Friday, June 20 was the first in a series of Friday evening concerts in Mill Race Park. In celebration of the beginning of the concert series the City of Parsons provided free drinks, chips and hotdogs fresh off the grill nearest the bandstand. Concessions for all future concerts will be sold by the Tucker County High School junior class in order to raise much needed funds for prom and graduation.
Jim King was the first musician to perform, using a beautiful guitar that he designed and built himself. The guitar has a wonderful tone and was the perfect accompaniment to the wide variety of songs Mr. King sang and played. According to the bio he sent, “Jim King is a West Virginia native, born in Buckhannon. He is a long time resident of Grafton and a graduate of Grafton High School. He also has two degrees from Fairmont State University. He has been performing in the local area for a few years now. He primarily sings classic country music and plays a guitar that he designed and built. Some of the places he has performed are the Sagebrush Roundup and the Middletown Community Center, both near Fairmont,; the Mountain View Jamboree on Kingwood Pike near Morgantown; and the Century Jamboree near Buckhannon. When he is not performing, he is doing nature photography, astronomy or wood working.”
Richie Musgrove from Red Creek, West Virginia was the next performer. According to his bio he is, “A soulful acoustic-style singer/songwriter performing country classics from the 50’s through the 90’s as well as many newer country hits while also adding a variety of many other genres and styles from Southern Rock, Classic Rock, Blues and Modern Rock. Originating from Fairmont, WV, he moved to Red Creek in Tucker County, WV in 2012 where he currently resides with his family.
Mr. Musgrove served ten years in the US Army. During his time in the military he continued to entertain both his fellow soldiers and civilian venues during combat deployments and peace keeping missions as well as locations surrounding his home duty stations when not deployed.
Currently Mr. Musgrove performs at local venues within the state of West Virginia on a limited basis. Raising his large family of ten children is his priority, however he schedules performances from time to time in order to feed his passion for entertaining and making music.”
Mr. Musgrove will be back in Mill Race Park on July 11th with Fred Puderbaugh. Mr. Puderbaugh likes to perform a wide range of songs from WW I and WW II in addition to such Irish classics as “Danny Boy”, “The Wearin’ O’ The Green” and “I’ll Take You Home Again Kathleen”. He also plays classic country tunes from the 30’s and 40’s as well. He currently lives in Davis, WV but grew up in Cumberland, MD and played guitar music since 1944 when, at the age of 15 he lied about his age (the minimum was 16) in order to join the Maryland State Guard at Camp Meade, now known as Fort Meade. Locally he has played at Cortland Acres and for veteran’s day ceremonies at the Parsons Veterans Memorial Wall.
The next concert is June 27 and will feature the music of John Chase. In his words, his music is “Soul lifting, emo-folk, country-hippie reggae rock.” He goes on to state, “The greatest blessing is to be alive, but at times we get tired of things. Music is the medicine. Music is here to help us on our way.”
The musicians listed below are scheduled to play in Mill Race Park from 6 to 8 p.m. on the following Fridays:
June 27 JOHN CHASE whose style of music he described as “Soul lifting, emo-folk, country-hippie reggae rock”! John recently performed at The Purple Fiddle and was a huge hit!
July 11 FRED PUDDERBAUGH and RICHIE MUSGROVE will play fiddle and guitar to showcase a wide variety of folk to Celtic to classic country music!
July 18 EMAY aka Erika May will bring us her award winning selection of original songs!
July 25 The KLINES from Elkins brings a wide array of music and storytelling from their vast performances!
Still trying to firm up musicians to perform on August 1 and 8!
August 15 THE DAVISSON BROTHERS will be here to delight us with their talent!
Any changes or additions to the schedule will be posted in the “What’s Happening” section of The Parsons Advocate as well as on bulletin boards throughout the county (and any place else someone will put up a poster)!
