Plucking the heartstrings

This weekend, the N.C. Symphony weaves a 'musical quilt' of homegrown sounds

To mark its 75th anniversary, the N.C. Symphony is celebrating the state's musical heritage and the sounds that inspired one of the group's first boosters.

Lamar Stringfield was a founder and the first conductor of the symphony from 1932 to 1935.

"He was on a Pulitzer Traveling Fellowship and was given some resources to travel and try to preserve indigenous music," says Scott Freck, the symphony's general manager. "He fell in love with this music, stuck around and founded the symphony."

The concert will open with "Cripple Creek," an old-timey fiddle tune that Stringfield collected in the western mountains and arranged as part of his prize-winning composition "From the Southern Mountains."

Besides old-time stringband tunes, the concert will feature other genres reflecting the state's cultural and musical diversity, and the interests of Stringfield, whose compositions championed Appalachian folksong, American Indian flute music and African-American gospel.

The program, "Blue Skies and Red Earth," marks the first time the N.C. Symphony has presented such a rich cross-section of the state's musical styles.

"Music is such an important part of life in North Carolina, and we're very fortunate to have been part of people's lives for 75 years," Freck says. "But we also know we're only one corner of a very rich landscape. So my idea was that we would bring together all these different styles of music that make North Carolina such a great place for music and put them all on one stage together. In a way, we tried to construct a musical quilt of North Carolina."

The program is a collaborative effort of the symphony, the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources, WUNC Radio's "Back Porch Music" and the N.C. Museum of Art. Together, they selected artists who represent some of the most accomplished performers in their genres.

"Often, when symphonies do pop shows, there is a lead star," says Joe Newberry, public information officer with the Department of Cultural Resources. "In this case, the music is the star. And we have very fine players from across North Carolina."

The lineup will feature gospel music by the Shaw University Choir, Piedmont blues performed on guitar and harmonica by John Cephas and Phil Wiggins, bluegrass by Al Batten and the Bluegrass Reunion, and spirituals sung by Tina Morris Anderson.

John Grant Jr., a member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee, will play Cherokee flute music. The Cane Creek Cloggers will dance to a fiddle-banjo tune played by Ted Ehrhard and Riley Baugus, who is featured on the soundtrack of the film "Cold Mountain."

Donna Ray Norton, an eighth-generation ballad singer from Madison County, and granddaughter of legendary fiddler Bayard Ray, will sing ballads from her family songbook. And cast members of "The Lost Colony" will perform selections from their summer theater production, based on the story of North Carolina's ill-fated first settlement.

"It's been a wonderful collaborative process," Freck says. "We've pulled together all of the styles and gotten advice on who might do them the best for us."