Natives of Warren County, Derek McKown and wife Pamela Tidrick have developed Yankee Bush Productions, a company that provides musical entertainment through tribute band shows. The two are pictured here in one of McKown’s former workplaces.

Derek McKown was born in 1958, and raised in Warren, graduating in the Class of 1976.

Receiving his bachelor’s in history from Clarion, with graduate work in museum studies, from the State University at Buffalo.

“All I ever wanted to do was work in museums. When I started in museums over 40 years ago there were only a couple of colleges that offered anything close to museum studies. Now there are over 100 in this country,” McKown said.

As a student, McKown worked in the Reference Department of several libraries, from Clarion to Buffalo. McKown said that his very first job out of college in 1980, was as curator at the Warren County Historical Society. He found himself working in museums for 25 years which included the director of the Warren County Historical Society, where he now volunteers.

McKown had put together as a consultant in 1983, a collection of documents for the trade name litigation Blair ensued back then. Currently as a volunteer, McKown said that some 40 plus years later, he will be processing that into a collection at the Historical Society as his first project.

Additionally, he taught Pennsylvania local history classes for Hi-Ed and was also an adjunct professor at Jamestown Community College and St. Bonaventure. He also spent 15 years as a liquor store clerk in Warren.

While McKown was still away at school, his future wife, Pamela Tidrick, was a volunteer during the Struthers Library Theatre’s ongoing renovations in 1983. They met that September and they’ve been together every day since. “It was restored after 1983, and because we were so active in the theater, not Yankee Bush yet, we got married in 1987, by Mayor (at the time) Susan McConnell, in the original library of the Struthers Library Theatre,” shared McKown.

The reception was also held there. The two have been married for 39 years.

The name of their production company, Yankee Bush Productions, comes from the name of the road on which his wife grew up and where they now reside, Yankee Bush Road. McKown shared some history saying it’s very meaningful to them. Tidrick’s fourth great grandfathers’ last names were Wilcox and Spencer who emigrated from Vermont and settled in the area and started a maple sugar bush which was how the area became known as Yankee Bush. The couple currently reside in the Spencer house and her mother was a Wilcox.

“So she’s (Tidrick) directly related to the two men who settled Yankee Bush. Since Pam is the Yankee from Yankee Bush, we decided to name the business after our home address of Yankee Bush,” McKown said.

Yankee Bush Productions got started because the theatre had so many dark nights, so in 1995, they decided to produce an irish music and dance show. In its beginnings, Yankee Bush Productions was primarily Irish music due to attending festivals between Pittsburgh and Buffalo and everywhere in between.

“We would go to festivals with Irish music and dance with our parents. So, when we started, the first three years were nothing but Irish music,” said McKown.

As they grew, they tried several other genres of music, from celtic rock to bluegrass to blues and more. They used to produce 10 shows a year, five at the Struthers Library Theatre and five at the Reg Lenna Center for the Arts in Jamestown. Eventually they scaled back to four shows at the Struthers Library Theatre only.

The first time that McKown sold advertising was with Diamond Rio as the first big show. They tried bringing in some “big” shows like Diamond Rio; Koko Taylor, Ray Romano and several more. They started with Diamond Rio because there was a connection from Sugar Grove, with Gene Johnson, the mandolin player.

“Diamond Rio won the CMA Vocal Group of the year four times in the 1990s. In 1995, they performed two shows at the Library Theatre for us. We got the family hometown price of $40,000 and we made a few thousand dollars.”

McKown shared that the smaller budget works better for them and they found their niche with tribute bands. Bringing in bands from the 1980s, but mostly 1960s, 1970s, upcoming shows for this year include tribute bands for John Denver, (Ted Vigil) Aerosmith, (Draw the Line) and Led Zeppelin (Lez Zeppelin).

Until 25 years ago, there were no tribute shows in the Western New York and Western Pennsylvania region. Yankee Bush Productions puts on two shows in the spring and two in the fall. They have been told by booking agents over the years that they have helped grow the industry. McKown credits his wife for Yankee Bush Productions still being here after all these years.

“The only reason it’s grown is because of Pamela,” McKown said.

Tidrick’s degree in secondary high school English gave her the background for doing much of the work for the company including editing, marketing and being in the box office at every show, while McKown sells advertising on their website and in their programs for revenue. They created a unique business plan early on; they found that the ticket sales paid for the shows, but their revenue had to come from another source, so they began an advertising program. First it was a printed directory, but now it’s a website where people can find businesses for things or services they need.

“We couldn’t do it without them because we only make enough money on tickets to pay for the concerts. We break even, so our revenue is advertising. Advertisers can buy in any time of the year,” said McKown.

The five-year anniversary for the company was in 2001, however due to 9/11, the show was canceled. Despite things like that and COVID, the company has thrived. During COVID the bands Yankee Bush brought in did two shows on the date scheduled, with 250 attendees, all 6 feet apart, and sold out.

“We would normally have 500 in one show anyway. Pamela was the reason that we continued unbroken through COVID and at the library theatre. She configured the seating, so we could do the shows. We were the only ones who had the lights on because of the COVID restrictions.”

One of the top Eagles tribute bands in the country known as 7 Bridges, has come to Warren nearly 14 out of the last 20 years including the year of their COVID shows, and is scheduled to return in the spring of 2027.

“They’ve been our base band from the very beginning, and year after year, I sell the 400 tickets that I need to sell, and then there’s 800 or more people in the theatre.”

Tribute shows have become what is exclusively booked and since 1996, Yankee Bush Productions has brought an abundance of talent to the stages of Warren and Jamestown and they plan to do so for many years to come.

The next show will be June 12 with Ted Vigil, a tribute to the one and only, John Denver.

Aside from the business of booking tribute bands, McKown’s hobbies include cooking, fishing, traveling and watching the Yankees. A proud lifetime resident of Warren, McKown said, “I don’t know who said this first, but I agree that Warren is a great place to be and a great place to be from.”