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The Crooked Road

The Crooked Road links Virginia's mountain music wonders

By JOE TENNIS

For 253 miles, Virginia's Heritage Music Trail winds through the ridges and valleys of southwestern Virginia. It's called "The Crooked Road." And for good reason.

More than half of this trail follows U.S. 58, Virginia's longest road. This curvy, often crooked route passes beneath the Blue Ridge Parkway near the popular Mabry Mill (Milepost 176.1). U.S. 58 looks like a straight line running along Virginia's southern border but actually contains several switchbacks at Lovers Leap and even more near Mount Rogers.

"It's a tough road," says Joe Wilson, the chairman of the National Council for the Traditional Arts. "We never lied to anybody about how crooked the road was."

Wilson, in 2002, coined the term "Crooked Road." Then he helped organize the non-profit group that is promoting southwest Virginia's old-time and bluegrass music venues along The Crooked Road. That includes the Blue Ridge Music Center, which features live music during
summer weekends near Parkway Milepost 213, just south of Galax. Following The Crooked Road means discovering the music of the mountains - fiddling tunes, banjo numbers and acoustic ballads. Passed from generation to generation, the sounds of bluegrass and old-time
Appalachian music is preserved today at weekly jam sessions, community-based festivals, and rustic concert halls in towns like Fries, Rocky Mount, Independence and Cana.

Among the most famous landmarks of The Crooked Road is The Carter Fold, a music barn built in 1976 near Hiltons, about 20 miles west of Bristol. Every Saturday night, this venue features all-acoustic shows dedicated to the style of music and songs played by The Carter Family. Considered "The First Family of Country Music," The Carter Family produced such classics as "Wildwood Flower," "Keep On the Sunny Side" and "Will the Circle Be Unbroken?"

Other venues along The Crooked Road include Lays Hardware at Coeburn, Country Cabin in Norton and the Blue Ridge Institute and Museum of Ferrum College. Near the Kentucky border, Clintwood's Ralph Stanley Museum traces the history of The Stanley Brothers, especially Ralph Stanley, whose music figured prominently in the George Clooney movie "O Brother, Where Art Thou?"

Zigzagging back and forth across the Blue Ridge Parkway, The Crooked Road links Ferrum to Floyd, Stuart and Hillsville. Early in 2007, in response to driving tour's increased popularity, the owner of the Floyd Country Store, Woody Crenshaw, knocked down walls at his 100-year-old store and doubled the dance floor for his traditional Friday Night Jamboree. The antique building is also being converted into a refurbished, yet quaint old-time country store. In nearby Galax, meanwhile, live bluegrass music remains a draw for the increased crowds at the Rex Theatre on Friday nights. Here, says the city's tourism director, Chuck Riedhammer, The Crooked Road remains all the buzz in the little city that calls itself the "World's Capital of Old-Time Mountain Music."