Singer and musician Roger Blevins Jr. toured the country and world with his band, Mingo Fishtrap, for three decades – until he received a life-changing tongue cancer diagnosis in 2022.

His wife, Valerie Blevins, said they both cried after receiving the news, "then we stopped crying and got down to business."

Surgeons removed most of Blevins' tongue and used tissue from his thigh to reconstruct a flap, allowing him to eat and speak again.

"So most of my tongue … is white. That's all part of my leg. I don't have control of that," Blevins explained.

He had to learn to speak again and said he locked himself in the bathroom and recorded practicing sounds and phrases.

"It's really hard to physically speak differently than you have for five decades," Blevins said. "Singing has been the cente

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