MerleFest

Really good guitar player and banjo player.

Uh, he would take me to music festivals when I was younger, to, like, MerleFest up in North Carolina.

Um, and then when I was seven, I got my first guitar, like a little classical guitar, and started taking classical guitar lessons.

And, um, just, that w- I, I fell in love.

So this came about about two years ago.

I'm born and raised about 30 minutes outside of the Watson stage at Merlefest.

So I grew up right there with Merlefest, and about two years ago, I went to the team, and I was like, hey, I want to be a part of Merlefest in some way.

I've always loved music, so I was like, I just want it to be a part of my life.

I want it to be a part of my career.

Yes, I will learn TikTok.

Exactly.

Did TikTok that first year, and I became Merlefest's best friend, and that became my image.

You know, like what I'm looking at shouldn't sound as good as it does.

I always say that, you know, so there's that first period from that 2001 to when they get to play Merlefest in 2004, which keeps the band going.

Like that gives them hope as a band.

Like they've talked about it that, you know, that was one of their goals, play Merlefest.

Well, they get it.

So then obviously they quit their day jobs a little bit before then.

And their music is full time.

And so Merlefest is a big moment.

Ireland.

And at Merlefest,

they come back

every year.

And this year we're getting to play.

We played the Merlefest band finals and we're getting to play Scruggs Fest.

Now we're playing Ola Belle Reed.

So it's pretty fun to get to play three festivals that honor the legends of, you know, Doc Watson and Earl.

yeah and like the festival like just people like that understand that it's like it's about the music but it's also about the people it's about just going to the festival.

We went to Merlefest this year, and I bet you 60% of the people there were like, yeah, we don't even look at the lineup.

We go to Merlefest every year.

We know

it's going to be good.

I love them.

And they're just, like, from California, so I feel like people out here, they're, like, people are starting to get it for sure, but...

They just played Merlefest, and that was, like, their first big, probably East Coast festival they played, and, like, people definitely do not know about them as much over here, and once they do out...

And we lived with that for years and years.

And about 10, 12 years ago, we got to Merle Fest – And we set up our banjos and a line formed and people started buying our banjos.

We sold just about everything, just boom.

And that gentleman with the radio show had got on the air and says, well, you know, those daring banjos are pretty darn good banjos.