THE BAR-STOOL SCHOOL : Jerry Jeff Walker and Chris Wall Are Fixin’ to Sing You Some Stories. So Set on Down.

If you were to go looking for the precise opposite of Michael Jackson’s bread (lots and lots of bread) and circuses approach to entertainment, you might wind up in a homey bar somewhere, listening to a couple of low-budget, dazzle-free guys like Jerry Jeff Walker and Chris Wall.

Walker, the old hand, and Wall, his protege (though not exactly a young one), are a couple of folksy country music troubadours. Both have voices with the texture of burlap and the flavor of sour mash whiskey with a cigarette chaser. Both belong to the bar-stool school of singers. Sit down next to them and they’ll tell you a story. Afterward you might feel inclined to kick some sawdust off your shoes, but you wouldn’t feel the slightest need to wipe stardust out of your eyes.

Walker, 49, is best known for telling the tale of that drunk-tank dancer “Mr. Bojangles.” He drew the song from life, recounting the time during his wandering wastrel youth when he landed in a New Orleans jail and met the old soft-shoe dancer who became the song’s poignant protagonist.

Through the ‘70s, Walker earned a reputation as a hard-drinking carouser: When he sang “I love sangria wine,” you could believe it. But the past 10 years or so have seen a settled-in Walker whose extracurricular passions are golf and family life. His latest release, “Navajo Rug,” is a snapshot of a happy man accepting life with equanimity and counting his blessings.

Walker also has emerged as a pretty sharp talent scout. A few year ago he helped usher the promising singer-songwriter Hal Ketchum onto the scene. Ketchum since has gravitated to Nashville (a precinct that the Austin-based Walker has studiously avoided), but Walker has come up with another fine talent to foster in Chris Wall.

Wall, 41, spent the first 30 years of his life in Orange County, where he tended bar, taught school and coached high school football, among other pursuits. Singing and writing songs weren’t among them.

Wall, a late bloomer as a musician, didn’t take up the guitar until six years ago. He was tending bar and singing occasionally with the band when Walker came across him in a Wyoming honky-tonk in 1987. Walker eventually summoned Wall to Austin and signed him to his custom label, Tried & True Music (records by Walker and Wall now are distributed nationally by the Rykodisc label).

Wall’s 1990 debut album, “Honky Tonk Heart,” deals with familiar country subjects, but it displays a knack for putting them in a fresh light with wry lyrics--all told in a deep-grained storyteller’s voice. His new release, “No Sweat,” is even better. It has such gems as “Rodeo Cowboy,” a humorous but respectful account of the bronco-buster’s life, and “I’ll Take the Whiskey (You Take the Wheel),” a fine expression of the hard but ultimately satisfying road traveled by a musician dedicated to slugging out a living on the grass-roots bar and county-fair circuit.

Michael wouldn’t understand, but you can bet that Jerry Jeff sure does.

Who: Jerry Jeff Walker and Chris Wall.

When: Friday, Nov. 22 at 9 p.m.

Where: The Coach House, 33157 Camino Capistrano, San Juan Capistrano.

Whereabouts: San Diego Freeway to the San Juan Creek Road exit. Left onto Camino Capistrano. The Coach House is in the Esplanade Plaza.

Wherewithal: $18.50.

Where to call: (714) 496-8930.