Armuchee pickin’ into night
♦ The Armuchee Memorial Day Bluegrass Festival will continue this morning at the Armuchee Music Park on Turkey Mountain Road.
Beyond the stage of the Armuchee Music Park, groups of musicians can be found, sitting in circles outside of campers picking away and making the music they love, as many before have done for hundreds of years.
These impromptu sessions are the lifeblood of bluegrass festivals, like the Armuchee Memorial Day Bluegrass Festival, which continues this morning at 10:45 a.m. and runs to around midnight. Lessons, like wisdom, are passed on from player to player, from the young to the old and back again.
Levi Herrington, a 12-year-old banjo player from Evans, said he and his dad, Bryan Herrington, had already jumped into picking with another group Friday, simply by walking up and asking to join in at the music park at 899 Turkey Mountain Road.
“You’re never gonna meet a nicer group of people,” said Bryan Herrington, whose son got the bluegrass bug from riding around with his dad listening to the only thing he ever played.
The younger Herrington, who also plays the guitar and mandolin, will take the stage this evening at 6 p.m. with Double Cross, a band he met at the Boxcar Pinion Bluegrass Festival in Chickamauga earlier this month by, once again, joining in on an informal session.
“We don’t do it for the money,” said co-founder Chuck Langley, adding that the money taken in at the gate is split between the bands — 16 of them this year. “If you get into bluegrass for the money, then you’re getting into it for the wrong reasons.”
Langley, a former player himself who had to stop after his hands went bad after over three decades of laying brick, said the Memorial Day festival is celebrating its 36th year. And in the fall, the Labor Day festival will be held for its 46th year.
“I’ve had one show rained out in 45 years,” he said, adding that he never imagined the festival would carry on for all these years, to make it the oldest in Georgia. “That’s a pretty good record.”
After growing tired of the travel in making it to the only two bluegrass festivals in Georgia at that time, Langley said he told his family over Thanksgiving dinner they were going to hold their own festival, on 65 acres of land of Old Dalton Road he recently bought. He remembers county commissioners and their attorney seated in a row on his property worrying about what a music festival would bring, not wanting a recreation of Woodstock, which was just a couple years removed from Langley’s request.
“They said you couldn’t have something like (a music festival) in Floyd County without someone getting killed,” he recalled.
Today’s admission cost is $12. Children under 12 are admitted free with parents’ admission. There is no alcohol or dogs allowed in the concert area.
Though there are no electric or water hookups left, promoter Langley said they will find a spot to set up a camper. Tent camping is $5 for the night. Camping is first-come, first-served, he said.
The festival ends with a Sunday morning worship service led by Gary Clardy, starting at 9:30 a.m.
For more information about the bands call Helen Burke at 470-554-9602 or 770-928-4517. For information about camping call Chuck Langley at 706766-6352.