The Crooked Road Sings: Stories from the Blue Ridge

Reading Time: 5 minutes

The Crooked Road isn’t just a mountain ramble. It’s a sound—a fiddle tune rolling through the hills, a banjo ringing against the Blue Ridge backdrop. It’s the laughter of dancers at a Friday night jamboree, the reverent silence after a ballad, the echo of generations who’ve carried these songs across porches, church pews, and festival stages.

Music isn’t just played along this winding trail through the Blue Ridge—it’s lived.

Some come to the Crooked Road expecting a museum—a neat collection of venues where old-time and bluegrass music are carefully preserved behind glass. But what they find is something living, something breathing. The music here doesn’t need protection; it’s in the air, in the hands of fiddlers and banjo pickers, in the wood of a well-worn stage.

These are a few stories of people and places that keep the road singing.

The Fiddler Who Never Left

On Friday nights in Galax, the old Rex Theater glows like a beacon. Inside, on the worn wooden stage, the bow of a fiddle rasps against the strings, and a tune as old as the hills fills the hall. Through the Blue Ridge Backroads show on WBRF 98.1 FM, 100,000 watts of live old-time and bluegrass music pour out from the Rex, reaching five states and listeners worldwide via the web.

If you’ve been to a Thursday night jam at the Historic Fries Theater or the Old Fiddlers’ Convention in Galax, you might know the name Eddie Bond. If you don’t, you’ve certainly heard his music. Bond grew up in Fries, Virginia, a town whose textile mill once roared as loudly as its dance halls. He was taught to play by his maternal grandmother and by sitting knee-to-knee with the old-timers, soaking up their rhythms and licks. Bond never left the music, and the music never left him. He became one of the best old-time fiddlers of his generation and, in 2018, was awarded the National Endowment of the Arts National Heritage Fellowship.

In his hands, the music and the people of the Crooked Road are one and the same. And in places like Fries, where the fiddles still sing and the dancers still stomp, those folks are never far away.

The Banjo Maker: Crafting the Sound of the Mountains

Not every song on the Crooked Road starts with a player. Some start with a luthier.

Throughout the mountains, you’ll hear banjos. And if you listen closely, you’ll hear a certain kind of sound—the Round Peak style, smooth and rhythmic, with a laid-back groove that feels like rocking in a chair. That sound originated a couple of generations ago with banjoist and luthier Kyle Creed.

Kyle Creed’s banjos are still in high demand, but getting your hands on an original? Not easy. That’s where Kevin Fore comes in. A Galax-based luthier, Fore has spent years studying Creed’s designs, crafting banjos that stay true to the originals.

Fore’s banjos are as close as you’ll get to the real deal. He uses the same materials, techniques, and attention to feel that made Creed’s instruments legendary. Fore’s Kyle Creed-style banjos are the go-to choice for players who want that Round Peak sound.

Kyle Creed’s legacy isn’t just in the banjos he built—it’s in the players still using them, the jam circles still echoing with that Round Peak rhythm, and the luthiers like Kevin Fore making sure the sound never fades.

The Stage That Holds a Thousand Songs

The Crooked Road isn’t about one town or one musician. It’s about all the places where music lives.

Some venues have seen a hundred years of music flow through their doors. The Floyd Country Store, an unpretentious building in downtown Floyd, has been hosting Friday Night Jamborees for as long as anyone can remember. Step inside, and you’re greeted with a scene that could belong to any decade: musicians gathered on folding chairs tucked into every corner and flat-footing dancers shuffling across the floor with the enthusiasm of a train engine rolling down the tracks.

But the Floyd Country Store isn’t the only place where the music refuses to fade. The Carter Family Fold, tucked into a valley near Hiltons, is a temple to the music that helped shape American country. Each weekend, the descendants of A.P. Carter keep the songs alive, their voices harmonizing just as their ancestors did a century ago.

There’s something special about these places—not just the music but the way they pull people together. A man who’s been playing for 50 years will sit next to a teenager just starting out, passing down not just tunes but a way of life. That’s the thing about the Crooked Road—it doesn’t belong to the past. It belongs to everyone willing to listen.

The Unexpected Keeper of Tradition

For all the talk of old songs, old places, and old musicians, the Crooked Road is still creating something new.

Take Martha Spencer, a musician from Grayson County who grew up with the music but never saw a line between tradition and invention. She plays guitar, banjo, bass, and fiddle, sings like a mountain songbird, and dances like the music runs through her veins.

She grew up in a house where the music never stopped—her parents played in The Whitetop Mountain Band, a staple of old-time music. But Martha isn’t just repeating the past; she’s pulling it forward, blending the sounds of the mountains with fresh energy, making sure that the next generation doesn’t just inherit the music—they make it their own.

And she’s not alone. Across the Crooked Road, young musicians are picking up fiddles, banjos, and guitars, breathing new life into old tunes. The songs remain the same, but the voices keep changing. And that’s how the music survives.

The Music Never Ends

The Crooked Road isn’t a relic. It’s a river. The songs don’t sit still; they move, twisting and turning through time, just like the road itself.

Maybe that’s why the music here feels different. It’s not something you buy a ticket to see; it’s something you stumble upon. A jam session in the back of a gas station. A banjo ringing from a front porch. A dance floor shaking under a hundred tapping feet.

The Crooked Road sings, and as long as there are hands to play and ears to listen, the music will never stop.

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