At a Little Richard concert in England a few decades ago, Robert Plant and Jimmy Page were visiting with Richard backstage. Little Richard introduced the legendary Led Zeppelin duo to his guitarist and band leader, Travis Wammack.

After hearing Wammack’s name, Plant and Page turned to each other and simply said, “’Scratchy’.” They were referring to Wammack’s 1964 single, titled “Scratchy” and known for its adventurous guitar playing. The flipside of the single, released when Wammack was still a teenager, featured another notable guitar cut, “Fire Fly.”

In our 2018 interview, Wammack said while hanging with Page and Plant, “Jimmy told me ‘Scratchy,’ ‘Firefly,’ those are the ones that really inspired him to bear down [on guitar]. He said, ‘I could play ‘Scratchy,’ but I never could play ‘Firefly.’’ What a compliment.”

On June 3, Wammack rightfully will get his due again. A slew of top Muscle Shoals musicians will perform at “A Tribute to Travis Wammack” concert at 7 p.m. at Florence’s Shoals Community Theatre, address 123 N. Seminary St.

Tickets for the show start at $45, via eventbrite.com. All proceeds benefit the Travis Wammack Endowed Scholarship at the University of North Alabama’s Entertainment Industry Program.

The tribute concert’s house band includes singer Mickey Buckins and bassist Bob Wray, two of Wammack’s fellow members of the FAME Gang, the FAME Studios session musicians who followed the iconic Swampers as FAME’s go-to instrumentalists.

The tribute’s house band also boasts the likes of: former Jason Isbell bassist Jimbo Hart; fellow Little Richard guitarist alumnus Kelvin Holly; Shoals Sisters backing vocalists Cindy Walker and Marie Lewey; keyboardist Clayton Ivey, known for his work with artist from Marvin Gaye to Toby Keith. Grammy-winning former SteelDrivers singer/guitarist Gary Nichols, “Nashville Star” winning singer Angela Hacker, Alabama blues icon “Microwave” Dave Gallaher, and Wammack’s son “Monkey” Wammack are among the many other musicians lined up for the show, too. Social media posts promoting the tribute concert have also teased special guests who haven’t been announced.

Born in Mississippi, Travis Wammack got his music career started in Memphis and then relocated to the Shoals, as that North Alabama area’s recording scene was booming. He went on to play on an array of Muscle Shoals hits by artists ranging from Clarence Carter to The Osmonds, Wilson Pickett to Bobbie Gentry to Mac Davis. In addition to touring as Little Richard’s guitarist from 1984 to 1996, Wammack wrote and played guitar on Richard’s slamming 1970 single “Greenwood, Mississippi.”

Now 78, Wammack is battling ankylosing spondylitis, the same spine and joint disease Mötley Crüe guitar legend Mick Mars has dealt with for many years. Wammack can no longer play guitar. Last summer he auctioned off much of his guitar, amp and effect pedal collection.

Outside of music, Wammack’s interests include hunting snakes, including cottonmouths and water moccasins, using a slingshot. During our 2018 chat, he joked about how he first got into snake hunting back in the day. “Everybody else was doing drugs and drinking, and I’m chasing rattlesnakes and women.” Not sure about snakes, but he found the right gal, his longtime wife Mitzi Wammack.

Whenever Travis caught rattlesnakes, he’d use their skin for making items like belts and guitar straps. He’d save the meat for cooking. As Wammack put it, “Everybody wants to eat rattlesnake.”