EVERYBODY IS A STAR AT HILLBILLY KEN'S

GORDONVILLE -- Topped off in black George Strait hats, teenagers Josh Rice and Justin Tanner have just sung the last words to Strait's "This is Where the Cowboy Rides Away." Out in the audience, a woman five times their age raises up an appreciative yipping noise.

"We're going to have to take her out and get her dipped," Hillbilly Ken says into his microphone.

Hillbilly Ken, aka Kenny Martin, emcees this Friday- and Saturday-night chili pot of "Hee-Haw" humor and "Star Search" fantasies.

Before the night ends at the family-friendly hour of 10, audience members backed by the guitar-playing Martin and his house band will offer an array of entertainments, including an Elvis imitation, a classic Jimmie Rodgers tune, gospel chestnuts, a contest in which a woman with a toilet lid around her neck will try to catch marshmallows in her mouth, and a low-volume "Johnny B. Goode" sung by a 16-year-old Tammy Wynette from Chaffee.

Hillbilly Ken's is an equal opportunity night club. "We never have a show we don't get everyone up," Martin assures the crowd of about 75.

It was Martin who introduced the area to the phenomenon of alcohol-free, make-your-own entertainment, now flourishing at the Little Ole Opry on Highway 34 northwest of Jackson and at the Country Music Hall in McClure, Ill.

In 1985, he started the Little Ole Opry on Main Street in Jackson. Martin, who is in his 23rd year of working at Shivelbine's music store, originally just wanted to give his guitar students a place to perform.

"It grew so fast," Martin said. "Then I started dabbling in comedy and it really went."

He and his partners at the Little Ole Opry have since parted, and for a while he did his act in the Chuck Wagon Restaurant near the intersection of Highway 25 and Route K outside Gordonville.

In October, Martin opened Hillbilly Ken's in the same building previously occupied by the restaurant.

In addition to alcohol-free, he has made the environment smoke-free. Cigarette smoke is the main complaint customers have had over the years he's been playing, Martin said.

That extends a long way back. In his high school days, Martin played basketball for Cape Girardeau Central High School and guitar for a rock band called the Vikings.

He quit performing for a while when he married Linda Crites, the high school sweetheart he met in 1966. "We both worked for the A&W," he said.

"My wife has been wonderful to put up with me because I'm in public life more than in private," Martin said.

In the meantime, Martin estimates he has taught about 4,000 people to play the guitar. He also custom-built acoustic guitars with the late C.A. Busche, and has written a "no-bull" guitar instruction book that is even sold internationally.

A number of the people who performed quite capably this Friday night were taught to play guitar by Martin.

"Everybody wants to scratch their name in there somewhere," he said. "I wanted to teach enough people to play that the music will go on long after I'm gone."

Once upon a time, Martin went on wild forays into the audience in search of slapstick laughs. More than one unsuspecting lady and gentleman was planted with a slurpy surprise kiss. But the 43-year-old Martin has diabetes, and the disease has forced him to curtail the more physically demanding parts of his performance.

"I have been wanting to retire because of the diabetes," Martin said. "But there have been so many people wanting me to continue that I decided I would do it as long as my health holds up."

One of those people is Pat Probst, who calls herself Martin's "silent partner" and has been a fan of his since the beginning at the Little Ole Opry.

"I don't sing or anything," she says. What she does is oversee the concession stand and the gate, where she asks everyone who comes in, "Do you sing? Do you play an instrument?"

When a Jackson man named Med Baker takes the stage to croon a couple of songs, Probst points out the discoveries self and otherwise that regularly occur in places like Hillbilly Ken's.

"I've known him for years and I never knew he could sing," she said.

Of course, not everyone who takes the stage can sing. But nobody seems to mind.

Martin's house band, which consists of himself, bassist Greg Collier and keyboardist Buzz Murphy, keeps everything under control. And Martin has an electronic gadget called a harmonizer that can add sweet voices to the mix at the push of a button.

Many of those who perform are already regulars who may trill here on Friday night and at the Little Ole Opry on Saturday.

Martin says he loves "seeing the thrill on their faces as they go on stage."

Fifteen-year-old Josh Rice, who returns later in the night to play his banjo, is back for his third appearance. He can sing and wants to be a professional musician. His hero is Jimmie Rodgers, and Hillbilly Ken's is his first taste of real performing.

Ruby and Sloan Tuschhoff, a pair of laughter-loving seniors dressed in matching black satiny outfits, probably have no Grand Old Opry aspirations. But once you've heard them sing "How Much is that Doggie in the Window?", with the distinguished-looking Sloan "arf, arfing" all the way through, you know Hillbilly Ken's is about giving them their chance, too.