No pickin' in Jonesborough in June

"Mean" Mary James

Those of you who know me love me in spite of (or maybe because of) my poor banjo playing.  I took up the 5 string banjo shortly after retiring as an attempt to keep a 40 year old pledge to myself.  In 1969, I was a student at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. As a US Navy Officer Candidate, I was obliged to wear my uniform to class a couple of days a week.  For those who lived the era, you know how welcome a Navy Uniform was on a major college campus - for those who did not, a plague rat was more popular. 

This presented a problem for a single 21 year old man with a desire to meet young women.  Even those young ladies who might have considered going out with me (a not so bad looking guy with a sense of humor and a pretty good income) shied away from the uniform - 1969, Vietnam, bombs, Beatles -- you get my drift. The Tar Heel Gals just couldn't take the chance of being seen with the war monger in the sailor suit.

Fortunately, about an hour was a women's college (now UNC Greensboro and co-ed) and it was there that I met Myra -- a genuine "Southern Belle" from South Carolina with the accent to match the geography. While sitting and sipping in a bistro one Saturday evening listening to a 3 piece country band, Myra (a music major) said to me between song, "I just Loooove the Banjo don't you?" Well, of course I told her I loved the banjo and was learning to play too. The next week I bought a 5 string banjo and attempted to play it well enough to impress Myra.

I didn't learn it and what I could play was unimpressive except as a way to repel feral cats.  Myra and I didn't last too long after that and a few months later I sold that banjo to someone who could actually play one. But I digress.

I bought a banjo not long after I retired and actually did learn to play.  I'll leave the torture my wife Mary endured while I learned the basics to another tale.  But over the last 10 years, we have traveled throughout the Southeastern US in search of banjo players and good music and one of my favorite pickers is "Mean" Mary James. We have made it a point to travel to listen to Mean Mary whenever she was nearby. We were going to see her in Jonesborough, Tennessee on June the 5th.  Her concert is a casualty of Corvid-19.  See her HERE