A Clifftop Intro to Mountain Music

It has been over ten years since Dan first took up the banjo in Seattle, and since then he's picked up the guitar and the fiddle. After hearing about this for years, we finally made it to Clifftop, West Virginia yesterday where each year a couple thousand people converge at Camp Washington Carver for the the Appalachian String Band Festival. 

It was undoubtedly one of the cultural highlights of our 2012.

 Listening in to two minutes of the Traditional Band Contest--it took three hours for the judges to listen to all of them and we didn't have the endurance, chairs, or sunscreen to judge for ourselves.

Listening to 92-year old Elmer Rich fiddle away inside Great Chestnut Lodge. He remembers playing with his father for Eleanor Roosevelt in 1936 at the age of sixteen.  He is amazing.

Saturday, the only day we attended, was final day of the largest old time music camp in the country, the day of the traditional band contest and flatfoot contest. But the music and dancing being judged wasn't the only music we heard and saw. 

There was old-time music and dancing everywhere!  Everywhere we looked and walked small and large groups were jamming, bent over in circles picking and strumming and fiddling songs over and over for mastery and creative experimentation. People of all ages and shapes and ethnicities had their banjos, basses, guitars, and fiddles.They sat on folding chairs and camp stools under trees and camp canopies and really creative tarp shelters. I couldn't stop snapping photos. 

The campground alone was a sight to behold. We had entertained the idea of camping there in years to come, but I am fairly certain that this camp never sleeps and there was zero room to breathe.  

Amazing craftsmen had their instruments on display for sale. D fell in love with at least three different banjos and if we had five thousand extra dollars I have no doubt that all three would have come home with us. 

We watched this woman dance flatfoot during one jam session and A was inspired. Later we watched as she competed and then won the flatfoot competition in her division. It is so amazing how flatfoot dancing creates the percussion line for each band with their simple steps.

I loved the makeshift bulletin boards on every surface.

D and I loved it all, and going into it we didn't know how the kids would do. They made it to the end of the day thanks to a sno-cone for E, a ribbon wreath for A, and the dozens of stand-up basses that J found himself coveting. We put them in their pajamas and drove back to Virginia just before it got dark. We will go back next year and hopefully make it to the square dance and concert at 8 p.m.


I knew I wouldn't be able to truly capture the feeling of the music in photos, so for the first time our blog brings you a very brief video of one of the jams.  Enjoy.