JOHNSTON CENTER EVENTS

The Fall 2004 series was organized in conjunction with the Center for the Study of the American South, with special thanks to the Office of the Provost, and the Departments of Music and History.

Click here to view streaming video of the Fall 2004 performances!

The Bluegrass Experience
Thursday, September 16, Educational Foundation Terrace, Graham Memorial, 12-2:00 p.m.
Our popular performance series begins its Fall 2004 schedule with The Bluegrass Experience, a powerful, energetic, entertaining and extremely creative band. Currently enjoying its thirty-third year of professional performing, the group has enjoyed entertaining audiences at such diverse venues as Lake Forest College in Chicago and The University of Mississippi in Oxford. Blessed with talented musicians, singers and songwriters, The Bluegrass Experience continues to enthusiastically create and perform their distinctive style of traditional music. Print the flyer

Choogie Kingfisher (United Keetowah Band)
Thursday, September 23, Educational Foundation Terrace, Graham Memorial, 12-2:00 p.m.
Join Choogie Kingfisher for flute, and Cherokee story telling. The stories Choogie tells are the stories that have been passed down from his own family elders and friends. Many are from the Western Band of the Cherokee, brought over from the Trail of Tears. Other stories are written out of his own childhood experiences growing up in the Oklahoma hills. He has performed across the United States for more than twenty years. Print the flyer

John Dee Holeman & Billy Stevens
Thursday, September 30, Educational Foundation Terrace, Graham Memorial, 12-2:00 p.m.
Piedmont & Texas style blues, featuring National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage award-winner John Dee Holeman.

At age 75, John Dee Holeman is among the last of Durham's great blues songsters. Playing both acoustic Piedmont-style guitar as well as electric rhythm 'n' blues, John Dee's repertoire ranges from Blind Boy Fuller to Muddy Waters, from Brownie McGhee to Jimmy Reed. A native of Timberlake, NC, John moved to Durham in the early 50's, learning guitar from an older generation that included Thomas Burt and Arthur Lyons, both of whom were directly influenced by Durham greats, Blind Boy Fuller and the Reverend Gary Davis.

Billy Stevens has known and performed with John Dee since the late 70's when he operated the Triangle's first nightspot to feature local blues artists, Durham's "Sallam Cultural Center." A veteran of the local music scene for almost thirty years, Billy plays harmonica with John Dee's Piedmont blues tunes, morphing into his "one-man rhythm section" for the uptempo electric
blues. Using his custom array of keyboards, harp and drum machines, Billy has toured for the US Information Agency to over fifty countries worldwide, performing and lecturing on the evolution of blues and rock 'n' roll. Print the flyer

Work Clothes, The Ghost of Rock, and Portastic
Thursday, October 7, Educational Foundation Terrace, Graham Memorial, 12-2:00 p.m.
Three different flavors of independent rock!

Lee and Jenny Waters formed Work Clothes in December of 2000. The initial motivation to record was to have Christmas presents to offer their families, but the end result was a band. The music is often described as quiet, melodic and dreamy. The two have performed in the Chapel Hill area for the last decade in outfits like: Bevel, Cobra Kahn, Clok-Lok, Panzer, The Ghost of Rock, and Shallow Be Thy Name. Work Clothes has just finished recording a new full length to be out soon.

"If rock is dead. . . . The Ghost Of Rock, the four-man Triangle rock 'n' roll assault team is alive and kicking, rampaging through a fuzzed-out, sticks-through-the-skins, straight-no-chaser revelry that few bands can challenge." -Grayson Currin / Indy Weekly

Portastatic is the solo project of Mac McCaughan, who is also known for his work in Superchunk and as co-owner of Merge Records. Started in the early 90's as a lo-fi side project and musical foil to Superchunk, over the years, Portastic has evolved into a credible artistic entity of its own. Print the flyer

Southern Culture on the Skids
Thursday, October 21, Educational Foundation Terrace, Graham Memorial, 12-2:00 p.m.
Chapel Hill's own southern-fried rockabilly/alt country sensation returns for a special performance. Described as a "walkng, talking storybook of Southern folkways," SCOTS has released seven acclaimed albums and gained a loyal national following. More. . .

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Cool John Ferguson
Thursday, October 28, Educational Foundation Terrace, Graham Memorial, 12-2:00 p.m.
Blues guitar virtuoso.
" John's musical path is immersion. The man breathes music and plays from the inside out. He commands the rare ability to develop a theme on the fly, incorporating every element of the situation along the way and somehow summing them all up neatly when he feels the end coming. His improvised pieces carry the aesthetic sensibility of careful, painstakingly crafted works, which in fact they are; it is simply all done in real time. Coupled with the willingness to play with anybody, any time, in any style, familiar or not, he possesses a formidable panurgy that is making him a force to be reckoned with in the music industry." -Wesely Wilkes

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Bob Carlin, The Joe Thompson Band, and The Hillbilly Pals
Thursday, November 11, John Lindsay Morehead II Lounge, Graham Memorial, 12-2:00 p.m.
Join us for the delightful variety of Bob Carlin's old time banjo, with The Joe Thompson Band (African-American fiddle), and retro-country by the Hillbilly Pals.

"Bob Carlin is probably the best known clawhammer style banjoist performing today. He has taken the distinctive southern banjo style to appreciative audiences all over the US, Canada and Europe. Carlin is a three-time winner of the late Frets Magazine (now known as Acoustic Guitar Magazine) readers poll, and has four Rounder albums and several instruction manuals and videos for the banjo." More. . .

"Thompson’s grandfather Robert, born in 1849, was said to have been a fiddler. The sons of Robert and wife Catie (born in 1858), including Joe’s father, were all accomplished musicians. They played at dances and other gatherings throughout their area, in the North Carolina Piedmont, trading songs and riffs and thereby putting their generation’s stamp on parts of the folk music tradition. 'Family Tradition,' [Rounder albums] the only album to date devoted exclusively to Joe Thompson’s music -- he performs on some out-of-print anthologies and on an earlier release with brother Odell Thompson -- is tall on talent and dedication and short on pretense and self-indulgence, in true folk-music fashion. It was produced to coincide with Thompson’s 80th birthday, and Thompson doesn’t sound a day over 57! He gives brief, spoken introductions to some of the songs, sings honestly and melodically in a pleasant untrained folksinger’s voice, and plays masterful and often subtle fiddle." - David J. Cantor