Appalachian Festival

Bluegrass and Barbershops

by Geoff Lawhorne

This past Saturday, bands from all over the region came to participate in the Appalachian Festival on the campus of Frostburg State University. Two of these bands, That’s It! and Black Diamond, performed from 3:50 to a little past 5:00 PM on the Sowers Stage.

The Appalachian Festival is a cultural event designed to show off the local heritage and allow people from other parts of the country to experience Appalachian life. It started Thursday the 16^th and concluded Saturday night with a concert. In addition to music, there were speakers and discussion panels, poets, and local goods and cuisine to buy.

That’s It! and Black Diamond represent the breadth of Appalachian culture. That’s It! is a barber shop quartet, a style of music that does not use any musical instruments, instead relying solely on the vocal talents of the four performers, and is considered to be a subtype of A cappella. That’s It! is composed of tenor Kurt Lemmert, lead singer Kevin McKenzie, baritone Dan Hastings and bass Roger Anderson. While the songs they sang ranged on topics from the serious to the humorous, the tone was always upbeat. One song that particular stood out was “Mr. Natural”, a song about a man who, during the day, is obsessed with eating only all-natural, healthy foods, but at night when he’s alone, he breaks out his lock box full of Twinkies and other fatty foods. In between songs, the band members entertained the audience; in particular, Mr. Lemmert told several jokes like “How many bluegrass musicians does it take to change a light bulb? Two; one to change the bulb and the other to complain that it’s electric.” He had similar jokes for folk musicians (“Seven; one to put in the new bulb and six to reminisce about the old one) and choir directors (“No one knows; no one watches choir directors”) before finishing with tenors (“It takes the entire tenor section; one to climb up on the ladder to change the bulb and the rest to say, “Hey, isn’t that awfully high for you?”).

Black Diamond was more serious, and more traditionally Appalachian than That’s It! Black Diamond is a bluegrass group made up by Donnie Gibson, the banjoist, Nick Blough, the guitarist, Tom Wilson on the mandolin, and Bob Boyce on the bass. All four gentlemen also sang. Mr. Blough explained that they weren’t going to talk so much, in order to maximize their time for playing music, although they did start talking a bit more later in their set. Their tone, appropriate for a bluegrass band, was somber, and seemed especially so after That’s It!, although they did have some more comical songs of their own. They performed almost twice as many songs, ten to That’s It!’s six or so.

The audience’s response was overwhelmingly positive for both groups. A young woman named Caitlin saw both performances and said she felt both “Sounded really well”, and her friend Laura felt that That’s It! in particular was “really animated”. That’s It! can be booked for most occasions by contacting Mr. Lemmert by phone at (301) 689-2099 or by e-Mail at klemmert@frostburg.edu. Black Diamond plays every Tuesday night in the Queen City Creamery on Harrison Street in Cumberland.