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Student-teacher duo set to perform on radio show |
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Thursday, 19 November 2009 |
 Left, Norman Mellin, left, and Andrew Rogers practice their love with folklore fiddle together before their public performance on Thacker Mountain Radio today. By SHEA STASKOWSKI
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Today, Armstrong Middle School eighth grader Andrew Rogers will be performing with his teacher Norman Mellin on Thacker Mountain Radio.
The duo will be showcasing their traditional fiddle talent to help shed light on the dying art of folklore fiddle. Rogers began playing the violin under the direction of Mellin in the fourth grade through his school’s strings program called the Goat Ropers, and from there, his love for small stringed instruments grew.
“Andrew signed up for my fourth grade strings class in the Starkville Public Schools four years ago and displayed a precocious talent for the violin and excellent ear for music,” Mellin explained.
“I was interested in the violin because I’ve always liked music and I figured I would give it a shot when it was first available to me,” Rogers said.
Rogers continued his love of music in the sixth grade when his school offered a full band program. He stayed with his violin, and even took lessons from Mellin after school. Rogers is currently apprenticing under well-known fiddler Charles T. Smith of Tupelo.
“I decided I should stick with violin because there is a rich tradition that is a dying art right now,” Rogers said. “It reached out to me and I figured some people would enjoy it because they don’t hear it as much.”
Like his teacher, Rogers developed a deep appreciation for the folklore fiddle and continues to play because of the joy he feels and the ability to share that joy with others, he added.
“I’m looking forward to people being able to hear this style of music and maybe taking up an instrument like that so maybe the art won’t die out,” Rogers explained of what he hopes to accomplish by playing publicly.
Thacker Mtn. is Rogers’s first public broadcast of this musical talent, but the show is welcoming back Mellin who has performed there previously.
Mellin is a folklorist, oral historian, and skilled fiddle enthusiast. Since the 1990s, Mellin has devoted much of his time to documenting traditional folk artists and gathering oral histories. A significant portion of his research was dedicated to the documenting, recording and videotaping of the state’s vanishing older traditional fiddle styles, which now has resulted in the production of over 150 compact disc recordings of Mississippi folk music.
“No one had done any serious and in-depth folklife research on Anglo-American fiddling traditions since Herbert Halpert did research for the WPA in 1993,” Mellin explained. “It was my challenge to preserve the last of the old-time fiddling traditions in this state before it all vanished.”
“Andrew’s love of music and natural talent make it easier for him to learn to play the fiddle which takes a great deal of skill,” Mellin said. “His exceptional abilities obtained him a folkarts apprenticeship with Charles T. Smith who is one of my major folklife research subjects.”
Thacker Mountain Radio is a live, unrehearsed broadcast that features author readings and a wide array of musical performances. The show is taped and broadcast every Thursday at 6 p.m. during the fall and spring before an audience of 200, who are seated in wooden chairs inside Off Square Books in Oxford. Tune into the live broadcast on Rebel Radio 92.1 FM, or listen to the rebroadcast on Saturdays on Mississippi Public Radio at 7 p.m.
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Last Updated ( Saturday, 21 November 2009 )
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