Doc Watson Hills of Home Celebrates Living Legend's Legacy

Media Contact:

Kristen Gleason
Director of Marketing
The Paramount Theater
215 East Main Street
Charlottesville, VA 22902
434.979.1922 ext. 103
kristen@theparamount.net

For Immediate Release

April 25, 2008

Without doubt a living legend in acoustic folk music, Arthel "Doc" Watson has been America's most renowned and influential folk guitar stylist for five decades. Described by The New York Times as a “Mountain-music patriarch ... Appalachian music master,” he is recipient of six Grammy Awards, a National Medal of the Arts, a National Heritage Fellowship, membership in the Bluegrass Hall of Honor, and the National Academy of Arts and Sciences Lifetime Achievement Award.

Watson returns to The Paramount Theater with longtime collaborator, Grammy-winning banjoist and storyteller David Holt and grandson Richard Watson for Hills of Home. This exciting multimedia musical evening of folk tunes and mountain wisdom showcases Watson's trademark lightning-fast guitar licks, soulful vocals, and rich storytelling skills on Saturday, May 10 at 8 pm.

This event is sponsored by Embarq. Special Media Sponsor is WMRA 103.5 -- NPR News, NPR Talk.

Hills of Home is an extension of Legacy, Watson's 2002 Grammy-winning collaboration with David Holt.  It largely recreates the album’s mixture of bluegrass, ballads, blues, and folk tales, combining music with stories of Watson’s early years growing up in North Carolina. Holt plays banjo and slide guitar, Richard Watson plays guitar, and Doc Watson contributes guitar, vocals, and the down-to-earth wisdom accumulated from a lifetime in American music.

A product of the rich musical environment of western North Carolina, Doc Watson created a unique flatpicking style of guitar playing that brought a speed, clarity, and melodic sense almost unprecedented in bluegrass and country music. President Bill Clinton has said, “There may not be a serious, committed baby boomer alive who didn’t at some point in his or her youth try to spend a few minutes at least trying to learn to pick a guitar like Doc Watson.”

A powerful singer who virtually invented the art of playing mountain fiddle tunes on the flattop guitar, the blind, self-taught virtuoso blends traditional Appalachian music with bluegrass, country, gospel, and blues in concerts of hot flatpicking tunes, slow romantic ballads, gutsy blues numbers, delicately fingerpicked melodies, and an old-time gospel song or two.

This witty, down-to-earth “man of the mountains” who loves to share the music of his heart and home did not set out from the Appalachian mountains to become a famous musician. Born in Stoney Fork Township near what is now Deep Gap, North Carolina in 1923, Watson was not yet one year old when an infection, exacerbated by a congenital vascular disorder, took his vision. 

From a musically-inclined family, singing and the sounds of the phonograph were always present. It wasn’t long before Watson joined in, playing harmonica at age five and banjo by age eleven. He picked up guitar as a young teenager at North Carolina State School for the Blind in Raleigh, and at 18, he got a gig performing for a radio show. The announcer felt the name Arthel wasn’t right for radio. While searching for a replacement, someone in the audience shouted, "Call him Doc."  The name stuck.

However, it was not until 1960, as the “folk boom” was emerging, that folklorist Ralph Rinzler “discovered” Watson. This meeting led Watson to tour the coffeehouse circuit in the Northeast, and eventually to the 1963 Newport Folk Festival, where he was embraced enthusiastically by all ages in the folk community. Watson went on to produce dozens of recordings, win six Grammy awards and perform in legendary venues including Gerde’s Folk City in Greenwich Village and Carnegie Hall.

Four-time Grammy Award winner David Holt is a musician, storyteller, historian, and entertainer dedicated to performing and preserving traditional American music and stories. His three-decade passion for traditional music and culture introduced him to a wide variety of instruments, including the mouth bow, the bottleneck slide guitar and the paper bag. Along the way, he mastered ten acoustic instruments, including his much-loved banjo, and has performed and recorded with Watson, Chet Atkins, Earl Scruggs, Roy Acuff, and many more. Holt's appearances include numerous programs on TNT, Folkways on PBS, and Riverwalk on NPR.

Watson and Holt will be joined on stage by Doc’s grandson, Richard Watson, who began traveling with his grandfather after a tragic tractor accident claimed the life of Doc’s son Merle in 1985. Merle and Doc had traveled and played together for 20 years, recorded more than 20 albums and won four Grammy awards.

Now 85 years old, Watson has acquired bragging rights through his music and accomplishments, yet remains a fundamentally honest man. He says, “I would rather be remembered as a likable person than for any phase of my picking. Don't misunderstand me; I really appreciate people's love of what I do with the guitar. That's an achievement as far as I'm concerned, and I'm proud of it. But I'd rather people remember me as a decent human being than as a flashy guitar player. That's the way I feel about it." 

Seats are still available for Doc Watson Hills of Home with David Holt and Richard Watson on Saturday, May 10 at 8 pm. Tickets are $38.50, $41.50, $44.50, and $49.50. Half-price student rush tickets and group discounts are offered.

More information is available online or through The Paramount’s Box Office at 434.979.1333.

For more information about Doc Watson and David Holt, please visit www.docsguitar.com and www.davidholt.com.