Folk School JAM is held in Cherokee/Clay Counties, NC, an area which is located near both Georgia and Tennessee in the Great Smoky Mountains. The John C. Campbell Folk School (JCCFS) is also located on the border of Cherokee and Clay Counties. JCCFS administrates and organizes the Folk School JAM program for area youth, and is held on the John C. Campbell Folk School campus. The program is open to eleven to eighteen year olds residing in Clay or Cherokee Counties. Featured classes are available for fiddle, clawhammer banjo, three-finger banjo, Guitar, mandolin, bass, singing, dance, and band. It runs on Tuesdays 4-8 pm and Wednesdays 4-6 pm.
Current Instructors
Bridgett Esterhuizen
Charlie Beck – Fiddle, Banjo, Guitar
Wyatt Espalin – Fiddle, Mandolin
Bonnie Lenneman – Beginner Clawhammer Banjo
Geraud Barralon – Guitar, Fiddle, Ukulele
Brian Gatti – Fiddle, Banjo, Guitar
For more information, please contact:
T-Claw, (Interim) Program Director
1 Folk School Rd.
Brasstown, NC 28902
Phone: 615-430-8230 Email: [email protected]
The John C. Campbell Folk School provides experiences in non-competitive learning and community life that are joyful and enlivening, by offering year-round weeklong and weekend classes in craft, art, music, dance, cooking, gardening, nature studies, photography and writing.
This area is geographically isolated with a sparse population. A version of two-finger style banjo is prominent here. Pete Seeger learned and afterwards popularized this two-finger banjo style (called the “Murphy” style after the Cherokee County seat) when he came to Bascom Lunsford’s Mountain Dance and Folk Festival in 1936. Notable players of the Murphy style of banjo are Hobbie Whitener, Caleb Mashburn, and Roberta Voyles Lunsford. Other historical musicians include Hardy Fain, a black banjo player, who was known for his clawhammer style, and Roy Stalcup, whose playing has been identified as pre-Scruggs three-finger banjo. There are also many fiddlers and ballad singers from past to present in this corner of North Carolina.
Click here for the Folk School JAM facebook page.
