Darrell Sanders - Brett Smeltzer - Libby Files - Eddie Barney
5 July 2013 - Martinsburg, West Virginia
It's Hot. My God, is it hot. I'm sitting smack dab in the middle of the city of Martinsburg waiting for Libby Files and Stoney Creek Bluegrass to come on and perform for the "Friday @ Five" concert series. I'm wondering if anyone is going to show. There are a few shade trees and little else. The stage area, if you can call it that, is up against a brick building that looks very ancient. The building is on a direct east to west axis, which means no matter what time of the day, the band is going to be in the blazing late-afternoon sun. Across the street is the Berkeley County Court House. It's a beautiful Victorian-style structure and it lends a quaint air to the emptiness of the city-center of Martinsburg. I got here early. You never know what traffic is going to be like on a Friday afternoon leaving the Washington suburbs. I was happy to find out that there was plenty of close parking once I got here. A few local citizens are starting to filter in and I'm surprised at that considering the sun and heat.
The last time I tried to catch this band it was a totally funny experience of rain storms, getting lost by absolutely wrong Google instructions, and getting lost by local citizens giving me bad information. That's the West Virginia/Maryland Panhandle region for you - hard to find, hard to figure out, but once discerned and understood, a treasure-trove of historical sites, stories, and marvelous bluegrass and mountain music. The Hedgesville-Martinsburg area is particularly rich with more than a few bluegrass bands and family groups that are popular and performing all the time. My philosophy is I can't sit in the DC suburbs and wait for the music to come to me. I have to drive out here to Martinsburg to hear the kind of bluegrass I want to hear. I want my bluegrass old-style and traditional. In that respect, it's worth it for me to drive a hundred miles to catch a band like Stoney Creek. Interestingly, the "Friday @ Five" Concert Series has booked some good traditional bands, along with other styles of music to please the general public. The Series is promoted and funded by the City of Martinsburg, the Martinsburg/Berkeley County Convention and Visitors Bureau, Main Street Martinsburg, and several other sponsors. I can always rely on "CVB's" really good promotion of locally-grown West Virginia style bluegrass.
Stoney Creek Bluegrass is Libby Files (bass) Eddie Barney (guitar) Brett Smeltzer (mandolin) and Darrell Sanders (banjo) and they have a consistent history of longevity and popularity in the Panhandle and beyond at a lot of big festivals. One main strength is gospel vocals and that is a fantastic gift in itself, but they mix up the program enough to suit any traditionalist taste in old-time bluegrass. There is a lot of flash and hard-drive in all the instrumental work, but it's there just when it's needed, and never overbearing. It's not an easy thing to put all these elements together. Eddie Barney is an accomplished flatpicker and plays one of the sweetest Taylor Guitars I've ever heard. Something about the sound of it reverberating off the brick building behind Eddie. Darrell Sanders and Brett Smeltzer played their guts out in the heat of the afternoon with just a short break to get some water and wipe the sweat off their instruments during mid-show. Two hours of paying your dues in the world of bluegrass. I looked behind me (which I hadn't done during the whole two hours,) and realized that across the street in the shade of the few available trees, the audience had grown considerably since the first down-beat. Not bad. Not bad at all. Just to show the audience they weren't done yet, Stoney Creek finished up with an encore of Jimmy Martin's "Freeborn Man" - with all the necessary gusto. Wonderful. And I often wonder if the general public realizes what working musicians have to go through and endure to please an audience. Thank you, Stoney Creek Bluegrass.
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