Presenting: Whitetop Mountain Band and Reel World String Band

The Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center will present the Roots of Appalachian Music: String Bands on Friday, May 9th at 7pm in Clintwood's Jettie Baker Center. Special guests for this event include the Reel World String Band and Whitetop Mountain Band. Reserve your tickets early for this rare opportunity to explore mountain music with some of the region's best performers!

The Reel World String Band is celebrating its 30th year of performing, and the fiddling and singing of the band has never been better. Their new CD, Live Music, has just been released. Originals of the band fill this CD with new found spirit. Bev Futrell's song about Bill Monroe and the environment “Where Kentucky's Blue Moon Rose” is a defining moment for this band so committed to the region, its music, and its
beauty. The creative edge of this new CD shows off a stylistic diversity. Keyboardist Elise Melrood's instrumental “Karsen's Reel” is highly arranged and ethereal. Sue Massek writes of Mother Jones' daughters in the union song “Cosby,” and Karen Jones swings with her playful lyrics in “Gone Camping”.

Not only has the band been in the studio for this latest release, but Reel World continues to perform throughout the region, collaborating with writers, activists, and other singer songwriters. The band is revered as a Kentucky historical treasure having been featured in Kentucky Women: Two Centuries of Indomitable Spirit and Vision, along with musicians Loretta Lynn and Helen Humes and numerous other Kentucky celebrities, giving credence to the band's longevity and contribution to the rich musical heritage of Kentucky. Since the beginning of the Reel World, the band has spread its southern musical roots to picket lines and folk festivals. In 1978, the band was booked at Englishtown Music Hall in New Jersey, and the New York Times, fascinated by the novelty of this "all-female group" from Kentucky, featured the band in an article "In Jersey, Five Women of Bluegrass". By 1980, the band was back in the NYC area playing at the Lincoln Center. They returned in 1985 to share the stage with David Bromberg after both had appeared at the Philadelphia Folk Festival.

The individual members are as diverse as the musical styles they encompass. Sue Massek learned banjo from old timers in West Virginia and Kentucky after she hitchhiked from the Flint Hills of her native Kansas. The Sears guitar of Bev Futrell hung on the wall after her graduation from a Houston High School, but by 1977, while raising a family, she tuned it up and has been singing her songs ever since. Karen Jones, a Midwest Norwegian, adopted her southern home while attending Berea College, Berea, Kentucky. She was a country dancer and began her own dance troupe in Covington, Kentucky while studying fiddle with Guy Blakeman. Sharon Ruble, college buddy of Karen, studied clarinet as a youngster growing up in Henry County, Kentucky, and in the Reel World moved from wash-tub to acoustic bass. Elise Melrood, the latest member of the Reel World, mixes her Jewish roots with honky-tonk blues piano. She met the other members of the Reel World during a tour in Virginia and now plays full-time with the band since her move to Berea. With the energy of an old-time dance, the tight vocal harmony of Bluegrass singing, the infusion of American jazz and blues styles and lyrics that reflect the politics of a changing South, Reel World is an undeniable force in the folk music scene. All in all, Reel World String Band is the essence of Appalachian grit.

The Whitetop Mountain Band is a family-based band from the highest mountains of Virginia. Whitetop, Virginia is an area rich in the old time music tradition, and this band has deep roots in mountain music. The members have done much to preserve the Whitetop region's style of old time fiddling and banjo picking and are legendary musicians and teachers of the style.

At the same time, Whitetop Mountain Band shows are very versatile and entertaining containing everything from fiddle/banjo instrumentals to powerful solos and harmony vocals on blues, classic country, honky tonk, traditional bluegrass numbers, old timey ballads, originals, and four part mountain gospel songs. Shows also include flat foot dancing. The band is well known for their high energy and charisma on stage.

Whitetop Mountain Band has performed at many venues throughout the United States from festivals to concerts, competitions, and colleges. The Smithsonian Folklife Festival, National Folklife Festival, World Music Institute in NYC, Carter Family Festival, Dock Boggs Festival, World Fair, Virginia Arts Festival, Floydfest, Ola Belle Reed Festival and Merlefest are a few of the many festivals where the band has performed. They recently were featured on the NCTA Crooked Road Music tour of California, Nevada, Oregon, and Idaho, and in September 2007, members toured the United Kingdom and Ireland playing the Cornish Bluegrass Festival and Open House Festival in addition to venues throughout England, Wales, and Ireland. In January 2008, members of the band played at the Illawarra Folk Festival and Tamworth Country Music Festival in New South Wales, Australia.

The Whitetop Mountain Band is carried on today by Thornton Spencer on fiddle and Emily Spencer on banjo and vocals. Their daughter, Martha Spencer, is a multi-instrumentalist (guitar, banjo, fiddle, bass, vocals) and dancer with the band as well. Originally from Oregon, Jackson Cunningham plays mandolin, guitar, and vocals in the band. He grew up in a musical family and has performed in several bluegrass and old time groups from the West Coast to the East. Spencer Pennington, from Warrensville, NC, plays guitar and sings in the band. Spencer has been playing for over 60 years and has been in several bluegrass and gospel quartets over the years. Debbie Bramer, originally from Michigan, moved to Fancy Gap, Virginia in the early 90s. Debbie plays bass and dances in the band.

Tickets to this special event are $10 per person for general admission and $5 for student admission. For more information about the May 9th performance, or to reserve your tickets, please visit www.ralphstanleymuseum.com or contact the Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center at (276) 926-8550.

The Roots of Appalachian Music Concert Series is made possible by the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities.

The Virginia Foundation for the Humanities was established in 1974 to develop and support public programs, education, and research in the humanities and to relate the humanities to public issues. The VFH promotes understanding and use of the humanities through public debate, group discussion, and individual inquiry. Principal activities of the Virginia Foundation include an internationally recognized Fellowship Program, the Virginia Folklife Program, the Virginia Center for Media and Culture, a statewide network of Regional Councils, and the Grant Program. The VFH is non-profit and non-partisan and receives support from private gifts, grants and contributions, and from the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Commonwealth of Virginia. For more information, write or call the Foundation's office at 145 Ednam Drive, Charlottesville, Virginia 22903-4629, (434) 924-3296, or visit the VFH online at www.virginiafoundation.org.

The program is presented as a public service. The principal aim of the program is to discuss in an objective and nonpartisan context issues of concern and interest to citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia. The views and opinions expressed in this program do not necessarily represent those of the Virginia Foundation, its contributors, or its supporting agencies.

Roadside Theater Partners With Museum & Center To Present “Christmas in Appalachia”

Roadside Theater, the Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center, and the Jettie Baker Center will present Christmas in Appalachia on Saturday, December 22nd at 7:00p.m. at the Jettie Baker Center in Clintwood, Virginia. Admission is free, so bring the whole family for a wonderful community celebration this holiday season!

If your Christmas experience this year has been lost in a whirlwind of shopping and frantically searching for the world's best pecan pie recipe, then you're probably ready for a break from the holiday rush. Let Christmas in Appalachia take you back to a time when Christmas was about the things that really matter.

Christmas in Appalachia features Roadside Theater performer Ron Short, local artists, children, parents, grandmas and grandpas, and aunts and uncles in a performance of holiday music, stories, sing-a-longs, and remembrances. It’s a meaningful community celebration of the holidays that recalls Christmas as a time of sharing and being with loved ones. Guests this year include the Ridgewood Boys, Jim Scott Mullins, Maggie Stanley, Mike & Marsheli Mullins, and more.

Christmas in Appalachia is a part of what Roadside Theater does year ‘round—celebrate our mountain culture,” says Roadside’s Ron Short. “It’s a bit like getting together with your extended family—something you enjoy and look forward to all year long!”

Donations of non-perishable food items for the Dickenson County Food Bank will be accepted at the door. No reservations are necessary. For more information, contact the Ralph Stanley Museum at 276.926.8550, Roadside Theater at 276.679.3116, the Jettie Baker Center at 276.926.8694, or visit us on the web at www.ralphstanleymuseum.com.

Presenting: German & Italian Roots of Appalachian Music

The Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center will present the German & Italian Roots of Appalachian Music, a performance and lecture event which explores the diverse roots of the region's music, on Tuesday, December 18th at 7pm in Clintwood's Jettie Baker Center. Special guests for this event include Gerry Milnes of the Augusta Heritage Center in Elkins, West Virginia and Rafe Stefanini of Elkins Park, Pennsylvania. Reserve your tickets early for this rare opportunity to explore the history of mountain music with some of the region's best performers and scholars!

Each month from September to December 2007, the Roots of Appalachian Music Concert Series explores a different side of Appalachian music's history and development, including events highlighting Africa, the British Isles, Germany and Italy, and the string band tradition in the mountains. This important series also seeks to extend special programming to area schools to promote educational outreach and provide area school systems with opportunities to work with regional scholars and musicians.

The first guest in this event, Gerry Milnes, will offer special presentations to highlight the German influence on fiddle music and the role of the dulcimer in Appalachian tradition. These presentations will include slide shows of players and makers as well as live music to demonstrate these important connections.

Named “WV Filmmaker of the Year” in 2007, Gerry currently serves as the Folk Arts Coordinator for the Augusta Heritage Center in Elkins, West Virginia. His newest book is entitled Signs, Cures and Witchery: German Appalachian Folklore and is available from the University of Tennessee Press. He has also published Play of a Fiddle: Traditional Music, Dance and Folklore in West Virginia, University Press of Kentucky, and Granny Will Your Dog Bite: and Other Mt. Rhymes, on August House. As a musician, he plays in the group “Gandydancer,” an old-time string band.

Rafe Stefanini will also appear during this next performance event to bridge the gap between Italy and Appalachia with a special musical performance. With roots in Italy and a love of the fiddle and banjo music of Appalachia, Rafe truly demonstrates and lives the connections between our two regions.

Stefanini formed his first band with his brothers Bruno and Gianni when he still lived in Italy. After his move to the United States, Rafe formed a new band with Stefan Senders and Carol Elizabeth Jones called the Wildcats. Between 1985 and 1990, the group released two recordings, and in 1989 were selected by the United States Information Agency to tour Southeast Asia, appearing in Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, and Brunei.

In 1990, Rafe teamed up with Bruce Molsky and Dirk Powell to form the L-7s, a power trio featuring twin and sometimes triple fiddling. Upon Dirk's departure from the band in 1993, Beverly Smith joined on guitar. The band changed its name to Big Hoedown, and they released a CD on Rounder Records by the same name, featuring Rafe on fiddle and banjo. They toured extensively, reaching Germany and Finland, and they became a staple at dances and dance camps. In 1998, they appeared on Garrison Keillor's “A Prairie Home Companion.”

Tickets to this special event are $5 per person for general admission and $3 for student admission. For more information about the December 18th performance, or to reserve your tickets, please contact the Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center at (276) 926-8550.

The Roots of Appalachian Music Concert Series is made possible by the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities.

The Virginia Foundation for the Humanities was established in 1974 to develop and support public programs, education, and research in the humanities and to relate the humanities to public issues. The VFH promotes understanding and use of the humanities through public debate, group discussion, and individual inquiry. Principal activities of the Virginia Foundation include an internationally recognized Fellowship Program, the Virginia Folklife Program, the Virginia Center for Media and Culture, a statewide network of Regional Councils, and the Grant Program. The VFH is non-profit and non-partisan and receives support from private gifts, grants and contributions, and from the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Commonwealth of Virginia. For more information, write or call the Foundation's office at 145 Ednam Drive, Charlottesville, Virginia 22903-4629, (434) 924-3296, or visit the VFH online at www.virginiafoundation.org.

The program is presented as a public service. The principal aim of the program is to discuss in an objective and nonpartisan context issues of concern and interest to citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia. The views and opinions expressed in this program do not necessarily represent those of the Virginia Foundation, its contributors, or its supporting agencies.

Presenting: The Dixie Bee-Liners

The Museum & Center is proud to welcome the Dixie Bee-Liners to the Jettie Baker Center stage in Clintwood on Saturday, November 3rd at 7pm. Tickets cost $10 per person for general admission and $5 per person for students. Give the Museum & Center a call at (276) 926-8550 to purchase your tickets today!

With a cult following reaching far beyond their south-western Virginia stomping grounds, and a debut album voted one of the Reviewer's Top Five Picks by Bluegrass Now, PINECASTLE recording artists THE DIXIE BEE-LINERS are creating quite a buzz. Known for their high-octane harmonies and stunningly beautiful original songs, the band has appeared live on BBC Radio Scotland, NPR, the Food Network, and radio playlists across the country and world-wide, including regular rotation on Sirius and XM satellite radio. Their self-titled CD debuted on the Roots Music Report bluegrass chart at no. 14, going on to spend 56 weeks on the chart, with 9 of those weeks in the Top 10. In 2007, the band's music was featured on the soundtrack of the Civil War film FREEDOM.

THE DIXIE BEE-LINERS have completed sessions for their sophomore CD, "Ripe," with legendary Grammy-winning producer Bil VornDick (Ralph Stanley, Alison Krauss, Bob Dylan, Jim Lauderdale, James Taylor), to be released on PINECASTLE RECORDS in March 2008.

Presenting: British Isles Roots of Appalachian Music

The Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center will present the British Isles Roots of Appalachian Music, a performance and lecture event which explores the diverse roots of the region's music, on Saturday, October 20th at 7pm in Clintwood's Jettie Baker Center. Special guests for this event include Katie Doman, Ted Olson, and Fire in the Kitchen. Reserve your tickets early for this rare opportunity to explore the history of mountain music with some of the region's best performers and scholars!

Each month from September to December 2007, the Roots of Appalachian Music Concert Series explores a different side of Appalachian music's history and development, including events highlighting Africa, the British Isles, Eastern Europe, and the string band tradition in the mountains. This important series also seeks to extend special programming to area schools to promote educational outreach and provide area school systems with opportunities to work with regional scholars and musicians.

The first guest in the latest event, Katie Hoffman Doman, is a Virginian by birth and a singer/songwriter who now lives in Greene County, Tennessee. Her repertoire includes traditional tunes ranging from Appalachian mountain ballads and songs to bluegrass, old-time, and early country standards. Her debut CD, Beautiful Day, was produced by Raymond McLain and features the incredible musicianship of the East Tennessee State University Bluegrass Band. The CD features nine of Katie's original songs.

Not only is Katie a practitioner of local tradition, she's also a scholar. She is currently writing her dissertation on Appalachian literature for a Ph.D. in English from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. She served as the Music Task Force Co-Chair for the 2003 Smithsonian Folklife Festival in Washington D.C. She travels the region performing and lecturing on traditional Appalachian music in Tennessee, Virginia, and Kentucky. Katie's recent projects include a performance on the Song of the Mountains Concert Series, televised on Blue Ridge Public Television. She also currently serves as traditional music consultant on an environmental history of Appalachia, a four-part series produced by the James Agee Film Project to be aired on National Public Television in 2008.

For more than 25 years, Ted Olson has performed folk ballads, songs, and tunes from the U.S.A.(particularly from Appalachia and the South), as well as Ireland, Scotland, and England. He has appeared at a wide variety of educational and entertainment venues, accompanying his singing on guitar, banjo, and dulcimer, with spoken introductions to each ballad/song/tune to establish the historical context.

Olson holds the Ph.D. in English from the University of Mississippi, the M.A. in English from the University of Kentucky, and the B.A. in English from the University of Minnesota. Presently Associate Professor of Appalachian Studies and English at East Tennessee State University in Johnson City, Tennessee, he has served as Director of that school's Appalachian, Scottish, and Irish Studies program and as Interim Director of that school's Center for Appalachian Studies and Services.

Olson is the author of several books, including Blue Ridge Folklife and Breathing in Darkness: Poems. He has also edited numerous books, including an award-winning poetry collection by the late Kentucky author James Still entitled From the Mountain, From the Valley: New and Collected Poems, CrossRoads: A Southern Culture Annual, and Sarah Orne Jewett's The Country of the Pointed Firs and Selected Short Fiction. Additionally, he was the music section editor and associate editor for The Encyclopedia of Appalachia as well as the co-editor of the award-winning book The Bristol Sessions: Writings About the Big Bang of Country Music.

Playing together for nearly five years, the quartet of Fire In The Kitchen specializes in presenting lively Appalachian and Celtic music to its audiences. Instrumentation of the ensemble includes: Teddy Helton on guitar and bass, Tammy Martin on hammered dulcimer, Irish bodhran and vocals, Debbie Shrewsbury on classical and Irish flutes, Irish low whistles and pennywhistle, and Linda Waltner on fiddle and viola. Representing both Virginia and Tennessee, members hail from Bristol, Abingdon, and Emory, VA and Kingsport, TN.

Fire In The Kitchen has performed at venues such as: The Virginia Highlands' Festival, The Bristol Paramount Theatre, The Barter Theatre, The Carter Family Fold, The Capital Theater, Sycamore Shoals Celtic Festival, Blue Ridge Celtic Festival, Wake Forest Celtic festival among many others. The group has been featured on Public radio programming "Live in Studio 1A" and performed at the BCMA's (Birthplace of Country Music Alliance) 75th Anniversary Celebration of the Bristol Sessions. Most recently the group performed on the Blue Ridge Public Television series "Song of the Mountains" which is being broadcast by local and national PBS stations across the United States.

This fine group of musicians has released two CDs of their renditions of traditional Celtic and Appalachian music. Their first CD, An Appalachian Celtic Journey, was released in 2002 and was archived at the Smithsonian Institute's Folklife Museum in Washington, D.C. in celebration of the Year of Appalachia. The second compact disc, The Journey Continues, was recently released in December 2006. This CD features a refreshing variety of styles. Tunes were gathered from diverse sources: Ireland, Scotland, France, West Virginia, Texas, and Southwest Virginia. They range from the haunting strains of "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing", to the driving acceleration of the polkas, "Riding on a Load of Hay" and "Cobbler's Polka", to the loving affirmation of the Carter family vocal "Storms Are on the Ocean."

Tickets to this event are $10 per person for general admission and $5 for student admission. For more information about the October 20th performance, or to reserve your tickets, please contact the Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center at (276) 926-8550.

The Roots of Appalachian Music Concert Series is made possible by the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities.

The Virginia Foundation for the Humanities was established in 1974 to develop and support public programs, education, and research in the humanities and to relate the humanities to public issues. The VFH promotes understanding and use of the humanities through public debate, group discussion, and individual inquiry. Principal activities of the Virginia Foundation include an internationally recognized Fellowship Program, the Virginia Folklife Program, the Virginia Center for Media and Culture, a statewide network of Regional Councils, and the Grant Program. The VFH is non-profit and non-partisan and receives support from private gifts, grants and contributions, and from the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Commonwealth of Virginia. For more information, write or call the Foundation's office at 145 Ednam Drive, Charlottesville, Virginia 22903-4629, (434) 924-3296, or visit the VFH online at www.virginiafoundation.org.

The program is presented as a public service. The principal aim of the program is to discuss in an objective and nonpartisan context issues of concern and interest to citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia. The views and opinions expressed in this program do not necessarily represent those of the Virginia Foundation, its contributors, or its supporting agencies.

Ralph Stanley Museum Mountain Music Festival To Be Held in Clintwood on September 28th, 29th, and 30th

The Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center will host its 3rd annual Mountain Music Festival on Main Street in Clintwood, VA on Friday, Sept 28th through Sunday, September 30th. Bring the whole family to Clintwood to enjoy bluegrass, old-time, and gospel music, area crafts and demonstrations, vendors, "taste of the mountains" cuisine, an annual quilt show, and much more.

This year's Ralph Stanley Museum Mountain Music Festival opens with a concert by Blue Highway and local favorites to benefit the Museum & Center. Tickets to the special concert event with Blue Highway are $20 and may be purchased from the Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center by calling (276) 926-8550 or by visiting the website at www.ralphstanleymuseum.com. The Museum & Center expects a sell-out crowd, so reserve your tickets early!

The Ralph Stanley Museum Mountain Music Festival will offer regional music, storytelling, workshops, crafts, vendors, an annual quilt show, and much more all day on Saturday from 10am to 10pm on Main St. All outdoor performance events and workshops on Saturday are free and open to the public, thanks to the support of festival sponsors The Crooked Road: Virginia's Heritage Music Trail, Alpha Natural Resources, BB&T Bank, the Dickenson County Board of Supervisors, Mountain Empire Community College's Home Craft Days and Mountain Music School, the Virginia Commission for the Arts, Childress Furniture, Thompson & Litton, Davis Service Center & Towing, the Town of Clintwood, and the Heart of Appalachia Tourism Authority.

On Sunday, September 30th, enjoy a very special set of performances at the Jettie Baker Center from 1pm to 4pm to celebrate the release of the new CD entitled Laboring Soldier: A Tribute to Billy Gene Mullins. This event will include several performances by contributors to the project. The release concert is also free of charge and seating is open to the public, so join us for a wonderful end to a wonderful weekend of regional music and crafts.
For more information, please contact the Ralph Stanley Museum and Traditional Mountain Music Center at (276) 926-8550 or visit us on the web at www.ralphstanleymuseum.com.

The Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center is a 501(c)3 nonprofit corporation. All proceeds from the benefit concert help to support future programming and events and ensure that the collection is properly maintained.

Museum & Center Adds Cheick Hamala Diabate to African Roots of Appalachian Music Concert

The Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center is pleased to announce the addition of Cheick Hamala Diabate to the African Roots of Appalachian Music concert on Saturday, September 8th at 7pm in Clintwood's Jettie Baker Center. Mike Seeger and Carpetbag Theatre will also perform Saturday evening in this opening event of the new Roots of Appalachian Music series presented by the Museum & Center and the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities. Reserve your tickets early for this rare opportunity to explore the history of mountain music with some of the region's best performers and scholars!

Cheick Hamala Diabaté is recognized as one of the world's masters of the ngoni, a Malian traditional instrument, and a West African historian in the Griot tradition. A sought after performer, lecturer, storyteller, and choreographer throughout Africa, Europe, Asia, and Canada, Cheick Hamala began touring in the U.S. in 1995. His performances have been featured at such notable venues as The Smithsonian Institute and the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

A steward of the 800 year-old tradition of the Griot, the storytellers of West Africa, Cheick Hamala shares the oral history, music, and song of his culture as it was passed on to him from birth by parent to child. At an early age, Cheick Hamala easily mastered the ngoni, a stringed lute and ancestor to the banjo. He learned to play the guitar from his uncle and now plays banjo and several other instruments; but his renown remains with the historical ngoni.

Each month from September to December 2007, the Roots of Appalachian Music Concert Series will explore a different side of Appalachian music's history and development, including events highlighting Africa, the British Isles, Eastern Europe, and the string band tradition in the mountains. This important series also seeks to extend special programming to area schools to promote educational outreach and provide area school systems with opportunities to work with regional scholars and musicians.

For more information about the September 8th performance, or to reserve your tickets, please contact the Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center at (276) 926-8550. If you would like to know more about the event's performers, please visit Mike Seeger's website at http://mikeseeger.info, Carpetbag Theatre's website at http://www.carpetbag.org, and Cheick Hamala Diabate's website at http://www.malimusic.net.

The Roots of Appalachian Music Concert Series is made possible by the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities.

The Virginia Foundation for the Humanities was established in 1974 to develop and support public programs, education, and research in the humanities and to relate the humanities to public issues. The VFH promotes understanding and use of the humanities through public debate, group discussion, and individual inquiry. Principal activities of the Virginia Foundation include an internationally recognized Fellowship Program, the Virginia Folklife Program, the Virginia Center for Media and Culture, a statewide network of Regional Councils, and the Grant Program. The VFH is non-profit and non-partisan and receives support from private gifts, grants and contributions, and from the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Commonwealth of Virginia. For more information, write or call the Foundation's office at 145 Ednam Drive, Charlottesville, Virginia 22903-4629, (434) 924-3296, or visit the VFH online at www.virginiafoundation.org.

The program is presented as a public service. The principal aim of the program is to discuss in an objective and nonpartisan context issues of concern and interest to citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia. The views and opinions expressed in this program do not necessarily represent those of the Virginia Foundation, its contributors, or its supporting agencies.

Upcoming Event: Pickin' Porch Jam Session

Bring your instrument and chair to enjoy an afternoon with local performers at the Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center on Sunday, September 9th from 1pm to 4pm. The Pickin' Porch jam session is free and open to the public and is held on the second Sunday afternoon of every month on the Center's front porch.

Jams are open to all levels of musicians who are interested in traditional mountain music so come, participate, and even learn a thing or two from our very talented local and regional musicians. The public is invited to listen in.

The Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center is a community of people of different ages, backgrounds, and interests, from around the world, with one common goal: preserving, investigating, and celebrating traditional mountain music. We welcome you to our community!

Presenting: The Midnight Ramblers

The Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center and the Jettie Baker Center will present the Midnight Ramblers on Saturday, September 1st at 7:00pm at the Jettie Baker Center in Clintwood. This event is the latest addition to the Music Along the Crooked Road concert series, which brings together the best in regional old-time, bluegrass, and gospel music to create wonderful evenings of culture and entertainment.

The Midnight Ramblers, southwestern Virginia's up-and-coming bluegrass band, will make their second appearance in the Music Along the Crooked Road concert series to celebrate one year of performances sponsored by the Museum/Center and the Jettie Baker Center. Be sure to experience the Ramblers' lively blend of standard bluegrass tunes and originals, all performed by one of the region's best young bluegrass bands.

Admission to this event will be $5.00 per person, and one child (ages 12 and under) per paying adult will be admitted free, so bring the whole family for a wonderful evening of regional music!

The "Music Along the Crooked Road" series of concerts will be held on the first Saturday evening of every month at the Jettie Baker Center with a scheduled performance time of 7pm. Tickets may be purchased in advance at the Museum & Center during the work week leading up to each performance.

For more information about upcoming events in the "Music Along the Crooked Road" series, or to purchase tickets, please visit our website at www.ralphstanleymuseum.com, call the Museum & Center at 926-8550, or call the Jettie Baker Center at 926-8694.

The Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center is a private, nonprofit, 501(c)3 corporation.

RSM&TMMC Announces Roots of Appalachian Music Concert Series with Mike Seeger & Carpetbag Theatre

The Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center is pleased to announce the Roots of Appalachian Music Concert Series, a performance and lecture series which explores the diverse roots of the region's music. The first event in this series examines the African roots of Appalachian music with special guests Mike Seeger and Carpetbag Theatre on Saturday, September 8th at 7pm in Clintwood's Jettie Baker Center. Reserve your tickets early for this rare opportunity to explore the history of mountain music with some of the region's best performers and scholars!

Each month from September to December 2007, the Roots of Appalachian Music Concert Series will explore a different side of Appalachian music's history and development, including events highlighting Africa, the British Isles, Eastern Europe, and the string band tradition in the mountains. This important series also seeks to extend special programming to area schools to promote educational outreach and provide area school systems with opportunities to work with regional scholars and musicians.

The first guest in the series, Mike Seeger, has devoted his life to singing and playing "Music from True Vine" -- the home music made by American southerners before the media age. "Music from True Vine" grows out of hundreds of years of British traditions that blended in our country with equally ancient African traditions to produce songs and sounds that are unique to the United States. For the peoples of the rural South, their great variety of music, song and story provided their Shakespeare, their dance music, their news, and the fabric of their daily lives. This music in time became the roots of today's country, bluegrass and popular music, and remains as ever, enduring and refreshing listening.

Fidelity to traditional sounds has set Mike Seeger apart from other performers since he began touring the United States and abroad in 1960. Mike's music conveys all the depth of feeling, the sheer energy and the infinite variety and texture of true rural music. Like earlier musicians, Mike seeks out his own vision of the music by creating within its traditions, making his music uniquely his own. As he sings the old songs, he plays in a wide variety of old-time styles, accompanying himself on an array of instruments, including banjo, fiddle, guitar, trump (jaw harp), mouth harp (harmonica), quills, lap dulcimer, mandolin and autoharp. Jon Pankake of Rolling Stone magazine writes that Mike Seeger's music is "Clean and crisp as any acoustic music now being played . . . Here is an American artist standing forth, voice 'well trained', in narratives, in fun, in irony, himself branch and root of the entwined true vine."

As a founding member of the New Lost City Ramblers, Make played an integral role in helping to revive interest in a variety of traditional musics, now played by thousands of young musicians across the country. Since his first recordings with the Ramblers in the late nineteen fifties, Mike has gone on to record almost forty albums, both solo and with others.

Mike Seeger has been honored with three Grammy nominations, most recently in 1991 for Solo: OldTime Country Music and in 1994 for Third Annual Farewell Reunion. In 1995 Mike received the Rex Foundation's Ralph J. Gleason Lifetime Achievement Award, established by the Grateful Dead to recognize "those who exemplify the qualities of talent, vision, innovation that Ralph so tirelessly supported." In the word of the award citation, Mike Seeger "...remains one of our great musical and cultural resources. To see him perform is to experience the richness of our traditions."

The Carpetbag Theatre, Inc. (CBT) is a community based, non-profit, professional theatre company dedicated to the production of new works. CBT's Ensemble Company develops new scripts primarily through collaboration and improvisation. Founded in 1970, CBT is a corporation of writers, artists, dancers and musicians. It has had a notably good record of performances, workshops, and other activities, and is one of the few tenured African-American professional theatre companies in the South.

The Carpetbag Theatre has long been a part of a movement in this country that seeks to redefine the way we view culture and the arts originating from culturally-specific communities. As they go about the work of turning people's stories into art, it is vitally important to them not only to tell the stories that make us stronger, but to tell those stories well. As they speak for those who are unheard and unseen by the larger society, they strive to tell those stories with honesty and dignity and concern for the aesthetic of that particular community. It is therefore part of their mission to produce the highest quality work based not only on the standards of the traditional artistic community, but also on the traditional standards of the communities reflected in their work.

The Carpetbag Theatre has been part of an important theater movement for thirty years. Founded in 1969 and chartered in 1970, CBT was a local response to a national movement towards community based professional theater. Carpetbag is a theater rooted in the aesthetic of the particular community, which it served. In the past ten years, they have addressed such issues as the death penalty and its impact on the African American community; economic development and the barriers encountered by people of color in the market place; domestic violence and black feminism; and environmental racism.

Historically, CBT has focused its program initiatives on the professional development of young artists and the participation of all segments of the community in the creative process. In the early years of operation, the organizational focus was the instruction and training of student and community artists. As they began to expand their focus, they developed the professional ensemble company and a series of drama based activities for specific populations.CBT became a resource for the many communities who had taken the initiative to document their own history.

For more information about the September 8th performance, or to reserve your tickets, please contact the Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center at (276) 926-8550. If you would like to know more about the event's performers, please visit Mike Seeger's website at http://mikeseeger.info and Carpetbag Theatre's website at http://www.carpetbag.org.

The Roots of Appalachian Music Concert Series is made possible by the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities.

The Virginia Foundation for the Humanities was established in 1974 to develop and support public programs, education, and research in the humanities and to relate the humanities to public issues. The VFH promotes understanding and use of the humanities through public debate, group discussion, and individual inquiry. Principal activities of the Virginia Foundation include an internationally recognized Fellowship Program, the Virginia Folklife Program, the Virginia Center for Media and Culture, a statewide network of Regional Councils, and the Grant Program. The VFH is non-profit and non-partisan and receives support from private gifts, grants and contributions, and from the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Commonwealth of Virginia. For more information, write or call the Foundation's office at 145 Ednam Drive, Charlottesville, Virginia 22903-4629, (434) 924-3296, or visit the VFH online at www.virginiafoundation.org.

The program is presented as a public service. The principal aim of the program is to discuss in an objective and nonpartisan context issues of concern and interest to citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia. The views and opinions expressed in this program do not necessarily represent those of the Virginia Foundation, its contributors, or its supporting agencies.

Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center Hosts Pickin' Porch Jam Session

The Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center will host its first Pickin' Porch jam session of the year on Sunday, May 13 from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Bring your chair and instrument and enjoy an afternoon of pickin' and grinnin' at the museum.

These informal jam sessions will take place at the RSM&TMMC on the second Sunday afternoon of each month from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m., so mark your calendars early in the season! Jams are open to all levels of musicians who are interested in traditional mountain music so come, participate, and even learn a thing or two from our very talented local and regional musicians. The public is invited to listen in.

The mission of the Ralph Stanley Museum & Traditional Mountain Music Center is to honor the talent and legacy of Dr. Ralph Stanley and to preserve and promote traditional mountain music through exhibits, services, and resource information to people in southwest Virginia, the nation, and the world. We are a 501(c)3 nonprofit corporation and greatly appreciate your support.