Asheville Citizen-Times from Asheville, North Carolina • Page 3

Roaming: Death Stills The Magic WestgateOpen Ik ft today 10-6 pm ly ft lAC AlrVI Continued From Page One of his little house and listened ASHEVILLE CITIZEN-TIMES, Sun. nl I once asked Bascom Lamar March 24, 1974 3A Ltmsford, the Minstrel of the Appalachians, to name me the best fiddle-player he had ever that time. He was livin' down at i Whittier. He was the king-pin fiddler, the champion fiddler of North Carolina for 50 years. to him talk and play his fiddle Makes for right music.

tornours. aiwayS beat the straws for Its all down on tape, and my daddy when he played Old yesterday after they had laid i Daddy Bowback, or what some him to rest I relived those calls Fire In The Mountains.1 long-ago hours with him. The old man raised his fiddle I remembered how he rosined to his shoulder again and up, his bow, tucked his fiddle touched the bow to the strings Of course, I didn't want to play against Dedrick, but he asked me to piay. He saw, you play. Well, when it was over with the judges decided to give "This one is called The Last underneath his chin, and whipped into a piece called known.

He wouldn t. What he did say was this: "When it comes to the best fiddle-players you have to name Marcus Martin of Swannanoa, Manco Sneed the Cherokee Indian, Dedrick Harris from Whittier, Fiddlin' Bill Hensley of Madison, Jesse Rogers of Henderson, and Pender Rector of Madison." But I felt it was significant that he started his list off with Marcus Martin. For he truly was a great old-time fiddler, maybe the best Gold Dollar," he said. "It's one that Aunt Samantha Bumgarner made up. Reckon you heard of 1 mi 11 1 1 iu.

"Cumberland Gap." When he finished, he said: Fiddlin' Balladvoman of me the prize over him. "Dedrick was a much better player than I was, and I couldn't understand why I got it. But he always told me, 'Now you're the best old-time fiddler there is in this country Love's Field. Lived over in a viuiuuai. vvildl 1 play IB old-time stuff.

I don't know a Jackson County. She was just thing about music, about the most complete music- maker that ever come along. "And I said, 'Well, I don't that ever came along. She could pick, fiddle, guitar, "I play quite a number of tunes. Reckon 1 know around 300 or so.

They're what you call old-fashioned stuff. Scolding Wife, Sandy River, a piece sins and dance. "No, I don't remember what the first tune was that I ever think so. I think I'm about as1 sorry as there But I won the prize over him. I didn't deserve it.

But the judges gave it to me. And I still say I didn't deserve it." "I played with Dedrick in played. But I could play Shout, Lou and Cindy. Well, almost all called Calico, a piece called i Happy Holler, Cluck Old Hen. Old time stuff.

"And Sourwood Mduntain, Oinnlp Crppk Shnnt I mi NAACP Officer Addresses Unit Here April 1 Alfred Baker Lewis of Greenwich, treasurer-emeritus of them old pieces back then JuliediRoma Junior Portrait Printzess Ah Spring! The new Spring Coat is all things to all women iThev don't play 'em much Turkey in the Straw, -SL, Katie Hill, Turkey Buzzard, he broke into Shout, of the national board of the Put ther Gray Eagle, Polly When he finished I asked him "I more conventions than almost anybody else almost. And it was always nip and tuck, but I never could win but that once." Years later when they had contests at the State Fair in Raleigh, and Dedrick was long dead, some of Martin's friends rv- IT1 NAACP, will speak at 8 p.m. April 1 at the Senior Op v' EAAE if he ever sang when he played. portunities Center on Grove "No, I don't sing. I listen," he shot Lincoln, Street durine the annual kickoff said.

"My mouth's so big mj membership drive of tne voice gets lost in it and I can't sing." Asheville chapter of NAACP. "There's one called Lady Hamilton. That one came over from England. It's a little slow but it's okay. I've been playin' Lewis, a retired insurance persuaded him to enter.

So, in 1949 he took down his fiddle and his bow and went to Raleigh. He won and became the champion fiddler of North He laughed, began playing Cindy and, in a high, thin voice, chanted: executive, has been a member of the NAACP's board of it for 60 years. Ever since I started playing a fiddle. directors for 27 years and "Cindy had a punkin, she started to town. She heard the Carolina.

served as the organization's it 11 Won it again in 1950." he I Vff I 11 1 treasurer for 12 years. "Got my first fiddle when I was about 14 years old. I'm 75 now. I paid $3 for it. Got it from an old man named Walls.

He said, "and never tried for it it lii 1 He has authored a number of Iff I cample ts including "True again, figured I could just sit back and let somebody else train a comin' and throwed her wnkin down. Get along home, Cindy, Cindy, Cindy, get along home." He grinned. "I can't sing," he said. Freedom for Negro and White Workers: "Why We Have i vvs3 Recessions and Depressions;" He recalled that back in the have a chance." Hie old man wouldn't say so, but it was generally understood that the State Fair folks reckoned that if he kept comin' he would keep winnin' and soon o'd davs he clayed the fiddle ail and "Progress At very Deliberate Speed." Lewis is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and the university's School of Law. He also taueht economics at the through the mountains, at It's a Travel Coat, a Coat-for-little-evenings, a Casual Coat, a Sunday Coat whatever vmi want it tn be! It mav be a traditional all lived about two miles from us over in Macon County.

"No, nobody taught me how to fiddle. I could almost play when I first picked up the fiddle. I could tune it and go right on with it just the same. I couldn't do it as good as I can (now, 'but anyway I could play. "Don't ask me how it come to me.

I don't know for sure. I gitess it was talent, if you would call it that. Just come naturally. nobody would want to fiddle dances and hoedowns and get-togethers, and fiddlers' con ventions. against him.

If. ft university. A member of the On the wall in our house is one of the rare dulcimers he Teachers, he is affliated with "I played once," he said, "for an hour and 20 minutes without the AFW3IO, a member of the made a masterpiece in cherrv Americans for Democratic Ac and holly. It is one of only about wool, or miraculous polyester in cord or jacquard design no matter which you choose, it-can be the most wearably welcome coat you own! We have them in white, red. celery, navy and a host of combinations with the most respected labels in America.

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"Back then fiddlers' con tion and a supporter of the Iff 51' 1 All my ancestors were a aozen wiat he made, but all of them were masterpieces and musicians, see, and I guess I ventions were all the go. There ook it from them. American Civil Liberties Union Shortest Monarch are now collectors items. Another one of these few "My father played. He was a1 was one somewhere about every two months.

Held 'em in all the cood old-time fiddler. What I graces the study of Robert Bun- King Charles barely over nelle, who, unlike me, can play a dulcimer. five feet tall, was the shortest tV.ll "Ml counties. There'd be five, ten, fifteen or more fiddlers. They come from all around.

And they give prizes for the best fiddler. Tfcere was so much magic in English monarch. ins lianas inai nis carvings ot the second best, and the third mountain people and mountain mean is, he play the sweetest you ever heard. I remember when I was just a small boy he would play and I would beat the battens or the straws for him. You never heard of that? Why, that's takin' straws and beatinthe time on the the other fellow saws on the fiddle.

best. Every county had 'em and scenes done only on comtniS' you went from county to county, sion and then with a great deal "I was at a convention in of hesitancy, are now priceless, Andrews in October of 1918 and but the genius of his whittling Dedrick Harris was living at fingers rubbed off on his sons. KM Spring Zings Bright and Right Natural Gas dries a lot more clothes for a lot less money. That's right! With gas, you can dry about 3 13 loads with the same amount of primary energy it takes to dry 1 load electrically. And for less than half the cost.

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