He has been referred to as “A Legendary Banjo Player”.   Kyle Creed (1912-1982) lived at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains in Surry County, North Carolina.  Coming from a musical family and being surrounded by old time music, he was just as adept at playing the fiddle as the banjo.

As a young man, Kyle married Percy Hicks (1912-1999) and had two daughters.  He was skilled at saw mill operations, carpentry, and stone masonry. At times he found it necessary to relocate his family to different parts of the country in order to follow his occupation.Kyle and Percy moved to Galax, Virginia area in Carroll County in 1960 where they bought a country store.  Moving back near his musical roots of North Carolina, he reunited with his “old music buddies” from the 30s and 40s. Together with Paul Sutphin, Earnest East, Fred Cockerham, Verlin Clifton and Ronald Collins, Kyle formed the “Camp Creek Boys” old time music band and began making numerous recordings.

At age 16 Kyle crafted his first banjo using tools and material available to him at the time.  Repairing musical instruments and building personal banjos was the beginning of a new career. Soon he had a list of orders for his custom made banjos to be shipped throughout the United States, Canada, England, Australia and Japan.

Kyle Creed was an innovator in banjo building, as well as a talented banjo and fiddle player.  He excelled in his trade as a carpenter which aided his craftsmanship abilities. With his excellent banjo playing in the clawhammer and the older two-finger picking styles he knew the qualities that were most desirable in an old-time banjo.  While growing up he had noticed that the fretless banjo played by the older musicians in the area had the bridge located toward the center of the banjo head. Thus, he came up with a formula to shorten the scale length of the banjo and bring the bridge toward the center of the head.  Today the shorter scale length is considered very desirable by most open back banjo players and is used by open back banjo builders around the world. He also retro-fitted tenor banjo rims with his 5-string necks, built a few resonator banjos, came up with his own tone rings from brass and bronze and a few of his own peg head designs.  He liked to experiment and built some banjos with 11 and 12 inch heads. He designed his own two sided finger pick that slips over the first finger to enable him to pick upwards or down. The pick was cut from the brass of a model T Ford headlight reflector in the shape of a “T” and then shaped to fit over and around the finger.

Being a saw miller, Kyle knew about the particular characteristics of different types of wood.  He used local wood in his banjo building process; maple, curly maple, apple, wild cherry, black walnut and dogwood.  Sometimes he used table top formica on the fingerboard and pegheads. Using the formica on the fretted banjo fingerboard was time consuming and tedious fitting between the frets and was much easier on the fretless since the fingerboard was cut in one piece.  The fretless banjo players like the formica fingerboard because it enables them to slide their fingers to note. A fretless banjo built by Kyle especially for Fred Cockerham was donated to the Smithsonian Institution. Fred’s family made the presentation in June 1988.

Kyle’s innovative ideas, experiments and playing skills have impacted the old-time banjo builders and players throughout the world.  All the banjos Kyle built, just under 200, are highly sought after by players and collectors today because of their uniqueness, sound and playability.

Bluegrass Unlimited is a monthly music magazine that is dedicated to the furtherance of bluegrass and old-time musicians, devotees and associates. The magazine was first published in 1966 and as of 2008 the magazine had a circulation of more than 25,000 copies and is widely considered the premier magazine for bluegrass music. Bluegrass Unlimited is a founding member of the International Bluegrass Music Association (IMBA).

Folklorist and music scholar Neil V. Rosenberg, in Bluegrass: A History, sets out the history of Bluegrass Unlimited and thereafter notes its prominence and influence as the oldest of the nationally distributed bluegrass magazines. The magazine launched in 1966, in a typed, mimeographed 7x8.5 inch booklet-like format with a hand drawn logo, and was available for $3 per year. In the fall of 1970, the magazine moved from an informal to a full-time operation with “new publishers”, Pete and Marion Kuykendall, upgrading it to a larger, standard format on glossy paper. The current U.S. subscription rate is $25 per year and the magazine is full-color and printed on high-speed web offset presses.

As music historian Bill C. Monroe observed, Bluegrass Unlimited magazine was initially devoted primarily to bluegrass music in the USA and abroad with occasional reference to old-time country music. It is now a treasure trove of information on every phase of bluegrass and old-time music – biographical articles, discographies, record and book reviews, concert and festival dates, interviews, classified ads, and songs. “Bluegrass Unlimited has always been a thorough compendium of material on bluegrass and old-time music.”

Speaking of founder Pete Kuykendall and the influence of Bluegrass Unlimited, David Freeman, owner of Rebel Records and County Records, said: “When the magazine started publishing, bluegrass was pretty much at a low point. The magazine spread the word and highlighted the artistic aspect of the music, which helped to bring it out of the bars where it was in the 1950s. Without him I don’t know where the bluegrass industry would be today.”

The 1996 International Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame citation inducting Pete Kuykendall says that Bluegrass Unlimited magazine is “a publication affectionately referred to as the ‘bible of bluegrass music’”.

Born on June 1, 1926 in Mount Airy, North Carolina, Andy Griffith's first career ambition was to be an opera singer. Later, he decided he wanted to become a Moravian preacher, and enrolled as a pre-divinity student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1944. While in college, he became involved in drama and musical theater, and graduated in 1949 with a degree in music. He taught high school music for three years before setting out with his new wife, Barbara Edwards, on a career as an entertainer.

Griffith and his wife moved to New York, where he made his television debut as a guest monologist on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1954. That same year, he won the role of Will Stockdale in the TV version of No Time for Sergeants. When the play was produced on Broadway in 1955 Griffith was nominated for a Tony Award for outstanding supporting actor. Griffith went on to reprise his role in the 1958 film version of No Time for Sergeants.

In 1960 Griffith earned another Tony nomination for best actor in a musical for Destry Rides Again. He made his feature film debut in 1957 in A Face in the Crowd. He was also a regular, with Don Knotts, on the NBC variety series, The Steve Allen Show, from 1959 to 1960.

Griffith's 1960 guest appearance as a small-town mayor on the sitcom Make Room for Daddy led CBS to give him his own sitcom, The Andy Griffith Show, in which he played the gentle, philosophical small-town Sheriff Andy Taylor. The show was a tremendous success, consistently ranking among the most popular sitcoms during the entirety of its eight-year run. Knotts co-starred from 1960 to 1965, as Taylor's high-strung deputy sheriff, Barney Fife. The young Ron Howard also co-starred, as the sheriff's red-haired son, Opie.

After The Andy Griffith Show went off the air in 1968, Griffith appeared in several feature films, including Hearts of the West (1975). For the most part, however, he concentrated on TV, and appeared in several short-lived attempts to recapture the success of The Andy Griffith Show

In 1972, Griffith formed a production company, Andy Griffith Enterprises. His company's projects included a TV movie, Winter Kills (1974), in which he starred. In 1981, Griffith received an Emmy nomination for his supporting role in another TV movie, Murder in Texas.

In 1983, Griffith was suddenly stricken with Guillen-Barre syndrome, a crippling muscular disease that left him partially paralyzed for three months. After six months of private rehabilitation, he made a full recovery and was able to return to acting. He made a triumphant return to TV stardom in 1986, as the title character in the courtroom drama series Matlock, which aired during prime time on NBC from 1986 to 1992 and on ABC from 1993 to 1995. He also served as an executive producer and an executive story supervisor for the show, and later reprised his role as Ben Matlock in a series of popular TV movies.

Meanwhile, fan allegiance to The Andy Griffith Show has continued through re-runs. In 1986, Griffith reunited with his co-stars, including Knotts and Howard, in Return to Mayberry, which became the highest-rated TV movie of the 1986 season. He also hosted The Andy Griffith Reunion Special in 1993, and served as executive producer for both programs.

Griffith's marriage to Barbara Edwards ended in divorce in 1972. He and his second wife, Solicia, divorced in 1981 after five years of marriage. In 1983, he married Cindi Knight, a former teacher and actress. The couple lived for many years on a 68-acre ranch in Dare County, North Carolina. Griffith and his first wife had two children: Dixie and Sam. Griffith died on July 3, 2012, at the age of 86, at his home in North Carolina.

William Oliver Swofford (February 22, 1945 – February 12, 2000), known professionally as Oliver, was an American pop singer.  Born in North Wilkesboro, North Carolina, he began singing as an undergraduate at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in the early 1960s. He was a member of two music groups — The Virginians and, later, The Good Earth — and was then known as Bill Swofford.

His clean-cut good looks and soaring baritone voice were the perfect vehicle for the up-tempo single entitled "Good Morning Starshine" from the pop/rock musical "Hair", which reached #3 on the Billboard Hot 100 in July 1969, sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc by the R.I.A.A. a month later. Later that fall, a softer, ballad single entitled "Jean", (the theme from the Oscar-winning film The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie) bested his previous effort by one, reaching #2 on the Hot 100 and #1 on the Billboard Easy Listening chart. Written by longtime beatnik poet Rod McKuen, "Jean" also sold over one million copies, garnering Oliver his second gold disc in as many months. Performing both hits on a number of TV variety shows and specials in the late 1960s, including the Ed Sullivan Show helped propel both songs to the top of the charts.

Later recordings had more modest commercial success however with covers of such songs as "Sunday Mornin'", which peaked at #35 in December 1969, and "Angelica" which stalled at #97 four months later. In addition, his 1970 cover of "I Can Remember", the 1968 hit by James & Bobby Purify missed the Hot 100 but climbed into the top 25 of the Billboard Easy Listening chart in the late summer of that year. Late that fall, Oliver also had one inspirational recording entitled "Light the Way", composed by Eric Carmen and his last single to enter the pop music charts was his 1971 cover of "Early Morning Rain" by Canadian singer-songwriter Gordon Lightfoot. The song "Bubbled Under" at #124 on May 1st 1971 and also reached the Easy Listening chart a few weeks later.

Producer Bob Crewe also recorded with The Rays, Diane Renay, Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels, Freddy Cannon, Lesley Gore, Michael Jackson, Bobby Darin, Roberta Flack, Peabo Bryson, Patti LaBelle, and Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons as well as his own The Bob Crewe Generation.

As Crewe preferred elaborate, often overly orchestrated musical arrangements and Oliver preferred a simpler folk sound, these "creative differences" led them to part ways in 1971. Resuming the name Bill Swofford, the singer toured hundreds of college campuses in the eastern and southern United States in 1976 and 1977, but a short-lived attempt to team up with Karen Carpenter during the same period proved unsuccessful.

Despite his vocal talents, Swofford was unable to sustain further success on the charts, and in 1983, People magazine ran a feature article on Swofford, describing him as a happily married father who kept his distance from the music industry, selling real estate. Several years later, it was reported that he was engaged as a business manager for a Louisiana pharmaceutical company.

Oliver had a brother, John Swofford, who was first a quarterback, and then athletic director for the UNCCH and became the commissioner of the Atlantic Coast Conference in 1997 as well as Coordinator for the Bowl Championship Series.

In the late 1990s, Swofford was diagnosed with cancer and died at the age of 54 in Shreveport, Louisiana.  On June 4, 2009, a resolution was introduced in the North Carolina General Assembly honoring Oliver.

Certain musicians achieve such a level of proficiency, have such a wide range of talents and accomplishments, and become so widely known, they become as one with the instruments they play. This is true of Robert “Tut” Taylor who is known as “Tut Taylor the flat-picking Dobro man”.

Tut was born in Baldwin County, GA on November 20, 1923. He came from a musical family. Daddy played thumpin Banjo. Mama played the fiddle, older brother played guitar and the other brother played the mandolin. He was nicknamed “Tut” by one of the brothers who gave everyone a nickname. Why Tut? No one will ever know, as he didn’t even know there was a King Tut.

Tut began playing mandolin when he was twelve. He later acquired a six string National-Dobro lap steel and started playing it with a flat pick. He didn’t even know that they were supposed to be played with fingerpicks! Then he heard the sound of the Dobro being played by Brother Oswald. He found one and learned to play it with his flat pick. He loved the sound of it so much he became a collector and trader with his collection reaching a high of 67 instruments at one time. With all those instruments over the years, it was 1968 before Tut found the one he loved.  It was a special model 27. This is the only one he played from then on until recent years.

Tut, with his wife Lee and family of eight remained in Milledgeville, GA until 1970. During that early period he held numerous jobs of different kinds but sign painting was to be his main continuing vocation. In 1970 he moved his family to Nashville. Along with George Gruhn and Randy Wood they opened GTR, a music store and repair shop. Tut soon bought a Nashville sign shop to continue with his sign painting, opened the Old Time Pickin Parlor, bought the former Billy Grammer guitar factory and started manufacturing the “Tennessee” line of stringed musical instruments. He picked in a group with Norman Blake and toured with The John Hartford Aereo-plain Band. All this is just a sample of his activities. It would take a book to cover it all in detail. In fact, there was a lengthy article about his life published in 1988 and later around 2000 a book about his life was published by Pat Ahrens.

To briefly summarize some of it, Tut is a songwriter, a vintage instrument collector and dealer, a craftsman, an instrument designer, an album producer, an artist, a sign painter, an author and a Grammy winner. Tut’s creativity knows no bounds. He has picked and recorded with a who’s who list of some of the most innovative and famous musicians of the era, including, Roy Acuff, Bill Monroe, Porter Wagoner, Hank Williams Jr., Ricky Skaggs, John Hartford, Don Reno, Grandpa Jones, Roland and Clarence White, Peter Rowan, Glenn Campbell, Vasser Clements, Bennie Martin, Mark O’Conner, Charlie Collins, Don Humphrey, Butch Robbins, Rual Yarborough, Red Rector, Herschel Sizemore, Norman Blake, Brother Oswald, Josh Graves, Jerry Douglas, Mike Auldridge, Stacy Phillips, Sally Van Meter, Gene Wooten Rob Ickes, lifelong friends Bobby Wolfe and Curtis and Ricky Burch.

Tut has played for all kinds of audiences from family and friends to festival crowds, to those dressed in tuxedos and to those in bib overall. He has picked on a flatbed truck in the hot sun and he has performed in the comfort of a symphony concert hall and he has played on the stage of The Grand Ole Opry including “The Last Night” at the old Ryman Auditorium. He was a friend to the Dopyera Brothers who invented the Dobro in 1927 and he traveled in 1996 to their native home in Slovakia to attend an annual Festival held in their honor and to receive the coveted Dobro Player of the Year Award.

In addition to all of the above, Tut has received many awards including one from the Governor of Tennessee in 1976 for “Tennessee Ambassador of Goodwill”. There are eight awards listed in the book by Pat Ahrens. He has participated in seven albums with other artists, and has around thirteen CD’s and albums listed in his discography. Further, he has been a friend, mentor and personal booster to many young and upcoming musicians such as Mark O’Conner at age twelve. He did all the gold leaf work and signage at the old Roy Acuff Museum on Broadway Avenue in Nashville. He and son Mark did all the signage for the new Opryland amusement park that opened in the 70’s in Nashville. Tut is also well known for his art work on musical instrument cases.

One could go on and on for hours about the life of Tut Taylor, a man now in his late 80’s, a flat pickin dobro man who has been part of Merlefest for many years and a man we have called friend and neighbor for many years here in Wilkes County, NC. There are many stories untold.

For more than thirty years, Cindy has pursued her passion for Bluegrass Music as an award winning broadcaster, producer, promoter, singer, musician, writer, photographer and MC.  Her national radio show, “Knee-Deep In Bluegrass”, went into syndication in 2003 with distribution by the John Boy & Billy Radio Network. Now heard weekly in nearly a hundred radio markets, Cindy uses her knowledge of the music and enthusiasm to entertain and educate the listeners of her show.  Her radio career started at the age of seventeen at her hometown station, WKSK in West Jefferson, NC. Her radio work continued regionally over the next fifteen years at WKBC, North Wilkesboro, NC and WFMX, Statesville, NC, preparing her for her ultimate broadcasting goal of national syndication.

Cindy was elected to the Board of Directors of the International Bluegrass Music Association for two terms and serves as chair of the IBMA Membership Committee.  She was producer of the 2008, 2009 and 2010 IBMA Awards Show at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, TN.

Cindy has been involved with MerleFest since its beginning in 1988 and started serving as MC in 1990. Her MC work has taken her to a variety of stages and venues over the years.

She was producer on the 2011 Bluegrass release, “In A Groove” by her husband, Terry Baucom, bringing together some of the top names in Bluegrass for these recording sessions.

She credits her early love for Bluegrass 100% to her father who played banjo, fiddle, guitar and mandolin and built stringed instruments.  As a teenager she performed in a band with her dad and went on to work in other regional bands, singing and playing bass and guitar. She feels fortunate to have been presented the opportunities to promote the music she has loved all her life.

While being blessed with many accomplishments, Cindy is most proud of her family – children, Houston, Molly and Hunter, grandson, Kayden and husband, Terry.  She thanks her mother and brothers for tolerating her Bluegrass obsession when she was relentlessly thumping bass to albums late into the night; carrying around a cassette recorder insisting on an interview; having jam sessions in the den; and begging to attend the next festival or show.  This honor she dedicates in loving memory to her dad, Jim Brooks, who taught her that music is less about notes and lyrics and more about the bond it creates among those we share it with.