel Hotel in Nashville doing what singers do: looking for songs. Songwriter Dallas Frazier was there and sang a song called Elvira. Flash forward 15 years. Allen got a call from Ron Chancey, who produces The Oak Ridge Boys, and he’d heard a song sung by a group at a Texas lounge that he thought might work for the boys.

“He came over to the house, and he played Elvira for us,” says Allen. “Everybody in the group, their smiles were so big.”

Kenny Rogers sang Elvira with the First Edition. Charlie Rich sang it, too, but it never caught on until The Oak Ridge Boys added the new, now infamous lines:

Giddy up oom poppa oom poppa mow mow

Giddy up oom poppa oom poppa mow mow

When Elvira hit, The Oak Ridge Boys, already a big-name country band, never had to eat at the Hungry House Café again, and most every mom, dad and kid in America could sing Elvira by heart.

“I remembered it from 1966,” Allen said of hearing Elvira a second time. “That’s what a hit is. It has remembrance factor. That’s what makes it a hit. You remember it. I could sing almost all the lyrics after hearing it one time. . . . The first hits paid a lot of bills, but Elvira bought us all a new house. The kids still love it.”

With Elvira came a 1982 Grammy, superstar status and a one-hour HBO television special. The American Music Awards named them Country Group of the Year, the Academy of Country Music named Elvira the Single of the Year, and they gave a performance on the White House lawn.

Life was good, Allen thinks now, maybe a little too good.

“We lived through those times when we made so much money we didn’t know what to do with it,” he says. “Money is the root of all evil. That is really the only time we had any troubles, when we were making too much money. We lived through that. We’re having more fun now than we ever had. . . The old men out there acting like a bunch of young boys.”

Besides a stretch of eight years (1987-95) when Golden left the group and was replaced, The Oak Ridge Boys have been a band of boys who are hard to beat. They used their fame and riches for more than their own pleasure. They have raised money for Feed the Children and a myriad of other non-profits.

“We went through a period of time when we went through our own problems,” Allen said. “I think people need to learn what I call my forgiveness theory. When you have a problem with someone, first of all forgive yourself if you did something to cause it. Ask God to forgive you. Then forgive the person you have the problem with, and then ask God to forgive them, whether they want to be forgiven or not. There is a third step. God gives you freedom from it. God wants your life to be happy and to be filled with joy. If you are a negative person living in a negative world, you are robbing yourself of the joy God wants for you. If you are a negative person you are spending a bunch of energy and wasting it.

“We went through a period of time we had to learn that the hard way, and when we got back all of our original members, we all became bigger men than before. We became bigger than the little bitty nagging problems that are so unimportant in the big picture. . . . I want to think about the things we’ve accomplished together and save all the good energy to help God keep blessing us and our business so we can keep singing as long as we want to.”

The road and their music keep the boys going

On and on and on The Oak Ridge Boys roll.

In September, they announced a new recording project to be released in the first quarter of 2018. The as yet unnamed project will “dig back into their roots of gospel music,” according to their website. Just a week ago theaters across the country featured The Oak Ridge Boys and other country stars in a 90-minute event named “Wednesday Night Prayer Meeting Rejoice.” And then there are all those live concerts and the Christmas Show, which is put together while the band is on the road.

The Oak Ridge Boys are all over You Tube, and you can buy The Oak Ridge Boys Favorite Southern Style Bread ‘n’ Butter Jalapenos on their website.

“I’m one of those believers that believes that God gives us gifts, and it’s up to us to use them for His glory,” says Allen. “It doesn’t have to be gospel music to entertain people and get them away from the troubles of the world.”

Entertain they have, with all those No. 1 singles and all those one-night stands at state fairs, coliseums and music halls. If something slows down The Oak Ridge Boys, it doesn’t look like it will be self-inflicted. They have two customized busses that haul Duane, Joe, William Lee and Richard all across America and Canada. All four ride the same bus with their manager, security and a driver.

They don’t do it for the money or the fame, two things they have in abundance.

“When we leave (Nashville) on a Tuesday night I can sleep all night and then get up, and in the front of the bus my office is set up, and I’ve got a recliner, drinks and a bathroom, satellite TV,” Allen says. “When I sit on the bus it’s just like sitting in my office in Hendersonville (Tennessee). I work all day long. One thing I love is I can open up all the big windows at the front of the bus, and it’s like riding in a bubble, seeing over all the cars and looking at the beauty God created and watching the seasons change. I like to see people react to the bus. It gives me a thrill and the energy to keep going.”