The Southern Highland Reader

Art comes in many forms and the newest addition to Southwestern Community College’s Oconaluftee Institute of Cultural Arts is actually old. It’s a letterpress that will be used to print books in the Cherokee syllabary.

“We are bringing back the Cherokee history in true art form,” said Luzene Hill, OICA progam outreach coordinator.

Years ago the Eastern Band published a newspaper called Tsa la gi Tsu lehisanunhi, or the Cherokee Phoenix. This first Native American newspaper was printed on a hot-type letterpress in which each word is put together by hand, combining individual metal letters or characters.

Through a $68,846 grant from Cherokee Preservation Foundation and a $47,792 grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services, OICA will purchase a metal press and develop a print-making studio at its facilities on Bingo Loop Road in Cherokee.

“It opens up a whole new craft of Book Art for us, including print making, hand papermaking and hand bookbinding,” said Hill. “For our students Book Art will blend fine arts with crafts.”

Sequoyah, the inventor of the Cherokee syllabary, recognized that conveying ideas in language was powerful so he spent 12 years developing the Cherokee syllabary, completing it in 1821. Each character represents a syllable, instead of one sound, thus the name syllabary.  As in the Phoenix newspaper, the power of the Cherokee language rises through the printed word on the page, transforming from thoughts to art, Hill explained.

“You already feel the power  of words but capturing them in a book through individual characters you’ve laid out in hot type and on paper you’ve made from linen or hemp fiber really helps you feel them in an art form, too,” said Hill. “To me, binding a book- accordion-style, for instance, is like producing a piece of sculpture.”

“You already feel the power  of words but capturing them in a book through individual characters you’ve laid out in hot type and on paper you’ve made from linen or hemp fiber really helps you feel them in an art form, too. To me, binding a book- accordion-style, for instance, is like producing a piece of sculpture.”

As students learn to produce first the paper and then the books, they will also learn skills such as precision, technique, spacing and artistic layout composition, said Hill, who is consulting with noted instructor Frank Brannon. Brannon, who runs his own letterpress studio SpeakEasy Press in Dillsboro, earned his master of fine arts in Book Arts at the University of Alabama and has recently taught Letterpress at the Penland School of Crafts and Papermaking and Printing at the John C. Campbell Folk School.

“One of Frank’s specialties is the Cherokee Phoenix newspaper,” said Hill. “He has explored and published copies from the original hand impressions of type from the Phoenix, found in a 1954 excavation of the New Echota historic site. He hand printed and hand bound the publications for exhibition.”

“The Phoenix was a bi-lingual weekly newspaper printed in parallel columns in Cherokee and English and one of its biggest subscribers was the British Library,” said Brannon, who also teaches at Book Works in Asheville. “Most folks don’t know that the paper was distributed in Europe, too. The first issue was published Feb. 21, 1828, using the 85 character Cherokee syllabary completed by Sequoyah just seven years earlier,” he said.

The first paper that the Phoenix was printed on came from Knoxville by wagon and it took two weeks to arrive, according to Brannon. The last issue was published in 1834, shortly before the Cherokee removal to Indian Territory in Oklahoma.

“Students will learn the Cherokee history right along with the history of the letterpress,” said Hill.

The Cherokee language will also be incorporated into the course since the books can be published in the Cherokee syllabary, she added.

MURPHY–Dwight Otwell, staff writer for the Cherokee Scout in Murphy, reported recently about efforts made by mountain farmers to diversify and to profit from niche crops.

Agriculture has dwindled rapidly in the mountains, where farmers face not only the standard competition from industrial farming, but the added challenge of a lack of flat land.

Otwell’s lead:

Farmers who make their entire livelihood from working the land are almost a relic from the past in Cherokee County.

As the number of large farms has steadily dwindled, a new type of farmer has emerged, one who can forge a living from an acre or two growing for a specialty market.

He goes on to interview a vintner, a dairy farmer and vegetable farmers, all of whom are using innovative methods to make their famrs work.

Another excerpt:

A new type of market is using the Internet to sell products to high-end restaurants or consumers. The main market for this area is Atlanta.

The idea is that a chef gets the fresh produce he wants the next day, Wood said. The chef knows the farm the produce comes from and he trusts it. A person with as little as a half acre of land willing to grow specialty crops can make $20,000 to $30,000 an acre.

Read Otwell’s story in the Scout here.

DILLSBORO–This story, in which Constance Richards writes up Barry Kennon’s tiki bar party spot outside his house on the Tuckasegee near Dillsboro, first ran in the August edition of swanky WNC Magazine.

It’s been posted online since, so, given that party journalism pieces are few and far between in the mountains, it obviously needed sharing.

Kennon, a championship kayaker, modeled his tiki bar after one he knew in Costa Rica, and built it around his boat takeout.

Here’s an excerpt:

As more decorations go up, including tiki totems and palm leaves, Dieter Kuhn, Sylva’s resident brewmeister and owner of Heinzelmännchen Brewery, takes the B.Y.O.B. standard to a master’s level and taps a keg of his seasonal Hoppy Gnome. The set-up crew continues their work with golden pints in hand.

“If you only eat your own food and drink your own beer, you’re selling yourself short,” says Kuhn. “We have so many great venues in this little area—people really come together and like to share what they have to offer.”

In the kitchen, [former Spring St. Cafe chef Karl] Engelmann is crisping slices of fresh ciabatta bread and sesame-covered filone from Annie’s Naturally Bakery in the oven, which will be served with a panoply of cheeses. For the early guests, he sends out a platter of thick triangles of farmstead cheeses from Yellow Branch Pottery & Cheese, globes of Dark Cove goat cheese covered in chopped chives, and crudités.

Moving on to the trout, he blends pork sausage from Nantahala Meats and Poultry in Franklin, chopped croutons, garlic, and herbs, and spoons the mixture into the whole trout before wrapping each with bright green banana leaves and tying them with string. “This will literally steam the fish, keep the moisture in, and enhance the flavors,” Engelmann says. He has another trick in mind, too. Shells from the boiled peanuts he’s serving with the Cobb salad will go into the grill flames to add a nutty flavor.

Read the whole story here.

REGIONAL-The ongoing conflict over usage rights on the Chattooga River is worth following, if, for no other reason, as a harbinger of things to come.

In its December issue, Blue Ridge Outdoors writer Graham Averill does a nice job of making the issue clear, and the magazine throws in maps, a timeline and a “headwaters highlights” section.

Here is Averill’s lead:

For three decades, paddlers have yearned to paddle the pristine waters of the Upper Chattooga River. Earlier this year, the U.S. Forest Service finally granted limited access of the Upper Chattooga to paddlers, but a flurry of legal threats—including a legal challenge from the paddling community—prompted the Forest Service to rescind their decision a few weeks ago, once again leaving boaters high and dry.

Paddlers have been banned from the entire 21-mile headwaters of the Chattooga and its tributaries since 1976, after the U.S. Forest Service divided the river in two parts due to a series of user conflicts. Citing fistfights, slashed boats, and gun play, the forest service separated the two user groups: Boating would be allowed on the lower Chattooga, but the upper 21 miles of the river and its headwaters would be reserved for fishing.

Another clip:

Many conservation groups, including Georgia Forest Watch and the Chattooga Conservancy, support the current zoning of the river into boating and non-boating sections. Other popular recreation areas like Tsali and Bent Creek are also zoned; some trails allow mountain bikes, ATVs or horses, while others are designated foot traffic only. Anglers also support the current zoning of the Chattooga, saying that it’s a more-than-equitable compromise: the 36-mile lower Chattooga is given to boaters, while the 21-mile upper Chattooga is protected for fishermen and hikers seeking a wilderness experience.

Ironically, no parties concerned in the Chattooga access issue seemed to be happy with the Forest Service’s recent decision. Soon after it was announced, the Forest Service was threatened with legal action from all sides: four separate appeals were filed by boaters, anglers, and conservation organizations. As a result, the Forest Service withdrew its decision to fully consider the concerns raised by the user groups.

Averill sources the Cullowhee-based group American Whitewater quite a bit in the story, and offers quotes from all sides.

Read the story here.

REGIONAL–Charlotte Observer Associate Editor Jack Betts posts about the season’s first snow.

A clip:

The snow gave up its ghosts around dusk when it thinned, bucked, coughed and stopped. An hour later the clouds parted and a cold luminescence lit up the landscape, giving these old hills an eerie specter until the wind began to pick up, blowing snow devils around like little white upside-down tornadoes. We threw more locust on the fire and poured a wee dram, and wondered briefly and idly if we might be able to salvage a snowed-in call to the office out of this lovely gift of late fall in the Blue Ridge.

Read the post at his blog here.

Ron Rash

CULLOWHEE – Ron Rash, the Parris Distinguished Professor of Appalachian Culture at Western Carolina University, is recipient of the 2009 Sir Walter Raleigh Award for Fiction for his fourth novel, “Serena.”

The award is presented annually by the North Carolina Literary and Historical Association in recognition of works of fiction that exhibit “creative and imaginative quality, excellence of style, universality of appeal, and relevance to North Carolina and her people.”

Rash will pick up his award at a February meeting of the association in Greensboro. He also won the Sir Walter Raleigh Award in 2006 – that one for his third novel, “The World Made Straight.”

Published in October 2008, “Serena” tells the story of timber baron George Pemberton and his ruthless wife, Serena, who come to the North Carolina mountains to create a timber empire. The book drew widespread praise from critics across the nation after its release. A New York Times reviewer complimented Rash’s “elegantly fine-tuned voice” and listed the book as one of her 10 favorites of 2008, and “Serena” made the “best of 2008” lists of Publishers Weekly, The Christian Science Monitor, The Washington Post and San Francisco Chronicle. The book also was No. 7 in online retailer Amazon’s list of the 100 best books of 2008.

A native of Boiling Springs, Rash teaches Appalachian literature and creative writing at WCU. His next book, a compilation of short stories titled “Burning Bright,” will be released in March.

SYLVA–One of the most harrowing crimes committed in western North Carolina during the first half of the 20th century is the alleged murder in 1913 of two-year-old Roberta Putnam by her grandmother, Nancy Kerley, known as Nance Dude. Released from prison after 15 years hard labor, Nance Dude lived out her life rejected by her family. But as she never admitted her guilt or testified in court, her side of the story was never heard. In his acclaimed play, Gary Carden imagines what she might have said, combining folklore, some compelling historical evidence, and a playwright’s storytelling art.The much-performed play is now available as a DVD, featuring a performance by Elizabeth Westall.

Friday, December 4, City Lights Bookstore in Sylva will host a reception and discussion to celebrate the release.

The evening at City Lights will feature copies of the DVD for sale as well as refreshments and conversation with the playwright. The focus of the discussion will be not only on the play but also more generally on the subject of preserving and celebrating the folklore and heritage of the region. Pam Duncan, Rob Neufeld, and Michael Beadle will join in the discussion, as well.

BRYSON CITY–The Smoky Mountain Times’s Jim Casada takes a break from recent reviews of outdoor literature to share some Thanksgiving memories of eating and hunting in the Smokies.

An excerpt:

From that point on throughout my boyhood and beyond, rabbit hunting loomed large in Thanksgiving weekends. Hunts on Thanksgiving Day were normally abbreviated, because we had a grand feast and family gathering commencing sometime in early afternoon and culminating with a feast featuring fare like Grandma’s cathead biscuits and gravy, Aunt Emma’s ambrosia, Mom’s applesauce cake, and of course, turkey.

The trimmings included things which aren’t standard everywhere, as Grandma Minnie provided delicacies such as watermelon and peach pickles, leather britches beans, and a brown-sugar topped casserole using cushaws – an old-time winter squash.

Read Casada’s piece here.

OTTO–The Land Trust for the Little Tennessee (LTLT) has awarded its 2009 Ramsey-Brunner Land Conservationist of the Year Award to Myra Waldroop and family for their conservation work on family property at Rainbow Springs, in the headwaters of the Nantahala River in Macon County.

The award, which is given to honor individuals who have made significant contributions to land conservation in LTLT’s project area, was presented at LTLT’s annual Fall Celebration at Tessentee Bottomland Preserve in Otto.

The 248-acre property conserved by the easement conveyed to LTLT by Waldroop and her family has numerous conservation values. It lies on either side of the Waterfall Scenic Byway which runs from Rosman to Murphy and is adjacent to National Forest System lands. There are prime farmland soils being farmed and productive forest land that is managed for timber harvest, and, last, but certainly not least, it has nearly 4,000 feet of Nantahala River flowing through it and over 700’ of Black Creek.

According to Myra Waldroop’s records, the family has owned property in Rainbow Springs since as early as 1853.

“My grandfather, C.W. Slagle, acquired land in Rainbow Springs over a number of years,” said Myra.

The family used the property for family vacations for many years. During the 20’s and 30’s the Ritter Lumber Company operated in one of the meadows complete with a thriving lumber town including post office, commissary, hotel and school. A railroad hauled lumber down the river to be shipped away.

In 1948, Myra’s father, Carl Slagle, retired to Rainbow Springs, and later, Myra inherited a portion of the her grandfather’s property where both of her daughters now live. There are many stories of four and five generations who have fished, hunted, and gathered with friends and family at “Rainbow”.

“Many family traditions live on,” says Myra. “With this long history, my family and I decided we wanted this property protected from development. The LTLT was our solution. We appreciate working with the folks at LTLT. A special thanks to Sharon for her patience as we worked out the details of the Deed of Conservation.”

In her presentation of the award to the Waldroop family, Sharon Taylor stated, “LTLT’s mission is to conserve the waters, forests, farms and heritage of the upper Little Tennessee and Hiwassee River valleys. However, we work with landowners on a purely volunteer basis, so it is somewhat opportunistic. When Myra Waldroop called to say she was interested in conserving a portion of the Family’s Rainbow Springs property, that opportunity fit our mission like a glove. I know that all of the conservation values are important to LTLT, and important to the Family, but the Waldroop Family conserved their land because of their love of the land and the heritage that the land represents.”

BRYSON CITY–Jim Casada churns out an amazing amount of outdoors writing for the Smoky Mountain Times, and his current series of book reviews is invaluable.

His most recent column takes a lengthy look at these hiking guidebooks of the Smokies:

Ken Wise’s “Hiking Trails of the Great Smoky Mountains.”

Russ Manning’s “100 Hikes in the great Smoky Mountains National Park”

“The Best of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park: A Hiker’s Guide to Trails and Attractions” by Russ Manning and Sondra Jamieson

Danny Bernstein’s “Hiking the Carolina Mountains.”

“North Carolina Hiking Trails” by Allen de Hart

Johnny Molloy’s “Trial by Trail: Backpacking in the Smoky Mountains,”

Michal Strutin’s “History Hikes of the Smokies”

Casada’s closing paragraph:

By all means, seek some armchair adventure through works such as those mentioned above, but the ultimate adventure, whatever the season, comes through being on the trail. Whether it’s a leisurely walk up lower Deep Creek – the sort scores of folks make daily – or one of those strenuous 20-plus mile ventures my brother Don enjoys, to be afoot in the park is to tread paths of wonder.

Read Casada’s column here.

ROBBINSVILLE-Zelerie Rose at the Graham Star writes that $120,000 of funding from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act supports a program to control invasive plant species and support habitat of two federally-listed endangered species along the Cheoah River.

Here’s a clip from Rose’s story:

The three-year project started this fall, involves nine miles of river and will protect the Virginia Spiraea, a federally-threatened shrub, and the Appalachian Elktoe, a federally-endangered mussel.

The treatment of the non-native species such as mimosa, Oriental bittersweet, yam, privet, Japanese honeysuckle, princess tree, kudzu, and multiflora rose, is the collaborative effort of Western North Carolina Alliance, the Cherokee Environmental Natural Resource Office, and North Carolina National Forests.

“Our job is to work with the various organizations involved in the project and educate them about non-native invasive plants,” said Bob Gale, ecologist for WNC Alliance. “These plants were introduced both intentionally and accidentally and have no natural controls limiting their spread. Left untreated they can threaten or endanger native habitats and native wildlife species.”

Read the story from the Graham Star here.

CASHIERS–David Joy at the Cashiers Crossroads Chronicle examines the impact of alcohol blue laws in Jackson County, and suggests that 2010 might be the year for a county-wide referendum.

An excerpt:

The sale of alcohol in Sylva and Dillsboro, both townships in a supposedly dry Jackson County, may ruffle the feathers of many conservative citizens, but these sales have brought in large revenues for state law enforcement and state alcohol education, as well as county and town recreation and general funds.

Since 2000 the Sylva ABC Board alone has brought $104,109 for N.C. alcohol education and $78,681 for N.C. law enforcement.

Furthermore, the Sylva ABC Board contributes 20 percent of their net profits to Sylva and Jackson County Recreation (10 percent each), and 100 percent of the remaining net profits to the Sylva and Jackson County general funds (50 percent each).

Read Joy’s story here.

REGIONAL–It’s a familiar complaint in the mountains: tax money, like water, runs downhill to Raleigh and never comes back.

The Asheville Citizen-Times‘ Joel Burgess contributed a history yesterday of western North Carolina’s under-representation in high-power state politics, quoting WCU faculty member Richard Starnes along the way and naming Jackson County’s Lacy Thornburg as an exception to the rule.

Here’s an excerpt:

With a few notable exceptions, including former House Speaker Liston Ramsey and Govs. Jim Holshouser and Dan Moore, modern mountain politicians have struggled to make a dent in Raleigh’s power structure. Reasons trace back centuries, scholars say, and range from geography to old grudges.“It has to do with the low population and also that WNC has often charted its own political path,” said Richard Starnes, head of the history department at Western Carolina University.

-and-

The list of western politicians who have held great sway in the Tar Heel State largely begins and ends with one man — former House Speaker [Liston] Ramsey.

Read the story here.

REGIONAL–David Tell at the Macon County News reports on the opening of deer season this Monday.

The season, which is expected to be an active one, runs until December 12.

Tell’s lead:

Deer hunting season opens Monday, and it’s expected to be a good one.

Whitetails are numerous, active, mobile — and hungry, according to wildlife officials, and hunter interest and presence are seen as strong.

Read the whole piece here.

REGIONAL–Those television wireless ads, the ones in which translucent, floating coverage maps follow various hipsters around town, have more to do with you than you know.

Even if you’re a consumer of rural land-line phone service.

The TV ads are pushing wireless “3G” service – 3G being a term for service that supports voice, video and data. But they’re relevant to land-line customers as well, because large phone companies are increasingly focused on the installation of wired networks with a capacity to stream great quantities of data.

In heavily populated areas companies that do this make big stacks of money. On the other hand, maintaining these services in rural areas like ours is expensive, which is why Verizon wants – and soon will get – out.

Verizon is in the process of selling its rural land phone business in 14 states – including North Carolina – to a Connecticut company called Frontier Communications. And while regulators in some states are being harder on the deal than others, there is little reason to think that Verizon customers in western North Carolina won’t become Frontier customers sometime next year.

In North Carolina, we haven’t heard too much about this, maybe because our Public Utilities Commission isn’t inclined to rock corporate boats. But in some states — West Virginia, Washington, Oregon and Ohio in particular — people, newspapers and politicians are pointing out that when Verizon makes such sales – and they do it often – the outcome is usually bad for rural customers.

Land customers here will argue that little could be worse than Verizon, but apparently they’d be mistaken. The smaller companies that buy Verizon’s rural land line infrastructure are often saddled with enormous debt in the transaction, and running a phone company in sparsely-populated, often mountainous terrain is high-dollar stuff.

The October bankruptcy of FairPoint Communications is a case in point. In 2008, FairPoint paid $2.7 billion to buy Verizon phone lines in Maine, Vermont and New Hampshire, but soon collapsed under the weight of its debt.

Wrote Oregonlive.com: “That set a grim precedent and served as a warning signal to regulators”.

Read the nuts and bolts of the deal here, from the Wall Street Journal
Read more about Verizon’s mixed messages on rural broadband here, from freepress.net
Read about an Oregon regulatory challenge here, from oregonlive.com
Read about West Virginia public opposition here from the Charleston (WV) Daily Mail
Read about West Virginia State Consumer Advocate Division’s concerns about deal here from WVNH television, Beckley, WV

CHARLOTTE–The Charlotte Observer reports that two Cullowhee area men were sentenced to federal prison Monday for “… attempting to transport, buy or sell an American black bear”.

Bobby Allen Gibson, 24, and Steven Louis Broom, 31, were charged in July of last year.

Both will spend ten months in prison, a year on federal parole and perform 100 hours of community service. Their punishment also includes banishment from federal lands, revocation of hunting and fishing privileges, and, in Broom’s case the revocation of the right to own a dog of any kind.

The Observer story is here.

Asheville Citizen-Times story here.

REGIONAL–Dave Tabler’s Appalachian History blog touches on an interview with herbalist Tommie Bass (1908-1996), and Bass’s take on giving money to politicians. Here’s Bass:

I figured . . . the fact of the business is a fellow running for office, a man or a woman, I’m like the little boy was about the peckerwood.

Peckerwood pecked a hole in a hollow tree and he went in there, and the little boy he drove a peg in behind it. Somebody said to him, “Son,” said, “you shouldn’t of done the little bird that way.” [And the boy said], “Well the son-of-a-gun pecked in, now let him peck out”.

And so I’m that way about a politician. If he wants to get into office, let him get in there (chuckles), but I ain’t gonna try to help him. Course, if he’s a good guy, I’d talk for him, but as far as paying him in there, I don’t go along with that.

Read the post here.

Tommis Bass. Photo by Tom Rankin, 1983

BALSAM–Hiking in the leaf-strewn woods feels colorful and messy, like a kid’s taped-together scrapbook. I am inspired to play the I Spy game. Spying the work of an industrious sapsucker drilled neatly into the bark of a tall tulip tree, I ask Sam (my six year old son) what made the neat line of bark holes.

Contributor Blair Ogburn is Senior Naturalist at Balsam Mountain Preserve. She, her husband Jon and son Sam live in Addie Community

“Woodpeckers” he says and I explain that a woodpecker did indeed tap out these little caverns. From the holes, tree sap will flow and provide nourishment to animals via sticky goo. Sapsuckers, other birds, and insects will come to the tree café and enjoy lapping some sap.

Sam takes a turn at I Spy and delights me with “I spy a tree’s nose”. I look around for a nose, perhaps nostril holes or a slimy fungus, but my eyes find only twigs and vines. Then I notice a wooden wedge pushed forth from furrowed bark of a dead standing tree (or snag). The growth Sam spied is actually a fungal shelf, appearing like a big black nose on the face of a dying tree. We take a closer look and find a pulsing web of life on the mossy shelf nose. There are beetles, scarlet colored mites, and dark spiders in webs from underneath.

Shelf fungi

Shelf fungi form dense anchors and send fungal fingers through snags and logs to weaken them. The wood then begins to rot and decompose. Wood munching insects and other recyclers move into softened wood to take advantage of a food source. Mother nature is on the job to create ‘new’ soil from old wood.

Peeking from a little nature nook in the snag, Sam and I find a golden mouse, our last discovery in today’s game of I Spy. The mouse’s fluffy fibrous nest is tucked inside the safe haven of the rotting tree. Thanks to decomposers like the shelf fungi, a mouse can find warmth and shelter from cold, wind and rain. As Sam and I are done spying on nature for the day, we turn back home to seek shelter of our own.

REGIONAL–Western Carolina University associate professor Anna Fariello takes an in-depth look at the extraordinary world of Cherokee basketry in her new book “Cherokee Basketry: From the Hands of our Elders”, just out from the History Press of Charleston, South Carolina.

Fariello heads up the Craft Revival Project at WCU.

Here’s an excerpt from a story by Jill Ingram for The Reporter:

An author, editor and former research fellow at the Smithsonian Museum of American Art, Fariello most recently turned her attention to Cherokee basketry, a thousands-year-old tradition, passed from mother to daughter, that she believes is integral to Cherokee culture. Fariello’s new book, titled “Cherokee Basketry: From the Hands of our Elders,” studies Cherokee baskets and basket-makers who lived during the first half of the 20th century.

The project reinforced Fariello’s understanding that for Cherokee people, “the making of things is significant to their culture and their identity,” a concept foreign to many people in contemporary, mainstream culture, she said. The Cherokees’ use of natural resources as basket materials gave Fariello an appreciation of the environmental sustainability and ecological balance also inherent in the culture.

Read the entire story and view photos here.

REGIONAL–Popular regional bluegrass act Balsam Range has had a breakout year.

Editor Kelly Donaldson at the Cashiers Crossroads Chronicle sums it up in this nice feature.

Here’s an excerpt:

The five-man band is wrapping up a phenomenal year that included touring, a number one song, a top five album and an appearance on a television show with one of bluegrass music’s hottest acts.

Balsam Range features Tuckaesegee native Darren Nicholson on vocals and mandolin, along with Western Carolina University graduates Buddy Melton (fiddle, vocals) and Grammy award winner Marc Pruett (banjo). The band is rounded out by Haywood County’s Caleb Smith on guitar and vocals and Tim Surrett on bass and vocals.

The boys recently took the stage on Saturday, Oct. 17 for a live TV taping of the popular PBS program “Song of the Mountains.” Balsam Range performed alongside Rhonda Vincent and the Rage, Next Best Thing Band, and Fall Creek.

Read the entire piece here.