We had a great time playing at the 2019 Mountain Dance and Folk Festival last weekend. Everyone treated us nice and it was great to play on the big stage at Lipinsky Hall.
Paul graduated from UNCA back in the day so he liked being back on his old stomping grounds. As we waited downstairs for our turn to play he told us stories about his college days, one of which happened just down the hall from the room we were in.
It was a music class and the teacher gave the assignment to play or sing a piece of music and then discuss the piece.
The music class was one of the required credits for the degree program Paul was in, which wasn’t music related. Paul never told anyone in the class, nor the teacher, that he was a guitar player.
Finally the day for Paul’s presentation arrived. He set in front of the class and played this song. He said once he was finished the teacher said “Well now. You just never know.” 🙂
We played right before intermission at Mountain Dance and Folk Festival. Once we left the stage and put our instruments up we headed to the lobby to stand at the table where the girls were selling cds.
I got to meet Maggie, the lady who was responsible for us being invited to be part of the show.
Maggie took a class at the Folk School and heard the girls singing during Morning Song.
Nana was standing there talking to someone when she suddenly saw Maggie and they started talking. I was sort of shocked. I said “Do you know each other?” Turns out they’re first cousins!
Months ago when Maggie called to inquire about the girls being part of this year’s Mountain Dance and Folk Festival she had no idea that she was asking about her cousin’s grandchildren. Talk about a small world-how cool is that!
Tipper
p.s. There was an issue with my hosting company yesterday and my post failed to send out. If you’d like to go back and read the post go here: A Sight Of
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Sounds like y’all had a wonderful time…so glad , love hearing all about it…. :):)
Lipinsky Hall is at UNCA, I think. That was quite an honor for the four of you. I’m sure Pap is very proud of you all!
What a nice coincidence that Maggie and Nana were related. Guess it’s not such a big world afterall!
Tipper,
I watched “Shindig on the green” the other day for hours, hoping to see Chitter and Chatter, but never saw them. I know they do Cloggin and stuff, I’ve seen ’em. This was at Asheville, too, but I guess the Mountain Dance and Folk Festival was good also, especially for Paul performing “Down the Escalate.” I think Paul is the best guitar player I ever heard. …Ken
Earlier this year David Dehart, Wendy Meyers and I gave a couple of presentations at the Swain County Historical and Genealogical Society monthly meetings on Needmore a community in Swain County that once was a thriving fairly self sustaining small village that has basically disappeared as such. One part of my small contribution was that anytime you’re talking with someone with ties to Needmore it’s best not to it’s advisable not to speak ill of anyone who also has ties to the community since the odds are like most of the mountain communities of the past the person you’re talking to is related to the person you’re speaking ill of. These communities of yesteryear usually had a limited number of families living there so the chance of these families being related to each other was great especially if the families had lived there for several generations. In fact I have three third Dehart Great Grandparents who were siblings, and three second Breedlove Great Grandparents who were siblings. This doesn’t include other ancestors who were related. While I’m not my own Grandpa I can identify with the song by that title. I have kidded my wife for several years that the reason I married her was that she was the first woman I had dated that i wasn’t related to but then when I was researching further back in her ancestry I discovered a Welsh Miller, William Sumpter, who was her eighth Great Grandfather as well as being mine. I figure that’s distant enough till our daughter is fairly safe as far as inheriting any bad genes.
There is a lot of truth in the old Southern attitude that we are all cousins. And I totally reject any idea of that as any kind of put down. From Adam we all are for starters. But with low population, long term residence and limited travel, it is to be expected that cousin ties are wide-reaching.
Glad you all got the opportunity to fo to the Festival. You all are following in Pap and Ray’s musical trail. Hope it all leads to great blessings. And I say ‘blessings’ because “The blessings of the Lord maketh rich and he addeth no sorrow therewith.” .
I just bet Paul got an A+ on that. Loaded with talent. as you all are. I am certain he has been a great inspiration to your girls.
Enjoyed the tune and the pictures.
That was cool about your cousin.
That is cool, my wife should have been a private investigator, or some sorta professional researcher, with her limited funds she has dug up so much with this whole DNA/Geneology ( nothing bad ) just amazing how much info is out there if you know where and how to look, the levels in which you want to go can get expensive, but it’s just been amazing, our adoptive Daughter ( on both sides) has folks (DNA) that my wife and I are both kin ( thru DNA) but not to each other, mind-blowing. I told her the other day she has to stop looking or she gonna find out that we are kin to each other. All kidding aside, I found out that some of my family had deep connections to the mountains of the Georgia/Carolinas, especially the Cherokee Indian people, actually a Cove named after a Chief in the North West corner of Georgia, we still have today family we’ve never met or probable ever will that was forced to migrate to Oklahoma, just the other day I was looking at find a grave and there are many Cherokee Indian people who bare our last name in the graveyards there. One the other day past he was an Older Cherokee Baptist Preacher. Interesting and sad all in one. So you just never know who you’re talking to, could be a lone lost cousin, I’m still looking for that rich Ole Uncle that meant to leave me millions and just forgot.