Driving through southwest Virginia you’ll likely run across signs that reference the Crooked Road. The Crooked Road is a 300+ mile route that connects 9 major venues and 60 smaller ones that celebrate the heritage of Appalachian music, old-time music, folk music, bluegrass music, the birthplace of country music and traditional dances like clogging and square dancing. In addition, there are 26 roadside exhibits where you can pull your vehicle over and use your radio to hear an audio recording about the music and musicians in the area.
Floyd VA is one of the major stops along the Crooked Road.
Floyd has shops that boast the world’s largest selection of bluegrass, old time and early country music recordings and also is home to the Floyd Country Store , a great place to experience authentic Appalachian music.
From Asheville NC (post here) we drove north up through Boone and Fancy Gap. We stopped along the Blue Ridge Parkway to visit Puckett Cabin, the home of legendary midwife Orlean Puckett who successfully delivered over 1000 babies but lost her own 24 children in infancy. She became a midwife at 50 years old and delivered her last child the same year she died at 102 years old! Unbelievable.
We also visited Maybry Mill, a restored 1910 grist mill which also included a blacksmith shop and information on making sorghum molasses during the Civil war years when sugar and corn syrup were hard to come by.
Puckett Cabin
Mabry Mill
We checked in at Floyd Family Campground before heading downtown to the Floyd Country Store for dinner and a show. On Saturday nights, the Floyd Country Store does a live Radio Show. A local teenager took the stage to tell a couple of jokes before the show hosts arrived to introduce the show which, very much like the PBS show, Prairie Home Companion, included live commercials for local businesses, a tongue-in-cheek James Bond skit about inflated banjos and, in addition to the 2 talented musical hosts, included 2 bands – Golden Shoals and New Ballards Branch Bogtrotters!
The show was great. Even now, you’ll sometime here one of us humming or singing “Pig in a Pen” with its oddly catchy lyrics
"I got a pig at home in a pen Corn to feed ‘em on All I need’s a pretty little girl To feed ‘em when I’m gone"
I’m not saying I’ve dumped Keith Urban, Neon Coven, Cheap Trick, the Beatles, or Jackson Brown for the New Ballards Branch Bogtrotters but I might download a few of their songs. I love all kinds of music and one of the things I missed most during the darkest days of Covid was live theater and live music. I am beyond thrilled its back and happy to be out supporting it in all forms. I hope you are too!
We had a thigh-slapp’n, hoot-n-hollerin’ evening in Floyd and I highly recommend a stop here!
