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Wednesday, August 22, 1990 / University Daily Kansan
Music
Dance will start fiddling contest
By Debbie Myers
Kansan staff writer
On Friday night, a professional dance troupe from Annapolis, MD., will kick off the 10th annual Kansas State Fiddling and Picking Championships at Liberty Hall, 642 Massachusetts St.
The Fiddle Puppets will perform a dance concert at 8 p.m. to begin the championships, which run through June four different Lawrence locations.
The troupe performs various types of step dances that emphasize the sounds the tap shoes make, said Mike Rundle, city commissioner and one of the event's organizers. These dances, with roots in Irish, Scottish and West African step dancing, are performed to bluegrass or old-time string music.
Tickets to the dance concert cost $8 for adults and $4 for children.
Steve Mason, Alerd Packer Memorial String Band member, said he thought the Fiddle Puppets would be the highlight of the罐
"They don't just stand there and dance," Mason said. "They swing around. It's a choreographed kind of deal. They don't obey the same laws of gravity that we do. You'll see them, and you'll be amazed."
On Saturday, the Fiddle Puppets will teach beginning and intermediate clogging workshops at the Lawrence Senior Center, 745 Vermont St. Clogging is a variation of st dancing.
Rundle, who has clogged for about nine years, plans to attend the intermediate clogging workshop.
'very often, one feels moved to dance, but if you don't know how to dance to it, you're just sitting there with your unfulfilled desire to
"He's a real good dancer," Mason said. "We tease him about being the best tap-dancing politician in Kansas."
Rundle's talents haven't gone unnoticed.
In addition to the clogging workshops Saturday afternoon, there will be a rhythm and dance workshop for children Saturday morning at the senior center. Saturday's activities will conclude that night with a barn dance at the center, which will include music and dance calling by the Fiddle Puppets.
At the Lawrence Arts Center, 5th and Vermont streets, will be several other workshops Saturday for instruction in guitar, ensemble folksinging, rhythms of the Caribbean, old-time fiddle mountain songs. A Children's concert will be that evening at the arts center.
The festivities will continue Sunday in South Park. The bands Ragged But Right, Drastic Measures, the Stringers and Wheatland Express will entertain the less ambitious members of the crowd, but those who are adventurous at heart can look forward to a day of live music and an assortment of instruments, ensemble folksing-wise, banjo, jibie, flat-pick guitar, mandolin and mountain dulcimer are planned. Contests are open to anyone who has not won first place in the past three years.
'Hee Haw' star still going strong
The Associated Press
NASHVILLE, Teen. — After more than a half century performing as a gentlymanly old man, Grandpa knew something. He's grown into his act.
Little did he know that when he was 22, an offhand remark by a colleague would earn him a lifelong nickname and career persona.
"Get up here to the mike," you just like an old grandpa, "radio entertainer Bradley Kincaid told him.
Fifty-four years later, he's still getting in front of the mike. And he's still everyone's grandpa.
He's one of the few performers who have been on television virtually every week since 1968. That was the first time "Hee Haw" aired, and Jones has been on the country-music humor show ever since.
Chances are he's going to be on the small screen much longer. Even if the one-hour program went out of production today, there would be more than 20 years of returns to use.
Since he was j2, Jones has been on stage in a battered gray hat, brown Western boots and brightly colored suspenders. A bushy mustache fails
to conceal a mischievous grin. A timeworn banjo is a constant companion.
"They don't have to make me up too much anymore," he says joyfully backstage at "Hee Haw," referring to his age, 76.
Grandpa has grown into his act
Every week on "Hee Haw" is a segment as traditional as the show's famous corn field. Cast members ask why "hey grandpa! What's for summer?"
He responds exuberantly with a lip-smacking menu of countrv food:
"Corn bread and gravy. Candied yams. Butter beans. Blueberry cobbler. The more to eat, the more to spare."
Not even Jones recalls how the routine got started.
"It seems pretty popular. When I go out on personal appearances, they holt that from the audience all the time. I have to have an answer quick."
Fellow performers on "Hee Haw"
call him "Grandpa" or "Pa" off stage.
In fact, "Hee Haw" producer
Sam Lovelou says, "Everyone on the
cast says he's their favorite.
"He means everything to the show. He's a link to the traditional country music we have with Minnie Pearl, Roy Acuff and others. He made a career off rural music and rural savings."
George "Goober" Lindsey of "Hee Haw" and "The Andy Griffith Show" told a story about Grandpa playing in a celebrity golf tournament. "We gave him a pair of golf shoes. He said, 'They're pretty good shoes if can just get these tacks out of the bottom.'
Jones was born Louis Marshall Jones in Henderson County, Ky., the youngest of 10 children. He began playing mandolin and fiddle as a younger sister and by 76 years old. But it was banjo played that earned him recognition.
His family moved to Akron, Ohio, where in 1929 he won first prize in a talent contest, winning $50 in $10 gold pieces.
"It bought me the first good guitar I ever had," Jones said. "I've been on stage ever since."
He has performed in the Grand Ole Opry music show since 1946. In 1978, he was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame.
Jones still makes up to six live appearances a month, playing such banjo favorites as "Mountain Shadow" and "The Wolf." Ramona, an diddler, often joins him.
He has entertained at such diverse venues as Carnegie Hall, the Hollywood Bowl, various state fairs and the Smithsonian Institution.
He says his biggest thrill was not on "Hee Haw" or at Carnegie Hall but on a flat bed truck in rice paddies performing for U.S. troops in Korea.
"We got within 20 yards of the front lines playing for the boys for four or five weeks," he said. "The boys liked everything you did because some of them hadn't seen anyone from the states in nine months."
He says being on "Hee Haw" has been one of the many joys of his long tenure in show business.
"I've had a big time. It's more like fun than a job. There's a lot of good boys and gals on it. We've had a lot of fun and no trouble." he said.
Local bands launch SUA concert season
By David Roach
Kansan staff writer
A free concert at 8:30 p.m. tomorrow on Wescoe Beach will wrap up Beach and Boulevard activities,
Entertainment will include the bands Diary of an Earthling and Sin City Disciples and a performance by KJHK disc jockey Sir Lire. The event is co-sponsored by Student Union and this program, which will provide music between acts.
"We wanted to have it to welcome new and old students back to KU."
said Tiiu McGuire, SUA Special Events coordinator
are older."
Organizers are expecting a good turnout.
"In the past, more freshmen have come to the Beach and Boulevard," said Anita Bajaj. SUA president. "But since Sin City is so strong in Lawrence, I'm looking for more upperclassmen to come to the event."
"I think it's a great thing. It's important for freshmen students to mingle not just with people in their own class but also with people that
Sim City is a blues and rock band from the Kansas City area. Diary of an Earthling features electronic music by Michelle Heffner, Topka senior
The event will lead the SUA Special Events concert season, which will be highlighted by a George Winston concert, both in October.
SUA also will schedule weekly concerts from noon to 1 p.m. Fridays at the Kansas University. The concerts
will feature local and KU performers, McGuire said.
In addition, SUA Special Events is looking forward to staging concerts in the Burge Union's new party room, and its upcoming reintroduction in mid-October, McGuire said.
Bv Elicia Hill
Kansas City Radio Jazz Festival showcases area, national talent
Kansan staff writer
"The University is one of the only places around town that offers an all-ages course. McGuire said "I love it, it's a single life course out and support the live music."
The eight annual Kansas City Radio jazzi Festival will be Saturday and Sunday at Volker Park in Kansas City. Mo.
Audiences will get a chance to hear local musicians Claude "Fiddler" Williams and the Joe Cartwright band. The Instrumentalists Messengers, the
Steve Miller Big Band and others.
Steve Miller big band and others.
The music will begin at 4 p.m.
saturday and 1 p.m. Sunday at Volker Park, 47th and Oak streets.
"Our goal for the festival is to promote jazz and the musicians who perform it in the Kansas City area," said Stacy Mings, spokesperson for the Jazz Festival Committee. "Although the festival is free, the musicians will be paid for their performances."
The committee is a volunteer organization comprised of people who love jazz. Mings said.
Kathe Kaul, president of the committee. said she had worked more
than 100 hours a week to put the festival together.
"We are really working hard to make the festive stronger and better than it was last year," she said. "We've made some changes to try and do that, and we really want input from you." We did our best in the area as to how we're doing."
This year the festival will feature Kansas City area high school students who will perform on the "Youth Stage" Festival. These performances will appeal to all age groups, Kaul said.
Some of the high school groups are Brady and Sons Percussion Ensemble, which consists of six differently pitched drum sets; the Heart of America United Way group; tap dancers from Gail's School of Dance and an eight-piece high school group directed by Jason Goudeau.
Pam Hider, a storyteller, will tell the story of Kansas City jazz to children.
"Jazz is alive in this town," said Hider, who also is president of the Mid-America Arts Foundation. "It seemed to be on life support and that he was a true artist. I hopefully this will drum up more support and awareness for the art."
The festival's media sponsor is the
Kansas City Radio Broadcasters Association. Because of the association's involvement, the committee called for a festival's name this year, Kaul said.
It was a disappointment to the committee when U.S. Sprint pulled out as a sponsor in the spring, she said.
"But we have obtained new sponsors," Kaul said. "The Radio Broadcasters Association has been terrific in supporting media support for the festival."
Additional sponsors include Kansas City Parks and Recreation, The Neighborhood Tourism Developmental Fund, The Missouri Arts Council and various corporate sponsors.
The festival did not receive funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, but organizers said they will support grants from NEANext year. Kaul said.
The Musician's Union also pulled their support from the festival because non-union musicians were hired to perform, she said.
Festival organizers said they expected 75,000 to 125,000 people to attend the two-day event.
In case of rain, the groups will be protected by a large, watertight showcase van, Kaul said.
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