Down the Road on the Blue Ridge Music Trails of North Carolina

In the Blue Ridge, the Christmas season was celebrated for days on end, with gatherings of family and friends, good food, and lots of music. This was especially true in the area known as Round Peak, around Mount Airy, N.C., and Galax, Va. The tradition was called Breaking Up Christmas, and December 25th was just the beginning.

In 1821, Sequoyah singlehandedly created a syllabary, or writing system, for his people, the Cherokee Indians. Within a few years, the tribe’s literacy rate was far higher than their white neighbors. First published in 1829, the Cherokee Hymnbook contained the lyrics to sacred songs, written in Cherokee, using Sequoyah’s syllabary. It was a groundbreaking achievement, created for an audience who could both read Cherokee and sing by heart the tunes that went with the lyrics. Nearly two centuries later, in 2014, a new edition of the Cherokee Hymnbook was published — keeping alive both the language and the sacred music.

In 2000, Helen White, a school guidance counselor, founded a music program in the Alleghany County, N.C, schools. She called it Junior Appalachian Musicians—or JAM. The program offered instruction in the traditional music of the mountains. To say that JAM has been a success would be almost as big an understatement as saying that Bill Monroe had something to do with bluegrass. Now dozens of JAM programs (also known as Traditional Arts Programs for Students or TAPS) play in the mountains of North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia. Rising stars from JAM programs are changing the face of traditional music festivals across the region.

North Carolina’s Blue Ridge Mountains are home to a rich heritage of African-American gospel music in local churches, performed by singers and instrumental musicians who may be professionals, or who may simply love to lift their voices in Sunday worship. One such place is Texana, a historic African-American community in Cherokee County in the state’s southwestern-most corner. Texana has a longstanding gospel music tradition, associated especially with Mount Zion Baptist Church.

Haywood County in North Carolina’s Blue Ridge Mountains is the heartland of a homegrown dance tradition—team square dancing, and its close relative, team clogging. Sam Love Queen, born in 1889 is often credited with being the founding father of this tradition. His Soco Gap Dancers performed for President Roosevelt and the Queen of England in 1939. You can catch the best of team dancing at the Maggie Valley Stomping Grounds, the Mountain Dance and Folk Festival in Asheville, Mars Hill University in Madison County and many other festivals across the region.

The millennial generation has brought new energy and talent to mountain music. Young stars of bluegrass and old-time music such as Josh Goforth, Emma McDowell and Bryan McDowell are doing their native North Carolina proud. And the generation younger than the millennials — Generation Z — is showing every bit as much promise to carry Blue Ridge musical traditions into the future. Among them are fiddlers Lillian Chase and Rhiannon Ramsey and flatpicking guitarist Presley Barker.

In the Blue Ridge, every county has its own musical heroes and history. The music of Surry County, N.C., is so popular among old-time music fans worldwide that if you visit a jam session in Barcelona or Tokyo, you’re likely to hear a fiddler play “Sally Anne” or “Breaking Up Christmas” in the Surry County style. And you can savor Surry’s style firsthand at the Historic Earle Theatre, in downtown Mount Airy.

Doc Watson’s signature baritone voice and unique lead bluegrass guitar licks became synonymous with traditional and bluegrass music. Born in Deep Gap, N.C., Doc lost his vision before his first birthday but never let his blindness slow him down, learning ballads and teaching himself harmonica, banjo and guitar. Since his death in 2012, Doc remains the most highly respected flat-pick guitar player in the history of traditional American music.

When English, Irish and Scottish settlers moved into Appalachia, they brought an ancient form of music with them – the ballad. The isolated mountains drew song collectors like Englishman Cecil Sharp. In Madison County, Sharp collected several hundred songs – including 70 from Jane Hicks Gentry from Hot Springs.

Brasstown, in the far southwest corner of North Carolina, is home to the John C. Campbell Folk School founded in 1925. Its founder Olive Dame Campbell collected the music of the region, including ballads and fiddle tunes. Today, people from all over the world travel to the Folk School to begin their day with Morningsong and attend classes in everything from mandolin playing to blacksmithing. Evening entertainment includes Southern Mountain Square Dance, jams and concerts.