BALLAD SWAP AT THE OLD MARSHALL JAIL
Once a month old time ballad singers gather on the outdoor patio of the Old Marshall Jail to swap (sing) ballads, usully not accompanied by any instrument. This is traditional rural Madison County music, the long tradition of mountain singing before the Northerners, like me, moved it. Most of the singers learned the ballads from parents and grandparents who were probably uneducated while most of the singers have gone to college and are aware that they are keeping an old tradition alive. Sheila Kay Adams is the leader of the group and has passed on to others in the group songs she has learned. The audience is mostly, I would guess, people who have moved to this region. But this newcomer audience is very attentive and are doing their part in keeping the tradition going. The place was packed with no empty seats with a number of people sitting on the railway tracks between the Old Marshall Jail and the French Broad River which was brown and swollen with white capped rapids from the recent rain
BILLYBABA’S WANDERING 