The Town of Boone is proud to announce the Fall 2015 Indoor Concert Series at the Jones House, featuring house-concert style acoustic performances in the Mazie Jones Gallery.
The series begins on Sunday, September 27, with four-time Grammy Award winner, David Holt, and includes four more concerts with a National Endowment of the Arts Folk Heritage Award winner, members of the Blue Ridge National Heritage Area’s Traditional Artist Directory, and a heir to the famed Carter Family.
“We are incredibly excited for the fall concerts,” says program organizer, Mark Freed. “The series has continued to grow over the past two years, and we are attracting some of the best folk and roots music performers in the country.”
The indoor concerts began in October 2013 and have featured performances with Bruce Molsky, Foghorn String Band, Casey Driessen, and many others. The series began to fill a needed niche for an intimate performance venue that could showcase unamplified and acoustic concerts.
“Audience members have the chance to sit in a small room with the performers and hear their instruments and voices uninhibited by amplification, in their natural timbres,” Freed says.
David Holt will give two separate performances on September 27, one starting at 4:00 p.m. and one starting at 7:00 p.m. Holt is known as a multi-instrumentalist, storyteller, television host and all around entertainer. He is host of Public Television’s Folkways program that takes the viewer through the Southern Mountains visiting traditional craftsmen and musicians. For years, Holt traveled and performed with legendary local icon, Doc Watson, and he last performed at the Jones House with Doc during the unveiling of the downtown statue of Watson.
The series continues on October 25 with The Harris Brothers band at 7:30 p.m., featuring brothers Reggie and Ryan Harris. The Harris Brothers are High Country favorites, playing in the area for more than two decades, featuring Reggie’s guitar playing, Ryan’s bass, and singing by both brothers. The Harris Brothers are music lovers and their repertoire consists of a variety of American roots styles, from country to blues, jazz to rock and soul.
On November 13, songwriter and heir to the Carter Family, Dale Jett, will give a performance starting at 7:30 p.m. Jett is the grandson of A.P. and Sara Carter, two of the original Carter Family members, and he grew up around the Carter Family Fold at the old home place in southwest Virginia. Jett learned his first guitar chords from legendary folk musician, Elizabeth Cotton, and he spent his life around some of the country’s most well known folk musicians. He has appeared on Mountain Stage, The Marty Stuart Show, The Grand Ole Opry, and many other notable stages.
The Crooked Road Ramblers will be at the Jones house on November 23, featuring the fiddling of band leader, Kilby Spencer. The Crooked Road Ramblers are an old-time band from southwest Virginia, steeped in the traditional string band styles of the Blue Ridge. The band has one numerous blue ribbons at fiddlers conventions around the region, and everyone attending the concert will receive a free copy of the band’s new recording.
The series concludes on December 5, at 7:30 p.m., with NEA Heritage Award recipient, ballad singer, banjo player, storyteller, and author, Sheila Kay Adams. Adams is a seventh-generation ballad singer raised in the Sodom Laurel community of Madison County, North Carolina, an area renowned for its unbroken tradition of unaccompanied singing. Adams has performed internationally and has been featured at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival, International Storytelling Festival, and many other events and venues across the country.
The indoor series are ticketed concerts held in the Mazie Jones Gallery of the Jones House. Each concert can seat 40 patrons, so advanced reservations are recommended. Seats cost $20 each and can be paid in cash or check at the Jones House.
The fall indoor series is supported by a grant from the North Carolina Arts Council with funding from the National Endowment for the Arts.
For more information about the series, including making reservations for seats to performances, please contact staff at the Jones House at www.joneshouse.org or 828.268.6280.
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