From Cradles to Caskets
Mast General Store releases album of local traditional music

By Jeff Eason

Last year the Mast General Store in Valle Crucis celebrated its 125th anniversary. While the store’s original purpose of supplying farmers and mountain families with the essentials of good living has changed a bit, the spirit of the mercantile has not. It is still a gathering place where people come to share recipes and gossip in much they did in the 19th century.

In the old days, the Mast General Store advertised itself as offering everything from “cloth to plows, cradles to caskets.” The store no longer sells caskets, but now offers a unique chance to purchase a musical time capsule of when it did.

From Cradles to Caskets is a new CD that features local artists performing traditional and traditional-sounding mountain music. The CD contains 20 beautifully recorded tracks plus an interesting written history of general stores in general and the Mast Store in particular.

The compilation was put together by Jane Sutton of Quinn Music with the goal of “faithfully reflecting the musical heritage of the mountains.” In the liner notes, Sutton emphasizes the relationship of general stores to the music of our shared past—from folks sitting around the store’s pot bellied stove picking out tunes to the goods lining the shelves of the store reflecting the needs and dreams of the customers.

From Cradles to Caskets features music by a variety of artists including Don Pedi, Steve and Ruth Smith, Sheila Kay Adams, Jim Taylor, Doug Phillips, Roger Howell, The Calahans, Jo Northrup, Andrew Magill, Laura Boosinger and Josh Goforth, Bill Morris, the Marc Pruett Band, Randy and Deborah Jean Sheets, Amantha Mill, Wild Blue Yonder, the Forget-Me-Nots, the Lone Tones and Naomi and the Home Folks.

The traditional tracks of the album include “vocals and instrumentals featuring instruments including the unaccompanied voice, fiddle, banjo, dulcimer, hammer dulcimer and guitar, performed by dedicated artists who preserve this art form by remaining true to its Celtic roots.”

While most of the cuts on the new album are new versions of songs that are as old as these hills, a few of the songs are newly written pieces meant to reflect mountain music traditions. The Calahans’ “Old Steam Train” was written by Tommy Calahan and the song echoes the sights and sounds of rail travel that were once common in the mountains.

Rebecca Eggers-Gryder’s “Still No Place Like Home,” performed by her band Amantha Mill, is another new song that fits comfortably among the older tunes.

Those older tunes include some classic banjo and fiddle tunes such as “Shady Grove,” “Cluck Old Hen,” “Grandfather’s Clock” and “Uncloudy Day.” The album contains a broad emotional spectrum from the somber ballad “Little Rosewood Casket” to the more lighthearted songs “Mole in the Ground” and the hilariously-titled “I Love My Wife as Well as Anybody, But When My Back is Turned, She’s A-Huggin’ Everybody.”

Musician and writer Sheila Kay Adams performs a wonderful a cappella version of “Wagoner’s Lad,” a song that dates from before the Blue Ridge Mountains were first settled by immigrants from the British Isles. Those immigrants brought their fiddle tunes, hymnals and ballads with them helping to create a style of American music that lives on this fantastic CD.

From Cradles to Caskets costs $16.99 and is available at all Mast Store locations as well as through the Internet via www.mastgeneralstore.com.