Eleven Hundred Springs is a classical country band whose style of songs has been recognized as showing the true soul of country music. For the past three decades, this group has perfected their craft and have become known as a group whose, “tradition and spirit that make up true Americana is easy to see. It’s all about honesty and lack of pretense” as the bio on their band website describes them.

Banded together in November of 1998, founding members Matt Hillyer and Steven Berg decided to form the band after their original plans didn’t pan out.

“Our baseball and pro rodeo career prospects were not very bright,” bass player and founding member Steven Berg said. “Forming (the) band is easy; anyone can do it. The steps that come after forming are the ones that are difficult.”

This line of difficulty originates from the group’s origins, as many critics felt their style of song was a mimic of artist such as Merle Haggard, George Jones and Hank Williams. Despite this response, the group continued to perform their music and found themselves with a committed group of fans.

The group’s most recent album, “The Finer Things In Life”, features a short set of original music dating back to the 1990’s.

“Our audience has had more time to digest and appreciate our older work.” Berg said. “With that said, there are always at least a couple of new songs on each album that resonate with our audience and end up staying on the set lists.”

Berg mentions that being able to perform songs such as “Arcadia Thruway”, a collective favorite of the group makes the challenges they face worth it.

“Scheduling studio time and other time sensitive logistics,” Berg said is the biggest challenge of making albums.

Berg and the group are not surprised about meeting fans who have never heard of them before and love talking to them.

“In terms of talking to fans of the loosely defined musical genres that we mesh with, who might possibly be interested in the band, I might connect the dots to something they feel comfortable with and just throw it out there,” Berg said. “For other musicians, especially ones who know us, but don’t really know our music, I might try to find some common ground.”

With the possibility of meeting fans, new and old, Berg and the group will be looking forward to performing at the Larry Joe Taylor’s Texas Music Festival.

“The LJT fest is always a blast, for all the obvious reasons,” said Berg. “Getting the opportunity to perform for such an enthusiastic audience, at an event that is so well run, in an atmosphere where so many of our friends are there, always makes for a great time.”

Catch Eleven Hundred Springs in action at Larry Joe Taylor’s Texas Music Festival on Saturday April 27 on the Hydro Pros Stage in the T-Birds Garage Pub.