Here is a list of our 2011 Faculty (scroll down for bios and photos).
Huastecan
Trio Chicontepec:
Rolando Hernández, Jorge Hernández, Rafael Camacho
Old Time
Hank Bradley with Candy Goldman and Dan Lockshon
Bruce Greene with Don Pedi
Alice Gerrard with Rick Good
Eddie Bond with Kirk Sutphin
Paul David Smith with Jimmy McCown
Bluegrass & Texas Swing
Bobby Hicks with Adam Masters
Cape Breton
Andrea Beaton and Troy MacGillivray
Magdalen Islands
Bertrand Deraspe and Alain Turbide
Cajun
Marc and Ann Savoy
Michael Doucet
Irish
Liz Carroll and John Doyle
New England
Dudley and Jacqueline Laufman
Swedish
Paul Dahlin and family
Guitar
Wayne Henderson
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HUASTECAN
Centrum is thrilled to present Huastecan fiddling at Fiddle Tunes for the first time. Trío Chicontepec was formed more than 50 years ago by Rolando Hernández, otherwise known as "Quecho." The trio currently consists of his son Jorge on the huapanguera and Rafael "Rafa" Camacho on the jarana. They play each week at his dance hall, known as "El Balcón Huasteco."
Quecho started playing at the age of eight in the small town of Chicontepec, in the north of Veracruz, one of six states making up the Huasteca region in northeastern Mexico. He got to be so good that he began to play at indigenous weddings and baptisms, religious festivities and civic events in different villages around Chicontepec. Parties often lasted until the sun rose. He founded Trío Chicontepec in the late 1950s with two of his brothers, Lázaro and Godelevo. They had a radio program to broadcast Huasteco music, and their first record was made in 1960 with one microphone in an old air shaft.
A living legend to the history of Huasteco music, and a serious musician committed to making it live on, Quecho doesn't plan to leave us anytime soon. "I plan to live until I'm a hundred and twenty," he says proudly. For more information on the trio and Huastecan music, see Zaidee Stavely’s excellent article in Fiddle Magazine.
OLD TIME
Paul David Smith, from Hardy in Pike County, Kentucky, was born in 1933. He became intrigued with old time music as a young boy after hearing the fiddling of Owen “Snake” Chapman. Paul started with the guitar, then learned some mandolin, and at the age of 12 or so he began to learn the fiddle. Eventually he picked up the banjo, too. He has played with a number of different bands over the years and has been featured as a guest artist and master fiddler at such prestigious gatherings as the Appalachian String Band Festival at Clifftop, West Virginia, and Fiddlers’ Grove. He accompanied Snake Chapman on his two Rounder CDs and is featured on his own Rounder CD, Devil Eat the Groundhog.
Accompanying Paul David Smith at Fiddle Tunes will be Jimmy McCown, who grew up in a musical family on Pond Creek in Pike County, Kentucky. He started playing music when he was about six years old, taught by his parents and his grandparents. His mother and uncles all “made music,” and his father was a fiddler of reputation in southern West Virginia and eastern Kentucky. Jimmy went on to master the three-finger bluegrass banjo style, and played in a bluegrass band with his wife, Ada, for many years.
Later, he refocused his playing on the clawhammer style. Jimmy explored some unique methods within the clawhammer style—techniques he recalled from his grandfather and learned from other old-time banjo legends—to develop his own distinguished sound. “I also play fiddle, and I could never accept the fact that the banjo had to be a ‘back up’ instrument,” he says. “So, I began trying to play the melody to the songs and realized this wasn’t possible without dropping my thumb into the scale.” He has become identified with this style of melodic drop-thumb playing, that his grandfather called “double note” banjo.
Hank Bradley, fiddle player and artichoke farmer, was drafted by the U.S. Army in 1963. He was stationed for 2 years in North Carolina and Virginia, which gave him his first exposure to the regional music of that area. He then continued at home on the west coast, active in playing and inciting old-time music between Berkeley and Fresno, until moving via Yugoslavia and Kansas to Seattle in 1972. Maintaining contact with his mentors, he returned to Galax in 1972, 1990 and 1991 to play in James Lindsey’s band, the Mountain Ramblers, gingerly standing in for the great Otis Burris. Hank was the Washington old-time fiddle champion of 1975.
Hank has continued with fiddle music as a musical language, in which improvised variations and new compositions within Southern idioms form the essential grammar. Hank believes that compositions in particular mark a student’s transition from reciting statements by others, to making convincing statements of his own. All the classic old fiddle tunes are surviving examples of just such statements, and Hank’s teaching aims at assisting fiddlers with repertoire, playing techniques and tune structure in a way that will provide a foundation for participation in the full spectrum of the art of Southern fiddling.
Candy Goldman has been playing the banjo since the 1970s. She takes her inspiration from all the many tradition bearers she has visited with in the southeast and learned from at the Festival of American Fiddle Tunes. Candy is an experienced teacher and has performed with such notable bands as the Cowlickers,the Wounded Egos and currently with the Blogtrotters.
Bruce Greene is best known for preserving and playing the fiddle music of Kentucky. As a young man, Bruce traveled throughout the state of Kentucky collecting and learning from the last generation of traditional fiddlers there, some born as far back as the 1880s. Bruce apprenticed with a number of older fiddlers including Hiram Stamper, the family of John Salyer, Manon Campbell, Gusty Wallace, and Jim Bowles, learning their archaic repertoires and bowing techniques, and introducing them to the contemporary old time fiddle world. Although he has been highly influenced by the musicians he has visited, Bruce has developed a personal style characterized by subtlety, attention to detail, and relaxed, but precise bowing.
Since the late 1970s, Bruce has lived in western North Carolina with his family, where he has continued to learn from local traditional musicians. He has taught at Swannanoa, Augusta, and Mars Hill. In addition to fiddling, Bruce also studied old time banjo with the Helton family of east Kentucky, and sings unaccompanied ballads both solo and with his partner, Loy McWhirter. Bruce also performs with master dulcimer player, Don Pedi.
Don Pedi's music sounds with a clear melody and a pureness of spirit. For over forty years Don has amazed and delighted audiences with his unique "Fiddle-Pick" style of playing the dulcimer. Drawing on decades of association with many of the best musicians in the southern mountains, as well as his deep commitment to preserving the old music, Don carries on the tradition in an exciting and innovative fashion.
Don grew up in a musical family, the grandson of a guitar and mandolin playing barber, in Chelsea, Massachusetts. His first exposure to the mountain dulcimer was in 1964 at a coffee house in Boston, at a Richard and Mimi Fariña concert. Four years later he took up the dulcimer himself, and like so many young Northeastern musicians in love with Southern music, he soon moved to the North Carolina mountains. In 1974 he entered his first contest, at Fiddler's Grove in North Carolina, and won first place. By 1980 he had won so many contests at Fiddler's Grove that he was certified "Master Dulcimer Player" and retired from future competitions.
Considered a pioneer of the dulcimer, Pedi's music has broken new ground and cleared the path for other musicians. He is even credited by many with helping the dulcimer gain acceptance as an instrument suited for traditional Southern Dance music, as many old-time musicians felt the dulcimer was better suited as a piece of art hung on a wall. He currently performs solo, as a duo with Bruce Greene or in a group with Bruce. In 2003 Don represented Appalachia at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.
Alice Gerrard is respected as a fiddler, banjo player, rhythm guitarist, vocalist, and as an advocate of traditional music. Her nuanced southern vocal style, down-home fiddle playing and songwriting first gained her notoriety through her pioneering work with Hazel Dickens. The four albums Alice and Hazel recorded between 1965 and 1975, plus their many performances provided inspiration for other women who were drawn to the high lonesome sound of bluegrass. Her fiddle style is influenced by Luther Davis, Tommy Jarrell, Roscoe Parish and other traditional fiddlers who taught her. She has performed and recorded with some of the most cherished names in bluegrass and old-time music.
Alice spent many years living in Galax, Virginia, learning regional music from the local old-time luminaries. Several recordings with her Galax friends, stints with the Strange Creek Singers, the Harmony Sisters, the group Tom, Brad & Alice, and a duet album with Mike Seeger, further define her legacy and provide a source of repertoire for others to learn. From 1987 until 2003, Alice edited and published the Old-Time Herald before stepping down to pursue her current musical interests as performer, songwriter, and recording artist. Alice is currently working on a new album.
Rick Good was a founding member of the Hotmud Family, a twenty-four year veteran of Rhythm in Shoes and a 2010 Ohio Heritage Fellow.
He is recognized and respected for his driving banjo, swinging guitar, his heartfelt singing and his crafty songwriting.
With his wife and long-time collaborator, Sharon Leahy, Rick has made a life of creating critically acclaimed performance art, rooted in American traditions.
He currently plays with the bands, ShoeFly and the Red Clay Ramblers.
Eddie Bond is from Fries, Virginia, a Grayson County village of 600 just north of the “Crooked Road” that was built around a now-disappeared cotton mill on the headwaters of the New River. That cotton mill produced four of the high-flying bands of the twenties; bands that helped invent country music with recordings on major labels and through radio broadcasting. Eddie plays in the forceful rhythmic dance style from the Galax/Mt. Airy area that captivated the nation in the 1960s. He learned directly from legendary masters Tommy Jarrell, Fred Cockerham, and Kyle Creed, and other great musicians who did not record. Like many of the older masters fiddlers from whom he learned, he is also a fine performer in the older clawhammer banjo style of the region, as well as a talented singer. Eddie plays at many dances in the region and is a frequent winner in the area’s many traditional fiddle and banjo competitions. A dynamic performer, he brings flair and a sense of humor to the music that engages audiences and delights musicians. Eddie is known for his powerful voice, and is often found singing and fiddling at the local Wednesday night jam session at the New River Café in Fries.
Eddie’s frequent musical partner is fiddler and banjoist Kirk Sutphin, a master of the Round Peak style long identified with the Galax/Mt. Airy area on the Virginia-North Carolina border. Thousands of others perform in this pre-bluegrass style, but Kirk differs in the razor edge of quality he brings to his performance. He also differs in that he comes from within the tradition. His grandfather, a fiddler and banjoist, was from Round Peak. Famed fiddler Tommy Jarrell, also from Round Peak, spent much time teaching tunes to a young Kirk. Sutphin is a master of the pure Round Peak style on both fiddle and clawhammer banjo. The banjo style of this area is highly developed, and Kirk’s smooth and seemingly effortless technique is especially evident when he plays the fretless. He also has a rich knowledge of other historic banjo styles from the Blue Ridge and Piedmont. Kirk toured the nation twice with the NCTA’s Masters of the Banjo tour, and became the favorite old-time banjoist of another participant, Ralph Stanley. He has performed at a number of major U.S. festivals. Kirk is housepainter by profession.
BLUEGRASS AND TEXAS SWING
The legendary fiddler Bobby Hicks was born in Newton, North Carolina in 1933 and started playing fiddle when he was nine years old. He is self taught and was hired by Bluegrass legend Bill Monroe in 1954 to play bass, but switched to fiddle after fiddler Gordon Terry was drafted into the military. Bobby spent the 1960's through the middle 70's in Iowa, Montana, Oregon and Las Vegas.
In 1975 he returned home to North Carolina, where he met Ricky Skaggs at Camp Springs, North Carolina. In 1981, Bobby joined the Ricky Skaggs Band, which was one of the hottest country bands of the 1980's and received many, many awards including three time winners of the CMA "Instrumental Group of the Year", three time winners of Music City News "Bluegrass Act of the Year", the five time winners of the Academy of Country Music 's "Touring Band of the Year".
The Ricky Skaggs Band transitioned to Ricky Skaggs and Kentucky Thunder and became an award winning Bluegrass band - twice winning the IBMA and SPBGMA's "Instrumental Group of the Year" in 1999 and 2000. Additionally, they have won Grammy awards for Bluegrass Rules!, Ancient Tones, Soldiers of the Cross, History of the Future and Live from Charleston Music Hall (Bobby's last album with Ricky).
In many ways, Bobby has come full circle - back to Bluegrass music where he started years ago. Bluegrass music is enjoying a resurgence in popularity not seen since the 1950's. Whether it's teaching young fiddlers or playing a hot fiddle break on stage, Bobby Hicks is a living legend and continues to contribute to the enjoyment of fans everywhere.
Adam Masters is a classically trained violinist who loves to fiddle. Starting with Suzuki as a youth and playing in various orchestras throughout high school, Adam has studied fiddle exclusively since 2001. Adam has learned more than a hundred local fiddle tunes from legendary fiddlers Arvil Freeman and Bobby Hicks and has won multiple awards for his fiddling. In addition to learning tunes Adam has extensively studied music theory…figuring out the “why” something sounds good and then teaching the “how” so that his students have the tools to create their own ideas and melodies within the framework of the tune. Adam teaches at various camps throughout the U.S. teaching bluegrass fiddle and improvisation. Adam is a local realtor by day as well as the 2011 chair of the Folk Heritage Committee which puts on Shindig on the Green. Adam plays violin with the swing band Vipers Dream as well as filling in for various fiddlers around the area.
CAPE BRETON
Cape Breton fiddler Andrea Beaton is the youngest of generations of Beaton family musicians. Andrea’s father, Kinnon, and grandfather, Donald Angus Beaton are some of the tradition’s most influential players. Over the generations, the Mabou Beatons have been celebrated for their music on the fiddle and pipes, and have become the prime practitioners of what has come to be recognized as one of the most distinctive of the local styles in the area, the Mabou Coal Mines sound.
Like her father and grandfather, Andrea is a composer in the tradition, adding fine new music to the island’s repertoire. Andrea is an energetic fiddler who mixes old traditional tunes with more modern pieces. She has released many of her own albums, and is featured on the Smithsonian Folkways Recordings release, Cape Breton Fiddle and Piano Music: The Beaton Family of Mabou, along with members of her extended family.
Troy MacGillivray is a multitalented musician who was born into a rich musical tradition. For generations, the MacGillivrays on his father's side and the MacDonalds on his mother's side have been proprietors of the Gaelic tradition in Antigonish, Nova Scotia. Troy first began impressing audiences with his step dancing skills at age 6. By 13, he was teaching piano at the renowned Gaelic College of Celtic Arts and Crafts in St. Anne's, Cape Breton. Today Troy is a top tier fiddle player, and a highly regarded pianist. As a pianist, he is known for his unique approach to accompaniment.
Troy has received numerous awards for his traditional and contemporary recordings. In 2005, Troy made his first appearance Celtic Connections in Glasgow, Scotland where he was chosen as the winner of the honourable “Danny Kyle Stage”. Troy plays numerous dances, concerts and ceilidhs throughout Canada and the United Kingdom. Troy’s playing embodies unique sense of pride and commitment to his Celtic heritage. His music continues to add to the history and development of the traditional music that is the epitome of the Maritimes.
MAGDALEN ISLANDS
Bertrand Deraspe is one of the great Acadian fiddlers and heir to a rich tradition of highly rhythmic dance fiddling and melancholic medieval songs. This is the fiddling that the Acadians later brought to Louisiana and that forms the roots of today’s Cajun music. Born to the renowned fiddler and traditional singer, Arnold Deraspe, Bertrand was exposed to the traditional fiddling of The Magdalen Islands (Les-îles-de-la-Madeleine) at a young age. These wind-swept islands off the Northeast Coast of Québec have been home to Acadian music since the Great Deportation. The British skipped the Magdalens when they expelled the Acadians from the Maritime Provinces, and their rough-and-tumble fiddling and old songs took root on the on these remote islands, along with their love of the sea and fishing.
In fact, Bertrand is a professional lobster fisherman, and gave up a life touring with the Acadian super-group Suroît to stay home and fish. Bertrand formed Suroît in 1977 and continued to play fiddle in the band for years. Known for their blending of Acadian folk traditions and rocking country-western music, Suroît was one of the most popular Acadian folk rock bands for years. Now Bertrand is known and respected throughout the Magdalens, Acadie and Québec as one of the finest fiddlers of his generation with a repository of tunes drawn from the older repertoires of Magdalen Island fiddlers.
Alain Turbide is one of the preferred piano accompanists in the Magadalen Islands (les-iles-de-la-Madeleine). He's performed with Bertrand Deraspe for years, traveling with him to festivals and performances and lives close to him in the town of L'Etang du Nord.
Alain comes from a musical family, where his brothers played piano and bass, and his grandfather was a fiddler. He still plays for square dances on the islands, but mostly he plays with Bertrand for local performances.
Like Bertrand's fiddling, Alain has developed a style of piano accompaniment unique to the Magdalen Islands that is influenced by Canadian Maritime music, especially Cape Breton, but also folk music from the province of Quebec.
CAJUN
Marc Savoy is a Cajun accordion player and a central figure in the revival and preservation of traditional Cajun music. Marc builds some of the best accordions in the world and is a proponent of an undiluted Cajun musical tradition.
Marc was born in 1940 on a rice farm near Eunice, an area which was saturated with old-time Cajun musicians. Young Marc was intrigued by the accordion and the sounds it made in the hands of the great musicians in his neighborhood. He repaired an old accordion so that he could learn to play, and by 1965, he decided to open up a music store and build accordions on a full-time basis.
Marc and his wife, Ann, restored his grandfather's house in the Savoy community near Eunice and settled there to raise a family. Today, Marc plays accordion in The Savoy-Doucet Cajun Band and in The Savoy Family Band.
Ann Allen Savoy is a musician, photographer, record producer, and writer. Ann sings, plays guitar, fiddle, and accordion. Ann’s destiny was sealed when she began to listen to rare 78 recordings of Cajun music. She began documenting Cajun culture, taking photographs, interviewing important musicians, and transcribing Cajun French songs. Her documentation ultimately became a comprehensive book, Cajun Music: A Reflection of a People Volume 1.
Ann, a musician since the age of ten, has toured extensively with her husband, Marc Savoy and with Michael Doucet as the Savoy Doucet Cajun Band. She and her friend Jane Vidrine also formed the Grammy nominated Magnolia Sisters, and all women band, to explore the womanly side of Cajun music. Currently she is proud to play in the Savoy Family Cajun Band, with her husband and two sons, Joel and Wilson. Most recently, she has put together a Django Reinhardt-style swing band called, Ann Savoy and her Sleepless Knights and also released “Adieu False Heart”, a CD of duets with the legendary Linda Ronstadt.
Michael Doucet, fiddler, composer, and bandleader, is perhaps the single most important figure in the revitalization of Cajun music in the United States. In 1975, he applied to the National Endowment for the Arts for an apprenticeship grant to study with and document the master fiddlers of his region. Doucet met and learned from the great elders of Louisiana music--Dewey Balfa, Dennis McGee, Clifton Chenier and Canray Fontenot, among others.
Doucet put what he learned into practice, not only dispelling academic snobbery but actively crusading to turn the world itself on to the richness of Louisiana's Cajun-Creole cultural heritage. Eventually, he formed his own band, BeauSoleil, which is today recognized as the premiere traditional Cajun musical ensemble. Lafayette based Doucet also plays with the The Savoy-Doucet Cajun Band.
IRISH
Liz Carroll, a gifted Irish fiddler, composer, and National Heritage Fellow, is one of traditional music's most sought after performers. Liz Carroll first astounded the Irish music scene in the United States and Ireland when she won the senior division championship title at the age of 18. Since then she has toured as a solo artist and with the Greenfields of America, Trian, String Sisters, and as part of the highly esteemed duo, Liz Carroll & John Doyle. Liz’s spine straightening style "conjures up a dizzying mixture of the sweetest tones, the fastest runs, and the most dazzling display of musicianship imaginable," says P.J. Curtis of the Irish American.
In 2010, Carroll became the first American-born traditional Irish musician to be nominated for a Grammy, when her recording with John Doyle, Double Play was nominated in the "Best Traditional World Music Album" category. This year Liz also published a long awaited printed collection of her own compositions called, “Collected.”
John Doyle is an Irish guitar player known for his distinctive style of guitar-playing and innovative tunings. His playing encompasses hard-driving strumming, inventive chord voicings, precise single-note runs, and powerful rhythmic effects borrowed from traditional instruments such as the bodhran and fiddle. John Doyle’s gifts as a guitarist, songwriter, vocalist, and producer have played an essential role in the ongoing renaissance of Irish traditional music.
John was surrounded by traditional music from his earliest years. His father Sean is a remarkable singer and collector of songs, with a vast repertoire of traditional ballads committed to memory. Tommy Doyle, John’s grandfather, taught him his first instrumental tunes.
John first rose to international prominence with Solas, the all-star Irish/American band whose emergence heralded the arrival of a new generation of bold, inventive traditional musicians. When the original members of Solas parted ways, Doyle embarked on a solo career, producing albums for other artists and touring as a sideman as well as recording his own material. John currently plays with Irish fiddler, Liz Carroll, among others.
NEW ENGLAND
Dudley Laufman has been actively involved in contra dance for over 50 years as caller, musician, composer, band leader, teacher, and latterly, documenter of the work of older musicians. The name Dudley Laufman is so closely associated with the contra and barn dances of New England that most long-term residents refer to local gatherings as "Dudley Dances." Laufman plays fiddle, accordion, concertina, melodeon, and harmonica.
Dudley came to New Hampshire in 1947 to work at a dairy farm and began to attend local contra and square dances. He called his first dance in 1948 and soon started his own musical group for the dances, which later became the Canterbury Country Dance Orchestra. During the 1970s, the orchestra made a number of recordings, and Laufman traveled throughout the region, performing and teaching dance at schools, community centers, and public parks, averaging 300 or more engagements each year.
Today he performs and gives workshops with his partner Jacqueline as the duo Two Fiddles. Dudley and Jacqueline live in the rustic house he built on the edge of the Canterbury woods in New Hampshire. The small structure is still heated with wood and has no television or refrigerator. A big garden provides much of their food. They live this way by choice, because it is fun and an adventure. They call their home, as well as the dances they give there on the fifth Saturday in the month, "Wind in the Timothy."
Dudley has been recognized for his contributions in many ways, including the 2001 New Hampshire Governor's Award in the Arts for Folk Heritage and a was a recipient of a 2009 National Heritage Fellowship.
Jacqueline Laufman first apprenticed to be a dance fiddler with Dudley Laufman in 1986, became a full time dance musician 1994 and continues to this day. While growing up, her dad played accordion and piano, mostly ragtime and the popular tunes of the day. She wanted to play piano but never got lessons.
She was first inspired to learn an instrument after hearing and enjoying the revelry of Morris dancing at the Canterbury Fair in 1980. She danced on the mixed-side team of which Dudley was the leader. When she learned that he earned his living playing music but didn’t read music, she thought, If he can do it, so can I. It wasn’t long before she picked up a penny whistle and played. By 1986, she had bought a fiddle and taught herself the tunes that Dudley tape recorded for her to learn from. Soon he began hiring her for gigs. The following year she became Dudley’s partner in business, Two Fiddles, and later became his partner in life.
As a Master Artist with New Hampshire State Council on the Arts, Jacqueline orally passes on this tradition of fiddling for dances and playing by ear to her students. She presents at local fiddle camps and educational conferences for music and physical education teachers nationally. At home, she walks daily though the beautiful land of historic Shaker Village, plays pond hockey as the ice allows, canoes, reads and plays fiddle as Dudley reads poems at poetry readings.
SWEDISH
Paul Dahlin is the American "taproot" to one of Sweden's most venerable and widely admired regional music, that of the province of Dalarna. Based in Minnesota, Paul is a fiddler, violin repairman, composer, festival organizer, and cultural spokesman.
Paul took up the fiddle when he was nine, by the time he was 17, Paul was performing regularly with his elders at Swedish American events. As his playing matured, he moved into the lead role while playing with his grandfather, and his Uncle Bruce. The three fiddlers called their group the American Swedish Spelmans ("folk instrumentalist") Trio. They performed at festivals and on the public radio program Prairie Home Companion and, in 1983, gave a command performance for the king of Sweden when he visited the United States.
Paul helped organize The ASI Spelmanslag, a fiddling group of the American Swedish Institute in Minneapolis. It currently has more than 40 fiddlers of all ages, from teenagers to octogenarians. The group practices weekly, and performs several times annually. Dahlin is hailed by his Swedish colleagues as an important keeper of a deep musical tradition.
GUITAR
Wayne C. Henderson is the Appalachian guitarist the Nashville pickers talk about, the one who lives in a very remote area of the Blue Ridge and makes those acoustic guitars with the amazing tone, the ones that are so hard to get. Sometimes Wayne’s playing is mistaken for flat-picking but actually he uses a thumb pick and fingerpicks to achieve amazing speed and fluidity, transforming fiddle and banjo pieces and even the occasional jazz standard into stunning guitar solos. Henderson was born, raised and still lives in tint Rugby, Virginia, population seven, in Grayson County near the North Carolina border. His father and uncle were musicians who for a time played in the string band of Estil Ball, a renowned guitarist in the area. Wayne admired Mr. Ball’s music and was impressed by his guitar, a steel-string Martin. Wayne wanted to play guitar, but he couldn’t afford a Martin, so he ordered one from the Sears catalogue. The mail-order instrument was a sad disappointment, one that helped launch him on his career as a guitar maker. Wayne Henderson built his first guitar using traced patterns and the wood from the bottom of a dresser drawer. More than two hundred guitars later, Henderson is considered one of the most extraordinary instrument makers in the world. He learned much of what he knows from the legendary Albert Hash, instrument maker and old-time musician who lived a few miles away and who was respected widely for the superior quality of his work and for his generous encouragement of aspiring young instrument makers.
Henderson’s shop is, and has always been, more than a place of work and business. It is a place where the Rugby community comes together to share knowledge, music, and most importantly, time. Henderson recently retired from his job as a U.S. Postal carrier and now has more time to devote to playing and instrument making. In 1995 he received the National Endowment for the Arts’ National Heritage Fellowship, the nation’s greatest honor for those who practice traditional arts. He has performed throughout the United States and the world, has taken first place 13 times in the Galax Fiddlers’ Convention guitar competition, and is honored annually by friends and neighbors at the Wayne C. Henderson Music Festival and Guitar Competition, held in Grayson Highlands State Park.
Tutorial Coordinator - Kevin Carr
Introductory Level Tutorials
Jane Rothfield - fiddle
Agi Ban - fiddle
Maggie Lind - banjo
Bruce Reid - guitar
Intermediate Level Tutorials
Jenny Lester - bluegrass fiddle
Courtney Granger - Cajun fiddle
Anthea Lawrence - Irish fiddle
Helen White - old time fiddle
Laurie Rivin - Quebecois fiddle
Betse Ellis - old time fiddle
Karen Heil - old time fiddle
Allen Hart - banjo
Jack Dwyer - mandolin
Paul Rangell - guitar
Daniel Steinberg - piano
Frannie Leopold - singing
Sharon Leahy - solo dance
Wilson Savoy - Cajun accordion
David Romtvedt - accordion
Nadine Landry - bass
David Kaynor - dance caller/alt band lab
David Cahn - beginner’s band lab
Kid’s Track Instructors
Cathie Whitesides, June Cannon, Pat Yearian, Kristin Smith, Melanie Luedders, Dina Blade
Kid’s Band Instructors
Caroline Oakley, Maggie Lind, Caitlin Romtvedt, Margo Brown, Brooke Bubna
Roving Red Noses and Rabble Rousers
Laurie Andres, Luther Black, Christina Wright, Tony Mates, Catherine Alexander, Charmaine Slaven, Charlie Beck, Greg Canote, Jere Canote, Steve Trampe, and others...
