Hindman Family Folk Week

When we got back from our trip, everyone at work asked me where we went for vacation. When I told them Kentucky, they asked if we have family there. That's when it started to get hard to explain. We went to a family folk week in a podunk town (Hindman) in the Appalachian mountains. We have no relatives there per se, but we saw quite of few old friends. It was a music heavy camp where people took lessons in the afternoon and everyone did quite a bit of jamming and singing. Once I mentioned that Matt carved a spoon and there were quite a few banjos, people tended to nod and walk away singing, "Dueling Banjos" figuring they knew as much as they cared to. How do you describe the lone mandolin set up among tons of music cases?


We started our days with breakfast in a dinning hall followed by group singing. Then some days I went to a lecture, and other days I took Elias to the kids' program. The kids' program was for kids about 4 and up and would have been great if Elias had been a little older.

One lecture I heard was about a fiddle tune that has made its way into many different genres. It is the tune to the old commercials, "Beef, it's what's for dinner" (I bet some of you know it). The second lecture was about the childhoods' of some wonderful musicians, Al and Alice White. What an interesting story about a family band making it big.

The kids' program was equally fun. We played a lot of play party games, heard stories, and
sang songs. The kids also danced and played play party games for about 30 minutes just before lunch. I put Elias in his sling, and we danced too. Some of the games were a little loud, so this was not his favorite class. Most of the kids were super cute. This is Mason.


After lunch, Elias had nap time while most people took instrument lessons. The beginning guitar class was just outside our window with our good friend Elwood as the teacher. We got to hear some great music and singing. We spent most of that time on the couch in our cabin. We had a room in a 10 room cabin and shared three bathrooms with the other folks in the cabin. It was a little noisy, but relatively close to the classes. This was helpful because we had to go back to get Elias' food about every three hours and to put Elias down for naps.

At 3:00, Matt went to work on his spoon while Elias and I went to shape note singing. The teacher was this great guy named Ron (see photo below). The last class was either traditional singing (what I took) or a music jam. After dinner, there was an evening concert (about 2 hours of music) and then an hour dance. Matt and I traded off since Elias went to bed before the festivities began. The concerts were amazing. I thought I saw the best ones (Al and Alice White, Aubrey Atwater and Elwood Donnelly and the class performances) and Matt thought he saw the best ones (Brett Ratliff, Debra Thompson, Paul David Smith, Jean Ritchie, Sonny Houston, and Rich Kirby), so it all worked out. I even had a great idea to set up the baby monitor base down at the concerts, so the person at the cabin with Elias could listen to the evening performances. The reception wasn't great, but it was better than missing out entirely. Two nights I stayed up super late and went to the woodshed party for conversation and singing.


The dancing was mostly circle mixers, squares and big set. The band was outstanding although not the most organized.


There was a silent auction where we scored an awesome Thomas the Train set for only $55 (plus the $33 it cost me to have it shipped home). We got a big box of track, plus probably 15 trains. Score!

On three of the four airplane flights of the trip, we got an extra seat for Elias, so that worked out well. That last leg was a little dicey since he was worn out. Too bad we couldn't put him in the overhead bin. He fit!



All in all, we had a nice time. It was a little hard because Elias was so young. Not super relaxing, but we enjoyed some wonderful music. Now all we need is for Elias to learn to play the banjo..."neer, neer neer neer neer neer neer neer neer." Maybe next year.