An ongoing accounting of some of my most memorable Bluegrass jams and other information about Bluegrass music in general.
The Right Move!
Posted 07-16-2011 at 12:44 PM by Fiddliferous
When I first started thinking about moving from the “North Country” in upper upstate New York, about 65 miles south from the Canada border, I was thinking some about how sedentary my life had become. About how “boring” and free from challenge each day offered as I climbed out of bed each morning destined to the same old routine, rarely deviating from the rut. Mary felt pretty much the same. She had mentioned several times that it was the longest she’d ever stayed in one place. Her life was becoming boring, too. We both wondered what to do to spice our lives up a bit. There were few opportunities to play Bluegrass music; old-time country was infesting the jam sessions at every turn, it seemed. I liked old-time country, but my heart was in the old traditional Bluegrass and had been since I was 19 years old. Since the passing of a few dear old friends, the playing and singing of traditional Bluegrass was becoming scarce.
Having a life-long love for “Bluegrass” music, I began searching the internet, mostly through “Google” search engines, for an area in the country, with mountains, where my favorite music was being played constantly without let up. Every search led to eastern Tennessee. The Appalachians dominated Google. The Blue Ridge Mountains, the Smoky Mountains, the Cherokee and Pisgah National Parks; now, I just had to add the traditional Bluegrass musicians and select an area to settle in.
Meanwhile, in another room on another computer, Mary became increasingly interested in the potential for elevating her love of photography. Her excitement began to catch fire with each new search she conducted. After a few days, it became clear that eastern Tennessee was the place to be. Now, we needed to find a place.
In no time, we were browsing through literally hundreds of available townhouses, apartments, senior citizen apartment complexes. We decided to look at one-family dwellings and somewhere along this whole inrush of available places entered where we are now; a quaint little furnished apartment over a two-car garage with wonderful neighbors next door. A few calls to the realtor and we were set. Now, we had to figure out what to stow and what could go. Mary busied herself with all those endless decisions while I set out to meet people on the internet and find places to visit.
Once we were locked in to our new location, I needed to find all the local picking places I could and get to know the local musicians via internet. The Banjo-hangout and Fiddle-hangout sites online were a great help as was city-data. In no time at all I had places lined up to jam and all kinds of people wanting to meet us. These people are so friendly.
One of the very first persons I met online was Tony Olivent (on www.banjohangout.org) who owns and operates, with his wife, Mary Ann, a music store in Newport, TN., named “Strings and Things”. Tony was very helpful and not long after arriving here I headed right down to see him and pick with him and his wife and their many picking friends. Later, at the Rheatown Store jam on Saturday night, we met Jeffrey and James who informed us of jams in Kingsport and Elizabethton. Later we learned of Philadelphia, Unicoi, Erwin and Greeneville jams. Also, I learned from www.city-data.com of the jam in Marshall, North Carolina, on Thursday nights and several jams in Gate City and Weber City in Virginia throughout the week. In our first forty-five days we had met upwards of two-hundred pickers
