成人X站

In Toledo, Washington, it鈥檚 time once again for the .

Toledo is in Lewis County on the way to Washington鈥檚 most famous volcano. The town is named for an old steamboat that once plied the Cowlitz River, and it鈥檚 near where the 鈥�Cowlitz Convention鈥� was held 1851 鈥� when settlers north of the Columbia organized the movement to split off Washington from what was then Oregon Territory.

The Mount Saint Helens Bluegrass Festival is produced by the non-profit Washington Bluegrass Association. It gets underway at noon on Friday, August 12 at in Toledo, where the audience can camp out overnight. The first Mount Saint Helens Bluegrass Festival was held in 1982, and this is the 37th edition.

The festival’s producer is General Cothren. 鈥淕eneral鈥� is not a rank, it鈥檚 his given name; he鈥檚 from North Carolina, and came to southwest Washington as a kid about 70 years ago, and graduated from Napavine High School.

Cothren took time out a few days ago from fixing his golf cart 鈥� which, as everyone knows, is a critical tool for producing an outdoor music festival 鈥� to describe what makes bluegrass 鈥渂luegrass.鈥�

鈥淚t鈥檚 just, you know, banjo, mandolin, guitar, a fiddle and a bass and you got good music,鈥� Cothren told 成人X站 Newsradio. 鈥淚t’s all acoustic.鈥�

Bluegrass is from the American South. It鈥檚 traditional music with roots that go back at least a few centuries, and its influence is still heard in country, folk, blues and rock. Kentucky鈥檚 popularized bluegrass beyond its geographic roots beginning in the late 1930s through radio and then through records.

In the Pacific Northwest, beginning around the same time 鈥� because of the Great Depression, World War II and other social and economic factors 鈥� a lot of 鈥溾�� (or people from North Carolina, such as General Cothren鈥檚 parents) moved west in search of opportunity. Many settled in the Puget Sound area, taking jobs in agriculture, forestry and manufacturing. Along with their personal possessions, those migratory Americans brought bluegrass 鈥� and banjos and mandolins 鈥� with them, settling in mostly rural areas in Western Washington and making music for fun in their spare time.

Vivian Williams is 84 and is a fiddler. She and her late husband Phil, who played banjo, lived in Seattle for decades. They had met at Reed College in Oregon in the 1950s, got married in 1959, and then moved north. Phil Williams, who passed away in 2017, was also an attorney. He also wrote a of bluegrass in the Northwest which was posted online several years ago and which remains a priceless resource for understanding how the music spread here.

Vivian Williams told 成人X站 Newsradio that around 1960, she and her husband started taking part in Tar Heel 鈥渉ootenannies鈥� to learn and play bluegrass with other amateur players. The two were partially inspired by what Vivian jokingly calls the 鈥淔olk Scare,鈥� when people like Pete Seeger and bands like the Kingston Trio and Seattle鈥檚 own Brothers Four led a popular revival of folk music in the American recording and broadcast industries.

Williams says that bluegrass was popular in and around the Skagit Valley, and other areas in Snohomish, Skagit and Whatcom Counties.

鈥淒arrington was kind of the center of it because there was this couple that lived up there and that鈥檚 Fred and Alice McFalls,鈥� Williams said. 鈥淎nd Fred was a good banjo player and a really nice guy, and his wife was a good cook and very, very sweet nice person, and they would just host these gatherings of musicians.鈥�

Fred , who should be better far known and remembered, is a legend who began playing bluegrass in his native North Carolina. He had moved to Darrington in the early 1950s and worked full-time in the timber industry, but did so much to share his love of music with people like Vivian and Phil Williams. Fred McFalls in 1996; died in 2014.

Fred and his wife Alice deserve a full-length documentary about the impact they had on bluegrass and the Northwest. Vivian and Phil Williams deserve one, too. Both were accomplished players who once accompanied Bill Monroe when he played a few shows in the Northwest in the 1960s, and Phil was an inveterate recording enthusiast who made tapes of live shows and hootenannies. The couple also founded a record label called to share their love of folk music. Vivian Williams recently donated their entire collection of tapes, including many rare and one-of-a-kind local recordings, to the Smithsonian Institution.

Vivian Williams says that annual summer gatherings of people who had moved to Puget Sound from places like North Carolina and Missouri were commonplace 50 years ago, and they always featured bluegrass and other folk music.

Those events, such as the 鈥淭ar Heel Picnic鈥� and 鈥淢issouri Picnic鈥� appear to have gone away, but a whole crop of bluegrass festivals began emerging in the 1970s, inspired by and not long after the era of Woodstock and the local , the Snohomish County concert which predated the more famous Empire State mud and all those hippies in New York by a full year.

Along with Toledo this weekend, Darrington held their bluegrass festival in July, and Bellingham has theirs next month. A full list of Northwest bluegrass festivals is available from the .

Tickets to this weekend鈥檚 family-friendly Mount Saint Helens Bluegrass Festival in Toledo are affordable, but bring cash, as the event is not set up to take credit cards. Food will be available for purchase from Boss Hogg鈥檚 Barbecue in Winlock, nearby home of the giant egg.

General Cothren says the best day of the event for bargain hunters is Sunday, when the music gets underway at 9:30 a.m. and which will feature many of the artists who played on Friday and Saturday.

鈥淲e鈥檝e got four bands playing the gospel Sunday,鈥� Cothren said. 鈥淚t’s all gospel music, and that’s free.鈥�

You can hear Feliks every Wednesday and Friday morning on Seattle’s Morning News and read more from him here. If you have a story idea, please email Feliks here.