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Programs & Activities
Music & Dance
Springfield Exit
Virginia
Appalachian traditional old-time string band Music
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| Springfield Exit |
Springfield
Exit is made up of David McLaughlin, one of the original Johnson Mountain
Boys; Linda Lay, as fine and affecting a singer as you'll hear anywhere;
and David Lay, a rock-solid rhythm guitarist. A brilliant multi-instrumentalist
and high harmony singer, David McLaughlin was a founding member of the
neo-traditional Johnson Mountain Boys, a band that stormed the nation's
stages for 17 years, playing turbo-charged bluegrass and acoustic music.
He helped create their critically acclaimed recordings, was nominated
for two Grammy® Awards, and performed in a huge array of halls, literally
from Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, and the White House, to Brazzaville
in the Republic of the Congo, and the Kala Academy in Goa, India.
Linda Lay began singing in church and on stage when she was six years
old. She's from Bristol, Virginia, a city at the center of one of the
nation's richest sources of traditional musicians. She grew up in a family
string band, often hearing local tradition-keeper Ralph Stanley and echoes
of the greatest of the family bands, the Carter Family. One of her favorite
people is Jeanette Carter - the sole surviving member of the original
Carter Family. Linda grew up singing for Jeanette, who operates the Carter
Family Fold, a music hall at the Carter homeplace at Hiltons, just west
of Bristol.
David Lay grew up in the coalfields of Virginia, where his preacher father
tended his Methodist flocks, and in the little towns of the tobacco and
vegetable farmlands of northeastern Tennessee. He always wanted to be
a farmer, and he is. A graduate of the University of Tennessee (Agriculture),
he once operated a large Tennessee dairy. But like many other American
farmers, David has had to supplement his current vegetable farming with
other work. He's climbed poles for an electric utility, run a welding
shop, and operated backhoes and bulldozers of all sizes. He's an electrician
and plumber, and if his bulldozer breaks down, he can take it apart and
fix it. "It keeps the costs down, and makes you skinny," he
says.
David grew up singing at his father's church and, along the way, he developed
a keen ear for the traditional music of the region. It was Linda who first
put a guitar into his hands, and it helped cement a powerful and enduring
relationship. He sings the low harmony part in the Springfield Exit trio,
and David McLaughlin says he is one of the finest rhythm men that he has
ever had the pleasure of hearing.
At the Great Lakes Folk Festival, the group's three core musicians are
joined by Marshall Wilborn (stand-up bass, banjo) and Ron Stewart (fiddle,
vocals).
Links
http://www.crackerbarrel.com/about-newsandhappenings.cfm?doc_id=762
http://www.crackerbarrel.com/about-heritage.cfm?doc_id=792
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