Tom Hyatt, Daniel Schronce, and Greg Blake at the E.H. Montgomery General Store
in Gold Hill, NC – photo © G Nicholas Hancock
On Sunday evening, August 3, a unique bluegrass music event occurred at the E.H. Montgomery Store in the small but historic town of Gold Hill, NC. Vivian Pennington Hopkins, store owner, hosted a 2 ½ hour summer concert featuring Greg Blake, the 2003 International Bluegrass Music Association Male Vocalist of the Year, backed by four area bluegrass musicians.
“The idea for the Carolina Summer Concert came from a conversation between me and Tom Hyatt,” Hopkins said. “I wanted to invite Greg Blake and his wife, Joy Sue, to the store since they’re new to the area, having recently moved to Lexington, NC. So, Tom and I invited some of the best musicians in the region to take part in the house concert.”
Those musicians included banjoist Tom Hyatt, bassist Daniel Schronce of The Gospel Plowboys, fiddler and vocalist Lake Carver of Carolina Detour, and mandolin player Jonah Chaney of The Grass Strings.
“From there it just all came together with one rehearsal. That rehearsal was the first time that these five players had ever picked together, and the first time Blake, Daniel, Jonah, and Lake had ever met,” Hopkins said.
A set list of 26 songs and tunes was created at that one-time rehearsal, and Blake and crew performed them like they had been playing together for years to a house-packed enthusiastic audience.
The E.H. Montgomery General Store at 770 St. Stephens Church Road in Gold Hill is the music heartbeat of the former mining town. The store was built in 1840, and the town soon became known as the richest, most famous gold mining boom town east of the Mississippi River. The store is one of the two remaining original buildings in the restored mining town.
“It’s a perfect gathering place for picking, especially on Friday nights where even during the cold winter months, folks gather around the big pot-belly wood stove to swap tunes and talk about everything bluegrass,” Hopkins said.
Vivian Pennington Hopkins is the vice president of the Historic Gold Hill and Mines Foundation, Inc. Her father was Ralph Pennington who wrote the bluegrass music standard, My Cabin in Caroline, who sold the rights to record that song to Lester Flatt in 1948.
