TCB Dec. 22, 2015 — The Avett Brothers family gathering

Greensboro / Winston-Salem / High Point triad-city-beat.com December 23 – 29, 2015

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The Avett Brothers’

family gathering PAGE 16

Filling Coble’s shoes PAGE 12

Honky-tonk Christmas PAGE 22

Panthers’ shooter PAGE 26

Dec. 23 — 29, 2015

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The road to the river

by Brian Clarey

26 UP FRONT

OPINION

3 Editor’s Notebook 4 City Life 6 Commentariat 6 The List 7 Barometer 7 Unsolicited Endorsement

14 Editorial: A moment of contentedness 14 Citizen Green: Wheel of life 15 It Just Might Work: High Point Makers Festival 15 Fresh Eyes: The quarter-life crisis

NEWS 8 F orsyth elections board turns down request for WSSU polling place 10 Project showcases millennials with photo legend’s help 12 Walker attracts challengers in 6th District

21 Barstool: That awkward moment when...

22 Music: Honky-tonk sad songs bring Christmas cheer 24 Art: Knitting together a crafting community

GOOD SPORT

COVER

26 Shooting the Panthers

16 The Avett Brothers’ family gathering

GAMES

CULTURE

SHOT IN THE TRIAD

20 Food: Sharing good Fortune, and Chinese food

27 Jonesin’ Crossword 28 Percy Street, Greensboro

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

You never know who your next dance partner’s gonna be. You never know who’s gonna be your next friend. You never know who you’re gonna need to depend on in life.

So before you leave here tonight, turn to your neighbor and give one another a hug.

Shake someone’s hand. It is Christmas, after all.

— Singer-songwriter Danny Dockery, page 22

1451 S. Elm-Eugene St., Greensboro, NC 27406 • Office: 336-256-9320 BUSINESS PUBLISHER Allen Broach

INVESTIGATIVE REPORTING INTERN Nicole Zelniker

EDITORIAL EDITOR IN CHIEF Brian Clarey

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SENIOR EDITOR Jordan Green jordan@triad-city-beat.com

ASSOCIATE EDITOR Eric Ginsburg eric@triad-city-beat.com

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EDITORIAL INTERNS Daniel Wirtheim intern@triad-city-beat.com

ART ART DIRECTOR Jorge Maturino SALES DIRECTOR OF ADVERTISING & SALES Dick Gray dick@triad-city-beat.com

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CONTRIBUTORS Carolyn de Berry Nicole Crews Anthony Harrison Matt Jones Amanda Salter Caleb Smallwood

TCB IN A FLASH DAILY @ triad-city-beat.com First copy is free, all additional copies are $1.00. ©2015 Beat Media Inc.

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EDITOR’S NOTEBOOK

CONTENTS

The road to the Haw River Ballroom is an unremarkable stretch of country highway radiating eastward from the Triad, just long enough to fall within the confines of my personal moratorium on the distance I will travel for a concert.

I’m not driving more than 90 minutes to see anybody — with the possible exception of Tom Waits, for whom I might even be willing to walk.

On Saturday night, the promise of the short drive and tickets to see Chatham County Line was enough to get me out to the ballroom, about which I had heard much but had yet to see for myself.

I don’t care for the country, preferring urban environs or, at least, a beach, to those deep swaths of untouched land that mark the distances between our cities in North Carolina. I’ll argue all day long that culture emanates from cities — that culture is, in fact, the whole point of a city. But there I was, parking in a mud lot in the true December chill to experience something I can’t get at home.

There’s nothing like the Haw River Ballroom in Greensboro, High Point or Winston-Salem, and not just because we don’t have any rivers.

There in Saxapahaw, a real gem has been worked into the guts of an old cotton mill: a 700-head music space on the river, narrow and long, with three floors of viewing space, ample balcony and enough post-industrial street cred to satisfy even the most ardent urban hipster. The sound booth is an old dryer tank, for examThere’s nothing like the ple. Solar panels Haw River Ballroom in and geothermals Greensboro, High Point or power the lights and sound. An upWinston-Salem, and not just stairs barista crafts because we don’t have any coffee drinks rivers. and herbal-tea concoctions. Like that.

And unlike most shows I go to, I wasn’t the oldest person in the room. Not even close.

The capacity crowd drew much of its number from the nearby Triangle and Triad, their cars lining Church Street before the parking lot even filled. They crowded the merch table at the show, and the general store before it, spending city money at country prices. A gas station on the complex no doubt does brisk business after the shows let out.

It’s a cultural magnet, an economic engine and a repurposed historical space, all the way out in the middle of a nowhere that isn’t really nowhere anymore.

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Dec. 23 — 29, 2015

CITY LIFE December 23 – 29

by Daniel Wirtheim

TUESDAY A Christmas Story @ Carolina Theatre (GSO), 1 and 7 p.m.

It’s all right there in the title. One of the most beloved Christmas films plays on the big screen at Carolina Theatre. Unless you own a grand home theater system, this is the best viewing of The Christmas Story you’ve ever witnessed. Visit carolinatheatre. com for more information.

WEDNESDAY

Holiday Market @ Greensboro Farmers Curb Market (GSO), 8 a.m.

Local artisans join the usual vendors to offer hand sewn crafts, decorations and lots of stocking-stuffer opportunities. Homeland Creamery sells peppermint ice cream and eggnog, others sell pasture-raised meats. Find the Facebook page for more information.

Dance From Above @ the Crown (GSO), 9 p.m.

It’s the final Dance From Above of the year. Get down with the house music squad: Darklove, Alvin Shavers, Pres, fiftyfootshadows and more who’ve performed as resident DJs in the Dance From Above series. Find the Facebook page for more information.

It’s a Wonderful Life @ Carolina Theatre (GSO), 1 and 7 p.m.

Anyone who’s honest with herself enjoys this heartwarming film. It’s a suicide-turned-love story and there’s nothing like it. Visit carolinatheatre.org for more information.

Free Draw Wednesday @ Urban Grinders (GSO), 4 p.m.

A group of local creative types meet in the coffeehouse for a few hours of group drawing. Showing some “Weapons of Mass Creativity” gets an artist a discount coffee price. Find Urban Grinders on Facebook for more information.

THURSDAY Christmas Eve Lovefeast @ Home Moravian Church (W-S), 2:30 p.m.

Thousands of lit Moravian beeswax candles make the Christmas Eve Lovefeast a sight to behold. “Glorious” might be the best word to describe it. Participate in person or via a live stream on the church website. Visit homemoravian.org for ceremony schedules and additional details.

Christmas Eve Lovefeast @ First Moravian Church (GSO), 3 p.m.

Candles are lit and hymns are sung at Greensboro’s Christmas Eve Lovefeast. Find the Facebook page for more information.

4

Christmas Day Merry Christmas, ya’ll.

“Doctor Who Christmas Special” @ Geeksboro Coffeehouse Cinema (GSO), 8 p.m.

The British sci-fi series “Doctor Who” breaks out a special Christmas episode for the holiday. Visit geeksboro.com for more information.

triad-city-beat.com

FRIDAY

SATURDAY

Boxing Day @ Commonwealth nations It’s the day when servants and tradesmen in the United Kingdom, Hong Kong, Canada, Australia and New Zealand received their gifts, which usually came in boxes, hence the origin of Boxing Day. Kwanzaa celebration @ International Civil Rights Center & Museum (GSO), 5 p.m.

Greensboro Kwanzaa Collective hosts the seven days of Kwanzaa. There’s a candle lighting ceremony, a drum circle and African marketplace to make this a positive, community-oriented festival and celebration of Kwanzaa. Find an in-depth schedule and additional details at indigoscac.org/gsokc.

Magpie Thief @ Gia (GSO), 8 p.m.

The Greensboro two-piece, folk act plays to a dining audience. Their songs are harmonious folk tunes built on humor and street-smart wit. Find more information at drinkeatlisten.com.

Ugly Sweater Christmas Party @ the Blind Tiger (GSO), 8 p.m.

Ugly sweaters are all the rage at this post-Christmas rock show. Seasonal sweaters move to the sound of Greensboro-based jam band the Mantras. Be aware that the ugly Christmas sweater is distinct from the ugly seasonal vest, and find more information at theblindtiger.com.

HAECO Invitational @ Greensboro Coliseum (GSO), 2 p.m.

Greensboro’s high school basketball teams are facing off in a bracketed tournament to raise money for the schools involved. Visit haecoinvitational.com for more information.

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Dec. 23 — 29, 2015 Up Front News Opinion Cover Story Culture Good Sport Games Shot in the Triad All She Wrote

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Nothing says Christmas like Skilcraft pens You can buy a 12-pack for less than $5, and much more (brooms and other Skilcraft pen designs) in the store at Industries of the Blind on Gate City and Tate. [“Unsolicited Endorsement: The Skilcraft pen”; by Daniel Wirtheim; July 8, 2015] Thanks to first learning about Skilcraft pens in this article, I just shopped there and got some unique, practical and local holiday gifts!

Gale Ketteler, via triad-city-beat.com Give us the vote Give me a break. [“Forsyth County elections board turns down request for voting site at WSSU”; by Jordan Green; Dec. 18, 2015] This guy gives his anecdotal data and says that’s enough to prevent WSSU from having an accessible polling place?

If faculty violated the law, then charge them. That would be the appropriate action — not punishing all students of the university.

If your preferred candidates can’t win on merit, they shouldn’t win. Stop trying to prevent Americans from voting.

This is one of our essential rights.

Kate Evans, via Facebook The Watauga County Board of Elections tried that same stunt with ASU and we see how that turned out!

David Frederick, via Facebook

7 last-minute gifts

by Daniel Wirtheim

1. A cast-iron pan

I’ll be you didn’t think of that one. Everyone loves a good cast-iron pan, the kind that will last eons and accumulate flavor. But a good pan is going to cost you. So if you’re going to cheap out on a crappy one, just move down the list.

2. Soap

Soap can be connoted to all kinds of messages.

Deliver soap infused with coffee beans and the person might believe they’re recognized as a very cultured person. Plain old soap can give off a message that the person is unclean. No matter what soap always makes a great present, unless you’re the one receiving it.

3. Some type of sports ball

It’s a way of saying, “Hey, let’s play.” And the right type of sports ball can really transcend all age groups.

You think you don’t like getting sports balls? Just pick one up and see if you don’t start bouncing that thing.

4. A large mirror

The best thing about a large mirror is that they’re never as expensive as one might imagine. You can get some great deals on a large mirror at just about any big-box store. For an added bonus try sprucing it up

with geometric shapes glued along the edges.

5. Snacks in a bucket

Just a bunch of snacks with seasonal paper sprinkled throughout a basket or bucket or some container is always a type of gift. Someone will eat it.

6. Slippers

Already got that special person some slippers last year? They’re probably not using them anymore so time to re-up.

7. Pop-culture ornament

You waited too long to get one bearing a photo of you and your gift recipient together. Just get a pop-culture ornament, duh. Find something that makes your recipient feel current, like a stormtrooper or something.

8. A tea set from a worldly kind of store

This one works especially well for mothers. Unique tea blends from stores that specialize in worldly goods is always a safe move. Try something infused with berries or chocolate, something no one will ever drink but looks good in the cupboard. Novelty above function has last-minute gift written all over it.

HIRING

Triad City Beat is hiring motivated full and part-time sales people for commission based advertising sales.

College degree and prior successful sales experience preferred but not required. Local travel and light lifting included in sales responsibilities. Occasional evening and weekend work. Must be a team player.

Send resume to brian@triad-city-beat.com. No Calls accepted.

90

70

50

20

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Yes

17% No

8%

Unsure

All She Wrote

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Shot in the Triad

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Games

40

Good Sport

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Culture

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Cover Story

New question: Which Triad city experienced the most significant positive change this year? Vote at triad-citybeat.com.

Jordan Green: As the reporter covering this developing issue in Winston-Salem, I’m going to pass.

Opinion

Readers: A solid 75 percent of you who voted said yes, and we’re guessing it’s because you agree with Brian, or at least something along those lines (though nobody left a comment explaining their reasoning). A small fraction, 17 percent, said no, but Jason Heyman explained why he voted “no” on the TCB Facebook page: “The DA is doing a good job by taking his time. If any charges are going to be filed, releasing the video prematurely could hurt the case in court, for the DA or the potential defendant.” The remaining 8 percent said “unsure/ maybe.”

by Brian Clarey It’s been decades since I left New York for the South, so long that I actually understand why people hate the New York Yankees. I have no regrets — life in New York can be brutal and cold and expensive — but it’s important to me to get back to the area, and more specifically the city, as often as I can.

Our family Christmas trip usually scratches the itch.

This year we’ll wend through at least two boroughs, with a couple days in Astoria, a section of Queens that still somewhat resembles the New York I grew up in.

Then, early on Christmas morning, we’ll take Manhattan.

There’s nothing like Christmas in New York: the window displays on Fifth Avenue, the smell of roasting chestnuts in the cold air, the seasonal lights and artwork. There’s a vibe to the holidays there that I’ve never felt anywhere else: Joyous and manic and abundant and icy, it accelerates through the season to a magnificent climax on New Years Eve, after which everything becomes awful again.

But there’s a moment on Christmas morning — early, super early, while most people are shaking off hangovers and opening presents — that the city is at its most generous.

That’s when my family pulls in, just after sunrise, and we can usually find great parking near the tree at Rockefeller Center.

We’ll get coffee and watch the skaters under the golden statue of Prometheus, check out the new scenes displayed in the window of the Lego store, hike over to an empty Times Square, the neon and billboards blaring just for us.

From there we can hit the Museum of Modern Art, open on Christmas, or ride an empty subway to the Central Park Zoo, also taking visitors on that day. But usually we just walk around and feel the energy, while showing our kids that there are bigger things in the world than the place they came from.

When the crowds start to come back out on the streets at mid-morning, we know it’s time to find the car and hit the bridge for New Jersey. Because Christmas in New York is great… for a couple hours, anyway.

News

Brian Clarey: Yes. The whole point of police body cameras is transparency: We don’t need to rely solely on officer’s reports and testimony anymore because the cameras provide objective views of police interactions. They are not personnel records, as some in Greensboro would have you believe, and they are not protected pieces of ongoing investigations, as many who would try to shield the footage try to maintain.

Police body cameras provide a real-time incident report that protects both the citizens and also the police, who are sometimes falsely accused of wrongdoing in their interactions. And in this instance, with a man dying while in police custody, these tapes need to be seen by everybody.

Christmas in New York

Up Front

Eric Ginsburg: What Brian said. The whole point of these cameras is transparency and public trust, and refusing to release the footage only undermines police-community relations. Funny how footage of Rep. Cecil Brockman’s traffic stop quickly came out publicly, but things like this and an officer-involved shooting in Greensboro in 2014 are closely guarded.

Winston-Salem city officials want the public to see videotape of the arrest of Travis Page, who died in police custody, but the district attorney is blocking the release.

Should it be released?

triad-city-beat.com

Release death in custody footage?

7

Dec. 23 — 29, 2015 Up Front News Opinion Cover Story Culture Good Sport Games Shot in the Triad All She Wrote

8

NEWS

Forsyth elections board denies request for campus polling place

by Jordan Green

The Republican-controlled Forsyth County Board of Elections declines to open an early-voting polling place on the campus of Winston-Salem State University and to accommodate early voting on Sunday — a day popular with black voters.

The Republican majority on the Forsyth County Board of Elections turned down a request from Winston-Salem State University students and others to reopen an early-voting site on campus for the March 15 primary during a contentious meeting last week.

The plan recommended by the majority includes 11 sites across the county, almost equally divided by locations in the heart of Winston-Salem and outlying towns. The majority plan would allow seven days of early voting, including the last Saturday before Election Day. Fleming El-Amin, the sole Democratic member of the board, said he intends to submit an alternate plan to the state Board of Elections. The state board, which is also controlled by the Republican Party, gets the final say. El-Amin’s plan would add the Anderson Center on the campus of Winston-Salem State University and provide the opportunity to vote on one Sunday, accommodating a tradition of the black church known as “Souls to the Polls.” Neither plan includes the first Saturday of March.

The Anderson Center was eliminated as an early-voting site in 2013, after Republicans took control of the board.

Student Government Association President Kyle Brown submitted a petition with 530 signatures gathered in five days calling for Anderson Center to be reopened as an early-voting site.

Reading aloud from the petition, Brown said removing the polling place “has decreased the voting turnout by students drastically.” The petition noted that the students are currently faced with a choice of going downtown to vote at the government center during early voting or voting at their precinct at the Sims Recreation Center on Election Day. Both locations are more than two miles away separated from campus by Highway 52.

Kyle Brown, president of the student government association at Winston-Salem State University, pleads with the Forsyth County Board of Elections for an early-voting site on campus.

“The right to vote is a natural right for every citizen of the United States, and the number of students that are disenfranchised by this polling site change is completely disappointing,” Brown said. “Freshman students cannot bring vehicles onto the campus of WSSU and many other students do not have the means of transportation at WSSU.” About 5,400 students are enrolled at the historically black university. The Winston-Salem NAACP and the Voting Rights Coalition joined the students in requesting that the polling place be reopened.

Ken Raymond, the chair of the board, said he could not support adding the Anderson Center as a polling site because of alleged election law violations that he observed there as a poll-worker in 2010.

“During that time many of [the students] were discussing openly among

themselves and with others and even with me how they were receiving rewards for voting — they were receiving grades from faculty members about voting. And as an election official, that’s an election law violation.”

After the meeting, Raymond cited a state election law that makes it a felony “for any person to give or promise or accept at any time, before or after any such primary or election, any money, property or other thing of value whatsoever in return for the vote of any elector.” The law does not spell out whether the “thing of value” must be given in exchange for a vote for a particular candidate or party, or simply to reward the act of voting, regardless of the candidate or party. [Wasn’t this investigated and no violations found?]

While encouraging students to vote at Sims Recreation Center and the government center, Raymond added, “I

JORDAN GREEN

cannot knowingly support a site where we may have another violation occur again.”

The Republican majority declined a request by El-Amin to add four hours on Sunday, March 6 for “Souls to the Polls.”

“It’s almost like a festive occasion,” El-Amin said. “Because the right to vote is one that our people basically died for. It’s like a cultural tradition in the community. We used to have pretty good turnout.”

As a gauge of the popularity of early voting on Sunday in the black community, the election access group Democracy North Carolina reported that while African Americans made up 29 percent of the electorate in the 2012 election, they accounted for 39 percent of the early voters who voted on the last two Sundays before Election Day. As part of a massive overhaul of

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Up Front Cover Story Culture Good Sport

site in presidential election years.

Interim Elections Director Lamar Joyner said he will do his best to make sure each site has adequate equipment.

Falin also warned that many of the poll workers are new and relatively inexperienced, and will need training to know how to accommodate voters without ID. El-Amin and others also warned that intense interest in the presidential primary, especially on the Republican side, is likely to draw large numbers of the voters, while the length of the ballot — which also includes a US Senate race, governor and council of state positions, along with county commission, city council and local judges — is likely to slow down the process.

The effect of reducing early-voting days was seen on the final day of early voting — a Saturday — before the 2014 general election, when people lined up in the rain outside the Forsyth County Government Center, some waiting as long as three and a half hours to vote.

All three board members concurred that it was wise to keep all the polling places open for early voting prior to the March 15 primary.

“What I would have in mind is a plan where we would use the last Saturday — have all the sites open on the last Saturday,” said Stuart Russell, one of the Republican members, “and use the hours there to kind of cover the weekend hours. That way we would avoid the scenario we had last time, which was it was the last day, we were having some long lines and it was a problem.”

triad-city-beat.com Games

state election law in 2013, the Republican-controlled General Assembly voted to shorten the early-voting period from 17 to 10 days. Historian Allan J. Lichtman testified in the federal trial challenging the election law in Winston-Salem in July that African Americans have disproportionately used early voting.

Similarly, political scientists Michael C. Herron and Daniel A. Smith wrote in a report entitled “Race, Shelby County and the Voter Information Verification Act in North Carolina” that “the early voting electorate in North Carolina is disproportionately black on weekends compared to the registered voter population in North Carolina.”

US District Judge Thomas Schroeder has yet to rule on the case. The Advancement Project, one of the plaintiffs, is predicting that the ruling “will have sweeping consequences for the state of voting rights nationwide.”

Fred Falin, a poll worker with eight years of experience, warned the Forsyth County Board of Elections that the voter ID requirement, which goes into effect during the upcoming election, is likely to slow down lines. Last summer, the General Assembly amended the law to allow voters who believe they have a “reasonable impediment” to obtaining an ID to sign a declaration and establish their eligibility at a later date. Such voters will have to cast provisional ballots, which will each need to be reviewed and approved by the board of elections before being counted.

Considering the number of people who can be expected to show up at the polls without ID, Falin suggested that each polling site be equipped with four laptop computers, with one set aside for provisional ballots. Three computers are typically assigned to each early-voting

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Dec. 23 — 29, 2015 Up Front News Opinion Cover Story Culture Good Sport Games Shot in the Triad All She Wrote

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Project showcases millennials with photo legend’s help

by Eric Ginsburg

An initiative to market Greensboro draws in star photographers and a local PR firm to highlight interesting residents — impressive millennials in particular — for a weekly “Made in Greensboro” series.

History will record Jerry Wolford as a legendary Greensboro photographer, but the 50-year old who has six photographer of the year awards and an exhibit at the city’s historical museum under his belt still experiences impostor’s syndrome.

As he climbed a stairwell at the Joint School of Nanoscience and Nanoengineering in east Greensboro last week, preparing for his second photo shoot of the day, Wolford freely admitted his insecurity.

At the beginning of this month, the private economic development group Action Greensboro publicly launched its “Made in Greensboro” series, focusing on intriguing locals as a way to celebrate the creatives who the city great. Wolford and Scott Muthersbaugh of Perfecta Visuals, who are supplying the portraits for the series, felt like the first two profiles were stellar. And the streak conERIC GINSBURG Priyanka Ruparelia poses for Jerry Wolford (right) while Scott Muthersbaugh blocks light from tinued — they were on a roll, Wolford the hallway with a gigantic umbrella as part of a recent “Made in Greensboro” photo shoot. said — and now he’s just waiting for “My job is basically to make sure he Muthersbaugh stood beside him, take so much,” Ruparelia said, laughing the “dagger in the heart” feeling if one breaks as few things as possible,” Muthholding a giant open unbrella like Mary at Muthersbaugh and Wolford’s cheesy doesn’t reach the same threshold. ersbaugh said as Wolford positioned a Poppins to block fluorescent light pourjokes aimed at eliciting a smile. At one This from the National Press Photogmicroscope.

“It’s never nothing.” ing in from a window to the school’s point she bowed her head in slight raphers Association’s 2015 PhotojourCarolyn Kuzmin, a communications hallway.

In the other hand, Muthersembarrassment at having four people nalist of the Year for smaller markets. manager at PR firm RLF Communicabaugh reached above his head with a focused on her and the awkward posiIt’s a high-pressure situation of Woltions who would later write the accomlight to try and keep Wolford’s phototioning of the photo. ford and Muthersbaugh’s own making, panying profile of Ruparegraph properly lit.

“It’s getting hot in here,” she said. but as they arranged a lia observed from a chair But Ruparelia needed to be higher, Photo shoots like this one, and anothtiny room stuffed with pushed into a corner of and her stool wouldn’t adjust, so Woler earlier that day at Hudson’s Hill, aim expensive microscopes for Learn more the small room, trying to ford grabbed his coat from the hallway to elevate the stories of people who repa quick turnaround shoot about Made in stay out of the way in the and asked her to perch atop it before resent “the multi-dimensional aspects of with Priyanka Ruparelia, limited space.

With lights prodding her to lean in even farther. what makes Greensboro an interesting Greensboro at their subject was the only clipped to shelves, Wolford The pair had less than an hour replace,” Action Greensboro Executive one who appeared nermadeingso.com. positioned a computer served in the cramped space, which they Director Cecelia Thompson said. The vous. The photographers’ monitor near the edge of said was no less chaotic than any of the city has struggled with its brand, but by controlled adrenaline and a desk behind his subject. other shoots in the series, and once they focusing on individuals, Thompson said jovial banter seemed to belie Wolford’s The screen displayed a microscopic shot got the shot they’d stage a few more in the city “can really showcase what a fears. of Ruparelia’s research that looked like the building with Ruparelia. great community” Greensboro is.

Wolford joined Muthersbaugh earlier blue Christmas lights affixed to green “There’s some reality show compoMillennials like Ruparelia often this year after leaving the Greensboro smoke plumes, and Wolford made her nent to this,” Muthersbaugh said. don’t receive much spotlight, but if News & Record and a decades-long sit uncomfortably close to another miAs Wolford continued tweaking the the city wants to create a more robust, career as a photojournalist. But the two croscope in front of her. shot, Muthersbaugh asked Kuzmin young and creative workforce and also guys are well attuned to each other, with “Can you kinda leeeeeeean, that’s to hold the light he’d been aiming at instill community pride, this “Made in Muthersbaugh joking about keeping good, chin up, sit up nice and tall like Ruparelia’s face.

Greensboro” series is one way to do Wolford in check. you own this place,” Wolford said.

“I never knew photography would that, Thompson said. Plus, millennials

take turns writing the features while Muthersbaugh and Wolford hold down the photographs for the heavily visual project. With any luck, the upcoming photo shoots won’t let Wolford down.

But as his own worst critic, that seems unlikely, especially considering the effort the pair applies to assembling every minor detail for a shot to come together.

“We build photos like you build a house, in steps,” Wolford said, later adding: “I guess we like to build a little bit of an illusion. I hadn’t thought about that.

“Are we magicians?” he asked Muthersbaugh.

“That might be overselling it a little bit,” his counterpart replied quickly from the adjacent room.

Only slightly.

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identify a city through looking at their peers, and by promoting the “great and smart people” in that cohort, the city can change the perception of the city long term, she said.

Someone like Ruparelia, who is trying to find a faster way to heal bones using natural polymers, seems like a natural choice. As does 35-year old Justin Smith, who started the lighted Christmas balls phenomenon in Sunset Hills as a teenager, according to madeingso. com, the initiative’s website, or 19-yearold aspiring surgeon Latifa Aboeid.

Made in Greensboro has already featured a chef, inventor, permaculture expert, aspiring Olympian and more.

And Ruparelia, a dancer and a few others are already in the pipeline. The project’s website also allows people to nominate locals to profile. Kuzmin and other RLF Communications’ employees

11

by Jordan Green

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Dec. 23 — 29, 2015

Walker attracts challengers from both parties in 6th District race

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Mark Walker

Chris Hardin

Rep. Mark Walker faces challengers from the right and left in his quest for a second term as representative of North Carolina’s 6th District in the US House.

Republican Mark Walker is up for reelection in 2016 after serving his first year as representative of North Carolina’s 6th District in Congress, but he faces opposition from the right within his own party while three Democrats vie for the opportunity to challenge him in the November general election.

As a former music pastor at Lawndale Baptist Church in Greensboro who won election in 2014 with the support of a tea party group formed at the church, Walker alienated some conservative supporters soon after being sworn in when he voted to re-elect John Boehner as speaker. Walker said at the time that a change in leadership “would have detracted from our conservative message.” In late September, when Boehner announced his resignation, Walker said he believed the speaker had “made the right decision,” adding that he “obviously felt the growing discontentment and has removed himself as an impediment.”

Walker later voted for Rep. Paul Ryan, a former vice presidential candidate, to replace Boehner as speaker.

Walker is facing pointed criticism from Chris Hardin, a pharmaceutical sales rep and reserve police officer with the Graham Police Department, who has filed to challenge the incumbent in the March 15 Republican primary.

Hardin lives in Browns Summit.

“I just think Mark Walker has been

Bruce Davis

a miserable failure as a conservative,” Hardin said in a recent interview. “You cannot be a conservative and vote for two progressives as speakers of the House. You cannot campaign from one end of the district to the other saying that you would vote John Boehner out and then vote for John Boehner, and then run for re-election saying you fulfilled your promise.”

Walker said the accusation is false and that those who criticize him on the point are a small minority.

“What I said is that ‘I would vote against leadership’ — and here’s where they stop, they don’t include the rest of the quote — ‘on any legislation that is detrimental to the 6th District.’ We have voted against the leadership. We just voted against the massive spending bill.”

Walker added that although he said on the campaign trail that he would support Rep. Trey Gowdy over Boehner for speaker, that wasn’t an option considering that it was Gowdy who nominated Boehner for the post in January.

Kenn Kopf, a Republican lawyer who lives in Greensboro, had launched a campaign website, but did not file for election before the cutoff at noon on Monday.

Walker won the Republican nomination after placing second in a crowded primary with eight other Republican candidates seeking to replace Howard Coble, the longtime representative of the 6th District. He prevailed over Phil Berger Jr. in a bitter runoff in June, and went on to defeat Democrat Laura Fjeld in the general election with relative ease.

Registered Democrats outnumber

Pete Glidewell

Republicans in the district, but voters have historically favored Republican candidates as a result of conservative Democrats crossing party lines. The immense popularity of Howard Coble, who died in November, also created a bulwark against Democratic challenges.

Coble carried 60.9 percent of the vote in the 2012 election, when the presence of President Obama on the ticket helped drive Democratic turnout. In the next election, the margin closed slightly, with Walker carrying 58.7 percent of the vote against Fjeld.

Pete Glidewell, a business consultant from Elon who has filed for the seat, sees an opening. Glidewell is the former chairman of the Alamance County Democratic Party.

“For the last 14 terms of Howard Coble, nobody could have touched him with a 10-foot pole,” Glidewell said.

“Given that they thought Howard was safer, the 6th District was the one that [the Republicans] drew to have more registered Democrats than Republicans.

The analysis says that in the last election where Howard was a candidate, there were 13,000 voters in Guilford County who voted for Howard and Obama.

That’s a 26,000-vote swing.”

Glidewell faces Bruce Davis, a former Guilford County commissioner who is the board chair of the High Point Convention & Visitors Bureau, in the Democratic primary on March 15. Davis said his candidacy will appeal to independents, who make up more than 20 percent of the electorate in the district.

He said Walker has disappointed some former supporters who expected him to

Jim Roberts

be more moderate, particularly with his support for suspending the resettlement of Syrian refugees in the wake of the recent Paris terror attacks.

“That’s taking a hardline Republican stance,” Davis said. “He’s taking the party line. That’s not what he said he would be about. He said he wanted to work across the aisle.”

Davis said he believes the current vetting process works well, and a pause is not needed.

“We cannot let these refugees down,” he said. “We cannot let down those who look at America as a safe haven. We are a nation of immigrants. We can’t live in fear. Fear is what ISIS thrives on.”

Davis ran for the seat two years ago, but lost to Fjeld in the primary. Davis lives in High Point and operates a daycare with his wife.

Glidewell’s views on refugee resettlement closely align with Davis’. Having grandchildren who are Native American informs his view of the matter.

“They tease me about being a pilgrim,” he said. “I understand the immigration system from a different perspective. I want to vet the heck out of them. I want to be what we are as Americans and welcome people from all over the world who are running from a terrible situation.”

Walker characterized his stance as squarely in the middle of the issue.

“I think there is an overwhelming number of people that are not anti-refugee, but they do believe there should be a short pause on our vetting process.

I’ve actually worked in refugee camps.

They’re able to say what they want to;

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they have a different process.

My obligation is to protect the country if it means a delay in the resettlement process.”

To Davis’ criticism that he hasn’t reached across the aisle, he noted that 47 Democrats also voted to pause the refugee resettlement program.

He added that Rep. Alma Adams, the Democrat who represents the 12th District in Guilford County, signed on as a cosponsor for the Human Trafficking Detection Act, the first piece of legislation Walker filed. The legislation would mandate training for Border Patrol and State Department personnel to improve interception of human traffickers. th COURTESY PHOTO Hardin, who is challenging The 6 District includes parts of Greensboro and High Point, and stretches from Surry County in the west and Durham County in the east.

Walker in the Republican prisomeone to look into this, and we need I have some concern with,” he said, jobs bill on the next president’s desk. mary, opposes allowing Syrian someone to grade the hospitals.” “especially with Malaysia and Vietnam, “The middle class is a shrinking midrefugees to enter the country.

Glidewell, who has worked for a and some of the child labor laws that dle class,” he said. “The divide between “We know there is a percentage that number of textile companies including the wealthy and the poor grows larger. they have.” are radicalized Islamic terrorists,” he Kayser-Roth Corp. in Greensboro and If someone at the bottom doesn’t see Davis also views job creation as his said. “I can’t tell you how insane that is Hanesbrands in Winston-Salem, said any hope, therein lies a problem with top priority.

With new leadership in the to let them in when you know some of his signature issue is restoring Amerithe country as a whole.”

House, he hopes Congress will put a them are terrorists. If you had a thoucan middle-class jobs. He opposes the sand M&Ms in a canister and you put Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreecyanide in one of those M&Ms, would ment. you feed them to your children?”

“Our manufacturing, middle-class A third Democrat, Jim Roberts of working population is on a thin thread, Pilot Mountain, said he entered the race and I don’t want to see them imperiled to restore a voice in Washington for any more,” he said. “Two thirds of it is common people. regulations that will never be enforced.

“There’s some things done in WashThey say working conditions will be the ington that we’re losing our government same in Vietnam as in America. We from a democracy to an oligarchy,” he will never be able to enforce working said. “The things being done are not in conditions in Vietnam.

If a company in the interest of the people, and I want to Vietnam has a complaint against a US change that.” company, they can sue the US govIf he’s elected, Roberts said he wants ernment.

Our own citizens can’t even to enact legislation to protect medical sue the government.

We’re giving up patients. A retired businessman who sovereignty.” formerly owned a pest-control company, Walker said he voted for Trade Roberts underwent surgery in 2010 and Promotion Authority, which he noted is woke up paralyzed from his ribs down different from the Trans-Pacific Partnerafter being told by physician that he ship.

The Merit Pit Bull Foundation strives had a 97 percent chance of a successful for a compassionate world where pit “It gives some basic parameters for procedure. bull type dogs live in responsible homes negotiating the deal,” the lawmaker “I think there needs to be a National and where owner education, training said.

“I felt like that was good, as opPatient Safety Board that would invesand anti-cruelty legislation support all posed the president just going in on his tigate every hospital death,” he said. pet owners regardless of breed. own.”

“If two people die in an airplane crash, Having read two versions of the trade they go out and investigate. If two peowww.themeritpitbullfoundation.com pact, Walker said at this time he cannot ple go out and die on a commercial bus support the deal. or train, they investigate. The hospitals “There’s some humanitarian things are just able to hide deaths. We need

13

Dec. 23 — 29, 2015 Up Front News Opinion Cover Story Culture Good Sport Games Shot in the Triad All She Wrote

14

OPINION EDITORIAL

A moment of contentedness Normally this is a space for malcontent, where we sling arrows and pointed criticism of the cities in which we live and the institutions that prop them up.

But now, at Christmas week, it’s a good time to acknowledge that things in the Triad are not all that bad. In fact, they’re pretty good.

So indulge us, if you will, in a bit of seasonal optimism.

In Greensboro, where most of our staff lives, voters re-elected the most diverse city council in decades, capping it off by putting Justin Outling in District 3 as the first African American to represent a city district with a majority white electorate in Greensboro’s history.

Construction moves apace on several downtown projects, including the Tanger Performing Arts Center and its attendant facilities, Joymongers Brewing near the ballpark and the Union Square campus across Gate City Boulevard, adding dimension and luster to the city’s most important neighborhood.

Somewhat less sexy but perhaps even more vital is the construction of the urban loop, which when completed will give travelers more ingress points into the city.

There’s even some work going on at the Cone Boulevard Extension, which will combine with the new development at Revolution Mill to give real heft to the often ignored northeast quadrant.

Winston-Salem is reeling — in a good way — from a cultural renaissance that is redefining business and the arts, and the relationship between them. Connections continue to be forged among makers, entrepreneurs, politicians and schools, building a lasting social infrastructure. And a slew of new public spaces — the ArtPark and Bailey Park among them — have brought the citizenry together to relish what has been created.

A city council election in the fall — the first under a new municipal schedule that moved the contest to even-numbered years — has no viable candidates challenging the consensus indicating the movement will almost certainly continue without much upheaval.

Even High Point seems to be tapping into this newfound spirit of optimism in its own way, with a couple new breweries in the pipeline, unimpeded growth at High Point University and, at long last, possible plans for downtown streets that have nothing to do with the marketing of furniture. We can dream, anyway.

Sometimes, in the gathering of news and dissemination of opinion, we lose sight of the good stuff: the progress of the Triad as a region, where we are all headed and the things that bind us. And though there’s plenty to complain about, there is much to celebrate in our little corner of the world.

CITIZEN GREEN

Christmastime and the wheel of life If I think about anything around Christmastime, it’s that our corporeal lives are flashing so quickly past. How important it is to live in the moment and to be present with each other.

During the Christmas

by Jordan Green season of 1991, just before my 17th birthday, I resolved to live with as much immediacy as possible. I developed a philosophy that when a notion struck me, I would just do that thing with as little forethought as possible. If the idea came that I should take down my laundry, I would grab a basket, head out the backdoor and start pulling my clothes off the line.

Or write a poem. Or pick up my guitar. I started a ritual of going outside as soon as I woke up and shouting, “Hurrah!” to put place the proper emphasis on the beginning of the day. The practice amused, impressed and mortified my mom, all at the same time.

My friend Bluegrass and I decided impulsively to celebrate the Winter Solstice by staying up until dawn. After a party, we found ourselves in the kitchen of his hippie mom’s place, known as the Schoolhouse — it was, in fact, a Depression-era elementary school with a drafty auditorium and two classrooms under a perpetually leaking roof. We brewed a pot of coffee at 11 p.m. to gird ourselves for the rite. We wandered frozen cow fields under the moonlight and talked about the mysteries of the opposite sex. And a couple hours before the first glimmers of sunlight peaked over the horizon, we climbed to the top of a wooded hill and then, at Bluegrass’ suggestion, sprinted to the bottom, bobbing and weaving through the hardwoods. In hindsight, it was a pretty dumb thing to do, but I’m afraid I have no regrets.

When I look back, the grace note of that time was the fact that, somehow, the anger and discontent that had gripped me like a bad case of acne for the past four years was beginning to wear off. My puerile contempt for my parents was softening. It seems so silly now that I faulted them, and I think now about the waste of not mining every ounce of their hard-earned wisdom. I had come down on my dad for his solicitousness toward the society matrons who paid him to landscape their yards, and on my mom for always looking for something good to say about the religious authoritarians who employed her at Owen County Schools. I had numbed myself to what I considered my peers’ mindless conservatism, but that Christmas I was starting to appreciate little glimmers of the potential for shared pleasures, adventures and simple fellowship.

I had been super sensitive to perceived slights by my dad — my goodness, I can’t even remember what

they were now — and angrily pushed him away when he tried to engage with me. He was a really good dad, taking me and my sister to New York City and Vermont the previous summer, picking me up after school to go running, and bringing me to art openings. I took all of it for granted and never told him thank you.

It’s funny when you look back on it how we seem to have a sixth sense for resolving our unfinished business when we need to. For me, it came as a simple invitation from my dad to join him and his friends in the hot tub during a party after that Christmas. The hot tub was a product of his ingenuity. A stock tank that had been used to water the cattle, it was wrapped in insulation, propped on cinderblocks and equipped with gas burners from a range top. In addition to winter recreation, the hot tub provided a source of heat to incubate seedlings in our greenhouse for the next growing season. But on this particular night, sitting with my dad and his friends, not really talking so much as listening to their mellow conversation, I felt respected and included. I felt close to my dad in a way that I hadn’t in a long while.

My birthday falls about three weeks after Christmas.

With more gifts, special meals and cake, it felt like an extension of the holiday. To make it even better, when my sister and I awoke the next day a heavy snow had fallen overnight and we learned that school had been canceled. We ate a late breakfast of pancakes. And then my dad went out to feed the cattle. It wasn’t much longer before I went out, too — I had the job of burning the trash outside. I don’t recall if I heard a thump or if I have invented that memory with the subsequent facts, but I certainly heard his cry, a low moan like you might expect from an injured animal. I found my dad on the ground; a large round bale of hay had slipped out of the frontend loader of the tractor and rolled over his back as he leaned into the steering wheel. His lungs were crushed.

He was gone before he made it to the hospital.

Take care, Richard. I’ll never get over losing you.

High Point Makers Festival

Freelancing, or my quarter-life crisis

Cover Story Culture Good Sport Games Shot in the Triad All She Wrote

Sayaka Matsuoka is a freelance journalist in the Triangle, avid tea drinker and dog enthusiast. Reach her at smatsuoka26@gmail.com.

Opinion

contributor.

My latest articles are also ones that came about as a result of my part-time gig. Feature pieces like ones on a new tea shop opening up and an herbal chocolatier were approved by the food editor at Indy Week. Now I was on the list of food writers in his email group.

Graduating from college wasn’t easy. I think I’ve cried more in the past year than I did during my four-year undergrad career.

I don’t believe them when they say that your twenties are supposed to be the best time of your life. For me, my post-college twenties have been defined by what I and several others in the same boat can only describe as a quarter-life crisis. I can’t even begin to tell you how many career-advice articles I’ve read or how many “tell me what career I’m supposed to have” quizzes I’ve taken.

But the one thing that I keep coming back to is journalism — the simple idea of finding the most interesting stories and writing them down to share with a broader audience.

When I go to parties and people ask me what I do, I fumble with words for a few seconds but I always end up saying that I’m freelancing; I’m a journalist.

It’s not as romantic as movies or shows make it out to be. Maybe that’s the exciting part. You never really know when you’ll stumble upon the next story or catch the tail end of an interesting conversation that could become a worthwhile piece. Of course freelancing is different than working as a staff writer for a publication, but I find that the most interesting stories present themselves when you’re doing the things you love. If you continue to go out and have new experiences and talk to intriguing people, you’ll discover that most of them have a few gems hidden in their caches. And they might not even know it; it becomes your job to ask them about their story.

You don’t have to wait to write just because you don’t have a platform. Carry a notebook around, jot things down in your phone. Start a blog. Just keep writing, because that’s the most important thing. Not so much getting recognition for your writing, but collecting the stories. Then you can reach out to different publications and put yourself out there. And it’s okay if you cry because being an adult is hard and it’s scary. But you just have to trust that it’s going to work out.

For me, it was about surrendering to my instincts and reminding myself of what I love to do; there will always be more tissues.

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It’s gotten easier.

At first it’s intimidating because you’re putting yourself out there and it’s your ideas and you feel vulnerable. Will they like it? Will they think it’s

by Sayaka Matsuoka stupid? But that’s the nature of freelancing.

After I finished my internship with Triad City Beat, I thought that the job offers would start pouring in; I was wrong. Just because I had worked at an excellent paper didn’t mean that similar papers knew who I was. It didn’t even mean that I deserved their attention; I had to work for it.

I started by writing a short, 40-word review of a movie for Indy Week, the alt-weekly in Durham.

It was the first thing that I had “published” after Triad City Beat. Excitedly, I flipped through the pages and found my tiny review in the vast sea of other critiques. It was one of those rare moments when you’re disappointed and proud at the same time. But that’s how you start out. Small pieces first, then a story here and there. And if you hustle, network and impress your editors enough, maybe they start including you in their group emails and asking you personally to contribute to stories.

The first 500-word-plus story I pitched successfully as a freelancer was about a publishing company launched by a Chapel Hill transgender man. The story touched on the birth of TransGenre Press and its mission to publish work by other trans people. I happened upon the story while I was working at my part-time job at a tea house; that’s the job that pays the bills.

Unfortunately, freelancing is a grind and it isn’t sustainable as your only source of income unless you’re able to write several stories each month.

And with each article going for about $100-200 a piece, you’d have to write five or six to just cover the basics. When my article came out, I was ecstatic. Sure, my parents didn’t understand what I was doing and it didn’t make a lot of money, but the reward came when the subject of the article reached out to me a few weeks after the piece had come out. He told me that someone had contacted him because they related to the article as a trans person and they felt like they had finally found a community. That’s why I write.

Not for money or recognition, but to shed light on important topics.

After I wrote that piece, the editor I had been communicating with began emailing me and asking if I could follow up on some interviews for an article that he had been working on; I had moved up from occasional freelancer to reliable

Up Front

by Jordan Green Even more so than Greensboro or Winston-Salem, High Point is closely identified with craftsmanship due to a tradition of furniture making dating back at least 135 years. Yet paradoxically, the Third City is alone among its cohorts in being bereft of street markets open to the general public to buy handmade crafts.

Greensboro has the City Market at the Railyard — a monthly confab with vendors, nonprofits with information tables, food trucks and live music organized under a rotating theme. Before that, entrepreneur Zeke Vantreese organized the Indie Market as a component of First Friday.

In Winston-Salem, the Hoots Flea Market serves a similar social and commercial function as Greensboro’s City Market, while focusing on vintage and secondhand goods. Piedmont Craftsmen Gallery on Trade Street provides an outlet for high-end handmade goods.

The elected leadership and citizenry of High Point seem oblivious to these burgeoning developments in the urban fabric of their neighboring cities. And it’s a shame because this should be right in High Point’s wheelhouse. There are people who hand-make beds and chairs, who salvage old barn lumber to make elegant shelving and tables, and who craft ring boxes and keychains inspired by pop-culture icons like Pacman and “Game of Thrones.”

A regularly scheduled High Point Makers Festival could offer residents an important quality-of-life amenity, generate economic activity and provide the city with a point of civic pride. The residents of the city should set the parameters of the market, but I strongly suggest handmade as a criteria. You should be able to buy furniture, of course, but also candles, pottery and hand-blown glass. I think it’s probably more important to have a wide selection of offerings than to impose a requirement that the vendors live in High Point. By all means, the artists at the 512 Collective should have some real estate in the market.

Food, craft beer and music have become expected components of urban markets, and High Point will need to step up its game to attract visitors. All these can be drawn from the community: Sumela and Tipsy’z Tavern both have food trucks and catering services. Liberty Brewery & Steakhouse and Brown Truck Brewing — whose opening is around the corner — have beer covered. Music is a little more tricky, but basically requires someone who can find talent while anticipating the tastes of the crowd and find the sweet spot in between.

In the warm months from March through September, the High Point Makers Festival should absolutely be held outdoors. The much-celebrated Pit, which city leaders have been talking about activating at least going back to the spring of 2014, is a natural site. Mayor Bill Bencini: Let’s make it happen.

In the cold months, especially in November and December leading into the holidays, people want to be inside. One thing High Point has in abundance is beautiful, historic mills with brick exterior, hardwood floors and high ceilings that have been retrofitted as furniture showrooms.

They remain underutilized throughout most the year. Is there a civic-minded showroom that would free up some space for a local makers market that is open to the general public? Bert Hayes, a commercial realtor with D-G Real Estate who has been instrumental in developing the North Elm Design District, could be a key player. Can you broker a lease arrangement, Bert?

I’ve talked to Bruce Davis, the new chairman of the board of directors at the High Point Convention & Visitors Bureau, about the idea. What do you say, Bruce?

FRESH EYES

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IT JUST MIGHT WORK

15

Dec. 23 — 29, 2015

The Avett Brothers’

family gathering

Cover Story

by Jordan Green

16

White was the theme for the Avett Brothers’ New Year’s Eve show at the Greensboro Coliseum in 2012. Pictured l-r: Scott Avett, Bob Crawford and Joe Kwon.

RYAN SNYDER

While not by any stretch in the same order of magnitude as those events, the Avett Brothers’ concert at the Green Bean in downtown Greensboro represents a seismic cultural shift of a different sort.

The night is vividly seared in the memory of Richard Richards, a local musician who serves as director of music at Oak Ridge Presbyterian Church.

When asked recently to reminisce about the concert, he blurted out: “Dec. 11, 2004.”

The Avett Brothers made an instant impression — musically, aesthetically and physically. The bearded Scott Avett, his younger brother Seth with long hair, joined double-bassist Bob Crawford, whose well-groomed appearance pegged him as the straight man against the brothers’ scruffiness. Then, as now, the band members’ dress signaled a kind of discipline that belied their explosive stage presence. Their ardor and sincerity instantly made instant fans of first-time listeners — among them Richard Richards.

“I saw a uniformed band: guys with white shirts — these Beatlesque white shirts with denim,” he recalled. “And jackets probably.

There was banjo and acoustic guitars.”

As a synesthete — someone who experiences music visually — the concert pushed him to the brink of sensory overload.

“I remember the music being as if two trains on the same track were going toward each other,” he recalled. “One was straight-up bluegrass, the other was punk, and it exploded into this beautiful fusion.”

The Rev. Grier Booker Richards, a Presbyterian chaplain for campus and young adult ministry in Greensboro and Richard’s wife, remembered the show as being loud and crowded.

“I definitely could tell there was a special vibe and energy, but if I had seen them on the street I would have no idea who they were,” she said.

“We came for fun,” she added, “and that’s what we got.”

It’s not hyperbole to say the Avett Brothers show at the Green Bean changed Pete Schroth’s life. A native of Atlanta, Schroth came to Greensboro in 1996 to study sculpture at UNCG. When he and his wife, Anne, opened the Green Bean in 2002, the coffeehouse at 341 S. Elm St. represented a turning point in what was then a moribund downtown, predating Natty Greene’s brewpub by at least one year.

Schroth had tried live shows in the coffeehouse before, with mixed results.

“I would have a regular tell me: ‘You gotta book this band — they’re incredible,’” Schroth recalled. “Then I’d book them, and the crowd would be that guy and four of his friends.”

He was understandably skeptical when two of his customers suggested that he book the Avett Brothers, but his doubts quickly dissipated when he listened to their music. He bought business-card software to make tickets, and quickly sold out the 99-capacity venue.

“I ask a lot of people about that show,” Schroth said. “I always ask

triad-city-beat.com

Some dates become indelibly connected with a major historical moment, marking a shift from before to after.

Sept. 11, 2001 instantly brings to mind the World Trade Center. In Greensboro, Feb. 1, 1960 is just as surely associated with the eruption of the civil rights movement as Nov. 3, 1979 summons a tragic collision of social forces. Nov. 4, 2008 marks the election of Barack Obama.

17

Dec. 23 — 29, 2015 Cover Story

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them if they took any photos. I actually know a couple photographers who were there. But I’ve yet to meet anybody who took photos of that show. I was behind the counter working — selling PBRs. I heard the show, but I didn’t get to see it. My experience was different.”

The December 2014 Green Bean show was likely the last time the Avett Brothers performed in a small room, at least in North Carolina, although they continued to play smaller stages on the festival circuit, including Shakori Hills in Chatham County the following spring.

Their energy and relative youth — both brothers, who grew up outside of Charlotte in Concord, were still in their twenties at the time — might have given the impression of overnight success, but in fact they had put in at least three years of solid roadwork, with an output of three full-length studio albums.

The punk sound that Richard Richards identified in the December 2004 show was well placed — the brothers had played in a loud, aggressive band with metal and grunge leanings called Nemo in the late 1990s. Inspired in part by the North Carolina roots tradition of Doc Watson, they began playing some acoustic music as a side project.

They auditioned Bob Crawford in a parking lot, jamming on the folk traditional “Going Down the Road Feeling Bad.” They drafted him as the third member just as the group was getting its recording career underway.

By the time the Avett Brothers’ released their third album, Mignonette, in the summer of 2004, they had established a sound that effectively fused the high and lonesome traditionalism of Bill Monroe with the tight harmonies of the early Beatles and the frenetic, rhythmic drive of the Ramones. From that point, the group gradually but inexorably grew into a national stature that few other North Carolina acts have achieved in the past two decades.

Their widely acclaimed 2007 album Emotionalism was the first to feature cellist Joe Kwon, who would go on to become an official member of the band. Emotionalism caught the attention of Rick Rubin, a legendary producer who has worked with artists ranging from Glenn Danzig to Johnny Cash. The relationship has yielded three consistently excellent albums on Rubin’s American Recordings label: I and Love and You, The Carpenter and Magpie and the Dandelion, with a fourth in progress. In the meantime, the band earned the honor of backing Bob Dylan on “Maggie’s Farm,” along with Mumford & Sons, when Dylan received the Grammys Lifetime Achievement Award in 2011.

The band’s rise can be charted through successive venues in Greensboro, going back to the Green Bean in 2004, and then War Memorial Auditorium in 2008 — a show also booked by Pete Schroth — culminating with the Greensboro Coliseum in 2012.

The Avett Brothers return to the coliseum on this New Year’s Eve as part of a homecoming tradition of celebrating the year’s end. The shows have rotated through arenas every year since ringing out 2011 in Greenville,

SC, with turns in Charlotte and Raleigh in 2013 and 2014, respectively. The Avett Brothers’ New Year’s Eve tradition has been recently memorialized with the Dec. 18 release of a new album, Live, Vol. 4, drawn from last year’s show in Raleigh. Two new songs included on the set — “Satan Pulls the Strings” and “Rejects in the Attic” — give a sneak preview of the material the band has recorded with Rubin for the next studio album slated for release next year.

Bob Crawford takes a modest posture on the widely held identification between the Avett Brothers and North Carolina music.

“I like a lot of the music in the twenties — the Piedmont old-time music,” he said during a recent interview. “You had a lot in Surry County, you had a lot in the Chapel Hill and Alamance County area. Charlie Poole is someone I really love. When I think of North Carolina music, I think of Doc Watson, who was a generation removed from that.

I think Doc is synonymous with North Carolina music.

We’re a generation or two removed from Doc. In some ways, an ethnomusicologist could tie us to North Carolina stylistically.”

The Avett Brothers’ impact on popular music is no less significant. Nowhere is their influence more apparent than in the music of Mumford & Sons, a British band credited with leading the recent folk revival. Marshall Winston, the group’s banjoist, told City Pages in Minneapolis that the band was listening to the Avett Brothers’ Four Thieves Gone album three or four times a week when they were recording their 2009 breakout record Sigh No More.

Here in North Carolina, the Avetts’ influence can be heard in Holy Ghost Tent Revival and the New Familiars, who emerged around 2006. Both bands matched acoustic instrumentation with a high-intensity stage presence, with Holy Ghost in particular reaching back to the 1920s to ragtime and other traditions, in an echo of the Avetts’ approach. The Carolina Chocolate Drops also explored early 20th Century Piedmont string-band music, arriving on the scene in the Avetts’ wake, but went deeper into the tradition.

Richard Richards, who performs with the Greensboro band Twain’s Jackrabbit, hears the Avett Brothers’ influence far beyond the folk-rock scene.

“I hear this rhythmic drive that I heard the first two times I heard them,” he said. “I heard it either in the bass drum or the percussive drive of the banjo. It’s this bom bom bom bom. I’ve heard it in so much music since then.

When I was listening to Simon & Garfunkel’s ‘Cecelia’ you could hear it there. I hear it in the Lumineers, in Fun, in Phillip Phillips, the ‘American Idol’ star. If you listen for it, you can hear it. I didn’t hear it as much until [the Avett Brothers] were on the national stage.”

Right around the time the Avett Brothers were transitioning from the North Carolina-based indie label Ramseur to Rick Rubin’s American Recordings, Pete Schroth

received an invitation to join the crew.

Schroth had sold the Green Bean and joined some partners to open the Flying Anvil, a medium-sized music venue modeled after the Cat’s Cradle in Carrboro. The Avett Brothers played with Mad Tea Party and Beaconwood on the second night of the venue’s grand opening, May 11, 2006. The venue would close before the year was out, an experienced that Schroth describes as being “like watching a dream collapse.” He and his wife, Anne, moved out to the country with their two boys, and Pete took odd jobs, including working for a veterinarian. Anne continued to make backdrops for the band through her fabric workshop Red Canary, and Pete booked them whenever they played in Greensboro. At one point, he told the band’s manager he would “rather be on your side of the business.”

“Scott Avett called Anne and said, ‘We want to offer your husband a job. Is it all right with you?’” Pete recounted. “Anne said, ‘Hell yeah, give him a job!’ They’re a family organization. Everybody who works for them is a friend, or a friend of a friend.”

The band gave Pete some time to talk the proposal over with Anne.

“I thought: If I do this, there’s no guarantee with this band,” Schroth said. “The answer we came up with was, ‘Yeah, we’ve got to give it a go.’ I believe in these guys, so why wouldn’t I venture into the unknown with them? Now, they’re some of my best friends.”

Schroth’s job was to run lights.

“Some of the first shows I did with them were opening for the Dave Matthews Band in front of big crowds,” Schroth recalled. “I was literally having Dave Matthews’ lighting guy explain to me how to operate this rig. At first every night I thought I was going to throw up. I was trying to learn something new every day.”

Luckily, through trial and error, Schroth improved at his craft, and by the time the band was headlining large shows he had gotten into his element. Once he got up to speed on the rudiments of lighting he was able to incorporate design into the lighting and stage set.

The band is famously disciplined.

“I think they respect the audience to where the audience deserves 100 percent,” Schroth said. “You can’t give 100 percent if you’re out there partying. They go full on with everything they do.”

Although the crew sometimes lets loose on nights when they don’t have a show the next day — what they call “roadie Friday — Schroth said the crew is similarly focused.

“I would not want to do the job hungover,” he said. “It’s very physically demanding, with long hours.”

Being on the road for weeks at a time is not always easy, especially when members of the band and crew have challenges at home. Most notably for the Avett Brothers organization, Crawford got a call from his wife while the band was on tour in 2011 reporting that their 1-year-old daughter had experienced a seizure. Her parents initially

aged us a little bit. Not in the sense of slowing us down in approaching our jobs with high intensity and ardor; it slowed us down in age and brought us perspective. It hopefully brought us a little wisdom.”

Nowhere in the Avett Brothers’ new music is the capacity to absorb sorrow — and to forge ahead despite it — more evident than in a song that surfaced in the band’s live performances this past summer called “True Sadness.”

The chorus, with Seth on lead vocals, drives home the catharsis: “I hate to say it, but the way it seems is that no one is fine/ Take the time to peel a few layers and you will find… true sadness.”

A verse in the middle of the song, sung almost a capella, contains the kind of vignette for which the Avetts are renowned. It transports the song beyond self-pity into empathy: “Angela became a target as soon as her beauty was seen/ By young men who tried to reduce her down to a scene on an X-rated screen/ Is she not more than the curve of her hips?/ Is she not more than the shine on her lips?/ Does she not dream to sing and to live and to dance down her own path/ Without being torn apart? Does she

Bob Crawford, Scott Avett and Seth Avett (l-r) hit a high note at the New Year’s Eve show at the Greensboro Coliseum three years ago.

RYAN SNYDER

not have a heart?”

Fans have taken note of the band’s growth.

“They’ve totally evolved,” the Rev. Grier Booker Richards said. “My memory of that Green Bean show was that there was some immaturity. It was playful and fun.

The spiritual undertones are more articulated now. As songwriters and performers there’s a deeper experience that they have to draw from.”

Fans will have to wait a while yet for the release of the next studio album, with recorded versions of “True Sadness” and other new songs.

“If the rumor for us is spring, I’m going to tell you summer or fall,” Crawford said. “Things never go the way you plan for them to go. It will be sometime in 2016. It’s well on its way. We’re in the final stages of mixing and mastering. All the music’s down on the computer.”

In the meantime, the New Year’s Eve show in Greensboro is the thing.

The band and crew put more planning into the New Year’s Eve show than any other night of the year, Schroth said.

“I’m taking a leap this year,” he said. “This New Year’s show I’ve designed a whole new rig. I know what I want it to look like, but I don’t know exactly how it’s going to come out. It is the most stressful night of my life, but it’s also the most satisfying.”

Schroth declined to say what the design theme will be this year, preferring to keep it a surprise.

“It’s going to be interesting to see if it works,” he said.

In 2012, the band dressed in all white.

“I draped all the risers with white,” Schroth recounted, “so whatever color I used in the lights, that’s the color that you see on everything — like these canvasses running around.”

New Year’s Eve is always a homecoming for the band.

The brothers live outside of Charlotte, while Crawford and Kwon live in the Triangle.

“It’s where they’re from, so they’re celebrating with friends and family,” Schroth said. “Starting from here, a lot of the fans first saw them at places like the Green Bean and have grown with them. We’re not the same people either; everybody progresses together.”

Back home in Greensboro, Schroth has been thinking about the family atmosphere around the Avett Brothers operation.

“Combining that with being in North Carolina, it’s a good place to be,” he said.

He experienced an epiphany when the terrorist attacks took place in Paris in November, and gunmen opened fire inside a crowded concert hall where the American band Eagles of Death Metal was playing. When the news broke, the Avett Brothers were preparing to go onstage in Fargo, ND. “Days later, it hit me: I can’t ever leave these guys,” Schroth said. “After I saw what that band went through, I realized I love these guys. I don’t think I can ever leave these guys, even if I wanted to.

“It was really heavy to have that realization. Unless they quit, I’m not quitting. I told Anne that. She said, ‘I get it.’”

triad-city-beat.com

didn’t know whether she would live.

She requires ongoing treatment, but Crawford said earlier this month: “We go one day at a time. She had a brain tumor. I would say she’s currently doing pretty well.”

While Crawford described his job as a “privilege” and an “honor,” he acknowledged that it can be hard to make sure that everyone else is having a good time while his family is struggling.

“You kind of look at it like it’s your job to be out there; it’s hard to join the celebration,” he said. “It’s kind of evolved over the past few years. At first I had trouble accepting it and celebrating when I knew at home we were going through a hard time. We received a lot of encouragement from the fans. Some people reached out with cards saying they’ve experienced similar things. So you know there are other people going through a hard time and you represent them.”

Band and crew have experienced adversity together, both through the support the other members have shown their bandmate and other challenges that Crawford and Schroth declined to specify.

“I think it has kind of clustered around when I went through what I went through,” Crawford said. “We entered a two-year period of trials and tragedy that probably

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Dec. 23 — 29, 2015 Up Front News Opinion Cover Story Culture Good Sport Games Shot in the Triad All She Wrote

20

CULTURE Sharing good Fortune, and Chinese food

by Eric Ginsburg

The right way to handle the situation didn’t strike me until I was standing there, reading over the $6 lunch specials at the counter.

A stranger, probably in his early to mid twenties, had approached me moments before in the nondescript parking lot in front of Fortune Cookie, a new Chinese takeout place in the same shopping center as Da Reggae Café on Gate City Boulevard, near UNCG’s new student housing. He’d said he was recently homeless and wanted something to eat, and asked if I’d buy him something inside. He spoke quietly and I couldn’t hear him at first, but once he repeated himself I’d offered some sort of noncommittal, callous response.

I’d never been to Fortune Cookie and didn’t know what to expect from the food or price point, and my friend Anthony was running late to join me. The restaurant looked small from the outside, and I’d guessed while parking that there wouldn’t be anywhere to sit and that we’d need to eat on the curb or leaning on the hood of my car. But when I realized I could afford an extra $6 meal and saw the two tables ERIC GINSBURG The chicken-fried rice that comes with the General Tso’s chicken (right) doubles down on and a few barstool-type seats, I quickly realized what chicken. The beef lo mein (left) is also worthwhile, but I’ll be returning for the General first. to do.

After ordering two meals, I walked back outside. abstract ideal rather than a practice.

City Beat’s Kickstarter campaign, she chose a reward This somewhat timid stranger still stood nearby. I told Maybe the fact that this happened during Hanukkah that granted her the chance to tag along while I him I’d ordered him lunch, and that he shouldn’t feel had something to do with it, or that I’ve been privy to explored a restaurant for a food article. But given that pressured to say yes, but that he was welcome to come several conversations about the irony of people celeshe lives in Ohio, she asked that I buy meals for homeinside and join me, and Anthony who would be arriving brating Thanksgiving or recounting the story of Jesus’ less people here instead. And that I actually sit down soon. We shook hands and exchanged names before birth while simultaneously turning their backs on the and eat with them. walking back in together. latest wave of refugees to this country.

I didn’t leave my meal at Fortune Cookie with Now, more than a week later, as I think about that My ancestors were once refugees, though I don’t Anthony and our new acquaintance feeling self-conmeal, I remember the General Tso’s chicken of course think they technically received the official status as gratulatory for my spur-of-the moment decision.

— Anthony ordered it for himself without knowing I Jews fleeing violent persecution in eastern Europe a Despite my beliefs and upbringing, in many regards my had, too, picking many people’s go-to Americanized couple decades before the world wars. And growing up invitation was contrary to my previous behavior.

Chinese food choice — especially because Fortune Jewish with the horror of the Holocaust imprinted in And that contradiction, that switch, is what I keep Cookie serves it with chicken fried rice that also had the minds of previous generations, my innate feeling of coming back to in my mind — that being more open other chicken in it, making for a particularly meaty outsider-ness has frequently aligned me with marginonly takes an ounce of willfulness, that any momenmeal. And I’d say the beef lo mein was as tasty as any alized people’s struggles for justice. tary awkwardness will subside, that we can stop makI’ve tried around here as well.

But I had never actually invited in the stranger being excuses or waiting for others to fix our communiBut what I mostly remember is the array of thoughts fore, never sat with him and asked about what he was ty’s problems and engage more actively in alleviating and feelings associated with invitstudying at North Carolina A&T them ourselves. ing a complete stranger to sit and University and what brought him I resolved to try harder to commit acts of solidarity eat with us. here from Baltimore.

I’m not, in with my neighbors experiencing food insecurity and Visit Fortune Cookie at 805 I don’t know exactly what comall honesty, even in that habit of to invite the stranger in more often. And I planned to W. Gate City Blvd. (GSO) or pelled me, likely a combination of giving people my spare change return to Fortune Cookie as well, because although the call 336.271.8180. reflecting on what I’m thankful for when they ask for it. gravity of our shared meal overshadowed the culinary after our recent national holiday, I make all kinds of excuses for experience, I’d argue that this fast food is among the a spate of YouTube videos about myself, in my head, saying I’ll top Chinese takeout places in a city with surprisingly homelessness and compassion I’ve watched on Facedonate to an organization like the Interactive Resource few worthwhile venues of the type. book and, in part, some underlying values.

Center instead, or that my mode of making a differChinese is an increasingly popular choice for ChristI grew up in a Jewish family, and that’s the kind of ence in the world is through journalism. But the reality mas food, not just among members of the tribe, but thing our religious teachings impressed upon me. My is that the donation is never made, at least in the form gentiles as well. Maybe there’s a way, as you mark this Torah portion — what I read during my Bar Mitzvah — of cash, and that for years I’d been feeling like I needed holiday celebrating Jesus, that you can invite a stranger focused on the importance of donating a portion of to be better about looking out for No. 1. to join you for some General Tso’s as well. I’m pretty your crop or fortune to those in need. During PassBut that’s not the person that I want to be, and it sure that’s what Jesus would — and all of us who can, over, we talk about the importance of inviting in the isn’t how I was raised. should — do. stranger, but at least in my house, this was always an When my Catholic grandmother donated to Triad

T

triad-city-beat.com

by Eric Ginsburg

That awkward moment when…

Up Front News Opinion Cover Story Culture

Tim Nolan’s finished wreath adorns the wall behind the bar at Hoots Roller Bar.

All She Wrote

The Forsyth Community Food Consortium does cool and important things, though I glossed over it here. Visit forsythlocalfood.org to learn more about the organization.

Shot in the Triad

works over at Reynolda House. Whether the dapper Wake Forest grad one year my senior realized it or not, I used him as my portal to the party. Before long, I’d introduced myself to Andrea Littel of Townies WS and Matt Troy of the Piedmont Wind Symphony. And Troy hadn’t even shown up for the event on purpose.

Just like that, I was in. I’d forgotten how awkward these sorts of things can be, but I’d also forgotten that with a small window, events like this are easy to crack wide open.

Games

playing with a new toy he’s working on related to the distillery next door.

The last time I’d seen him, just a couple days earlier, he shared some visionary ideas for downtown that are still in the making.

Nolan’s worked behind some of the best bars in the city, and already earned his share of ink in this publication (as well as his mug on the cover), and so he generally knows how to strike a balance between being a host and when to slip into the background. Acknowledging that I’d come for a reason other than him without me hinting at it, he peeled off when appropriate.

And by then, another quasi-friend had arrived, also responding to a Facebook invite from Hill, and I transitioned to catching up with Dan Rossow who

TIM NOLAN

Good Sport

It’s easy to be distracted by Tim Nolan.

It began with the DIY wreath, as Nolan led me into the back room (also known as the brewing area) of Hoots Roller Bar, where co-owner Eric Weyer had been making a phone call near the barrels and where Nolan had stashed the beginnings of a gigantic homemade wreath for the bar.

In the taproom, two parties were interacting like oil and water, occupying the same space but not exactly mixing.

The Forsyth Community Food Consortium, a food-policy and advocacy group, had set up a station with nametags and some snacks near what we’re going to call — for lack of a better term — the lawyer birthday party. The consortium organized the early-evening affair last week as its first social hour, drawing from a wider net than the crew that typically holds down meetings.

Not knowing how late it would run, I aimed to show up stylishly yet thoughtfully late, about 25 minutes after kickoff. At first I only recognized Marcus Hill, the tall and friendly lead coordinator for the group.

It’s awkward to host a social hour at a bar that isn’t closed for you, private-event style, unless you know everyone coming. We tried our own at Hoots a while back, actually, though unlike Hill we forgot nametags, making it all the more cumbersome to find your people.

A bar isn’t the best place to meet someone for the first time (unless I guess you’re into blind dates) in part because it’s awkward to approach strangers already and the setting — nametag or not — only adds to the burden.

These are all things I forgot until I arrived, and so after greeting Hill, I happily followed Nolan out of the room.

Back in the bar, I let Nolan distract me from the social hour again, as he offered a shot of chilled fernet served out of a Jagermeister machine. I’d never had fernet that way, I told him, to which he replied something like: “Of course you haven’t, unless it was here. I came up with it.”

That’s often how it goes when I run into Nolan, usually at the West End Mill Works, where he bounces between making the cocktail menu at Hoots to

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Dec. 23 — 29, 2015 Up Front News Opinion Cover Story Culture Good Sport Games Shot in the Triad All She Wrote

22

CULTURE Honky-tonk sad songs bring Christmas cheer

by Jordan Green

he billing for the free Saturday-night-before-Christmas show in a storefront in the Winston-Salem Arts District mentions only the three songwriter-stylists anchoring the concert: Stephen Corbett, Richard Boyd and Dan Dockery.

But the semi-annual event has come to be known as the “holiday hootenanny” or “honky-tonk Christmas” show. And hootenanny is a good word for an event that’s less a showcase for talent than an informal gathering of friends, with ample opportunity for guest duets and instrumental assistance, and an expectation that there will be plenty of flubs. There’s tremendous mutual respect among the musicians, including singer Emily Stewart and harmonica player Danie “Big Hope” Jones. The venue shall go unnamed to prevent certain music-industry vultures from exacting their infernal tribute.

Seated in a chair in a faded flannel shirt and engineer cap on the corner of the makeshift stage in the storefront establishment, Richard Boyd is the éminence grise of this scene. Todd Eric Verts, who plays clean, Bakersfield-style honky-tonk on a Canadian-made, hollow-body Godin guitar, has been practicing Boyd’s material in preparation for the opportunity to accompany one of his heroes.

After Corbett makes an entrance in a shiny black suit with swooping line detail, Boyd summons him to the stage. Corbett gives him a quizzical look.

“Your name is Stephen, and you do sing, don’t you?”

Boyd deadpans.

After a quick huddle, Boyd says, “I’ll be Merle, you be George.”

The first verse of “Yesterday’s Wine” runs into the ground when Boyd finds himself out of his vocal register.

“You pick a key, and we’ll go with it,” Corbett says.

Later, on another vocal duet of the George Jones classic “He Stopped Loving Her Today,” Corbett steps back from the mic after singing his line with a huge smile on his face that could be mortification or exhilaration. Each in their own way, they toy with the lyrics of a song that has become the stylistic signature of the genre since its release in 1980.

When Boyd delivers the line, “This time he’s over her for good,” Corbett quips, “Or is he?”

Before Boyd retires from the stage, he delivers a heartfelt rendition of the lead track of his band the Bo-Stevens’ most recent album, Your Crazy Heart. As Boyd sings, “Your crazy heart is killing me, your crazy heart is thrilling me,” the seasoned owner of the establishment can be seen leaning in to kiss his wife, as the two sit on folding chairs near the door and in front of a Santa Claus mannequin.

Corbett and Verts have been recording together over the past year or so under the name Stephen Corbett & the Three Fifths, with a pending album called Debris, although they haven’t rehearsed or played live much in

T

Todd Eric Verts (left) and Stephen Corbett lend an assist to Richard Boyd (right), the patriarch of Winston-Salem honky tonk.

advance of this performance.

Corbett’s set focuses squarely on his own material — a fairly deep catalogue that reaches back at least a decade. He mixes newer songs, including one called “Rest Assured, It’s Probably My Fault” that was inspired by a conversation with his friend, the honky-tonk artist John Howie Jr., with material recorded with the Radials before his departure from the group.

With Verts’ able accompaniment on lead guitar, many of Corbett’s songs match the relaxed pacing of Waylon Jennings during from the early ’70s outlaw-country golden age with a vocal style inspired by George Jones’ emotionally wounded warble.

In keeping with the spirit of familial fun at the gathering, Corbett name-drops his girlfriend, who’s watching from the back of the room, in a lyrical substitution.

“I see Erin coming, she’s got a hammer, Lord, she’s got a nail,” he sings. “That woman studies evil, she’s looking….” And then, for comic effect and to save his ass, he ad-libs in a meek voice: “… Really nice.”

Danny Dockery, a longtime songwriter and journeyman musician, closes the night with a set of finely curated original songs. A natural storyteller, his banter between songs is almost as enriching as his music. His

JORDAN GREEN

stories ache with flawed humanity, frank honesty and humor, belying the exquisite craft and lyrical economy of his music.

“All This Missing You,” with its forlorn image of a single cup beside the coffeemaker, is the mature testament of a seasoned soul stirrer. The cocky wordplay and sinewy rhythm of “Superman” projects a country R&B sound that Delbert McClinton could easily inhabit, while the foreboding minor-key tonality of “Lying Still” tells a story of murder from the perspective of a

Pick of the Week Little drum n’ bass boy Dance From Above @ the Crown (GSO), Wednesday 9 p.m.

A night of music and dance is the dance music series gift to Greensboro. Get down with Darklove, Alvin Shavers, Pres, fiftyfootshadows, Sönder and others who’ve performed as resident musicians.

Expect drums, bass, electronics and a lightshow

by Chapel Hill visual artist Thefacesblur. Find the Facebook page for more information.

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jilted lover.

Introducing “Heartbreak in G, C and D,” the one song in his set that fits the honky-tonk idiom, Dockery pays a compliment to his fellow troubadours.

“I love country music,” he says. “I think it’s the last honest soul music around these parts…. It’s about real life.

That’s what you get with Richard Boyd and Stephen Corbett.”

There’s a kind of secular, or at least ecumenical spirituality in Dockery’s message — a gospel based on country songwriter Harlan Howard’s axiom about “three chords and the truth,” if you will.

Introducing a song about unconsummated sexual attraction, Dockery preaches, “You never know who your next dance partner’s gonna be. You never know who’s gonna be your next friend. You never know who you’re gonna need to depend on in life. So before you leave here tonight, turn to your neighbor and give one another a hug.

Shake someone’s hand. It is Christmas, after all.”

Culture Good Sport Games Shot in the Triad All She Wrote

23

Dec. 23 — 29, 2015 Up Front News Opinion Cover Story Culture Good Sport Games Shot in the Triad All She Wrote

24

CULTURE Knitting together a crafting community

by Daniel Wirtheim

aura C. Frazier sat behind a glass case that surrounded her miniature needle-felt sculptures of a donkey, owl, sheep and cat. The sculptures, each one no more than 6 inches tall, are made from sheep’s wool that Frazier sheers herself.

Her small table and needle-felt animals occupied a far corner of the atrium, just yards away from the Stitchin’ Brewer table where Charla Haley-Caudle, who Frazier had taught the needle-felt technique, worked a spinning wheel.

It was Dec. 19 at Krankies 2015 Winter Craft Fair.

Hundreds of shoppers meandered through the atrium in what was hyped to be the biggest craft fair yet and the first held in the BioTech Place.

They shoppers meandered along the tables adorned with crafts as Frazier sat behind her sculptures and worked on a needle-felt horse. She takes stringy tufts of wool and jabs them into a matt with a handheld needle until the wool turns to thick, matted chunks.

The hairs are coarse enough that two pieces of wool will stick together without adhesive. Once she makes a rough outline of a horse body she begins to sculpt. The body of the horse had a beige, natural-wool color but that will change later, when she uses acid dyes.

“I don’t get to make horses very often so I was excited to make the donkey, being in the horse family,” Frazier said. “They’re a good guard animal. It was fun to give it a personality, make the ears wonky and the DANIEL WIRTHEIM Laura C. Frazier raises sheep and makes animal sculptures from the wool. tail just right. Attention to detail is what I do.” across the atrium. She’s known for her needle-felt art social connections than, say, the wood-spoonmakers She had sculpted with clay all of her life but when as well as the pack of Gulf Coast Natives — the only or the screen-printers. There were more screen-printed she married into a sheep-raising family, she found a true native American sheep — that she keeps on a farm items than knitted ones at the fair, yet finding a comnew material to work with. Frazier learned the needle just northeast of Winston-Salem. munity of printers was difficult. felt technique on a tour of another farm and quickly Walt Bartnikowski, a knit-artist who specializes in A woman sold flour-sack towels bearing the realized that she could make realistic animal sculpAngora wool, has seen Frazier since her first craft fair. screen-printed shape of North Carolina and denied tures in a way that clay had never allowed her. She He’s a bit shy, with not a lot of business acumen, he feeling a sense of community between herself and the started with sheep and quickly moved onto other admitted.

Bartnikowski creates eccentric wool clothing other screen-printers.

One artist and screen-printer animals.

— mostly hats — out of Angora wool, an expensive Woodie Anderson said that she had worked with other “I feel a spiritual connection to the animals and the material harvested from rabbits. printers before at an artist collective but didn’t really process of artmaking,” Frazier Bartnikowski describes the interact with those at the craft fair. And Kayla Jones, said. “Everything meets for me in tradition of Angora wool as being who was selling a collection of wooden spoons, said Laura C. Frazier and her this needle process. I have always passed down from a long line of that she knits with friends on the side but makes the felt that animals have been knitting friends will be at Eastern European craftsmen in a wooden spoons in solitude, even though she has a friends through thick and thin. I’ve the Old Salem Cobblestone move not unlike the way Frazier studio with other woodworkers. raised horses through my twenMarket, beginning Jan. 16. taught Haley-Caudle to needle ties. Three dogs a cat and seven Pick of the Week felt.

You can find her needle felt sheep and I feel a deep connection At the fair, screen-printed Night of light to them.” work at farmgirlarts.com. textiles were popular, as well as Christmas Eve Lovefeast @ Home Moravian Church Typically, Frazier makes neehandmade jewelry, paintings, (W-S), Thursday 2:30 p.m. dle-felt sculptures by commission soaps and nearly every other craft known to the southThe Christmas Eve Lovefeast is a sight to behold.

— most of the time a client’s dog or cat. But the sculpeastern United States. But within the array of merBetween four services, thousands of Moravian tures in her glass case were made during her fellowship chants there’s a pattern, a common thread: Knitters beeswax candles are lit as a choir sings to create with the NC Arts Council, which ended in September. and wool workers know one another. Perhaps that can one mesmerizing scene. These are huge, inclusive She was selling wool from her farm and the animals, be said about practitioners of any craft, but no social events for people of all ages and demographics. but the donkey was priced extra high because she’s connections are as clearly distinguishable as those in Participate in person or via a live stream on the okay with holding onto it. the wool and knitting community. church website. Visit homemoravian.org for cereIt was Frazier’s fifth turn at Krankies Craft Fair and The wool- and knit-artists appeared to have better mony schedules and additional details. the connections she’s cultivated in those years spread

L

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Megan Maddox who traveled to the craft fair from Virginia Beach had some kind of answer. She sat behind a table of colorful, knitted creations while wearing a purple tie-die shirt. Her metallic and purple needle that matched her shirt kept moving as she looked around and nodded towards the other knitters she had met earlier.

“I don’t know what it is about knitters,” said Maddox. “They just get things.”

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GOOD SPORT Shooting the Panthers fter the Carolina Panthers’ win over the New York Giants on Sunday, I spoke over the phone with Panthers team photographer Melissa Melvin-Rodriguez as she healed from a broken leg in Charlotte.

A

by Anthony Harrison

about it for a little bit. I didn’t instantly jump at it. I I’m traveling with the team now, and still doing everythought, Well, that’s not a newspaper job. It’s pro footthing else, plus whatever they need help with on the website. ball. And before then, I hadn’t really watched professional TCB: What’s been the most enjoyable aspect of football games; I didn’t really watch pro sports at all. being the Panthers’ photographer?

So I talked it over with a few friends who were photogMMR: Getting to be part of this organization. raphers, and they were just like, “Oh, that’s really cool, you should do that! At least try it out and see what it’s like.”

I had my preconceived notions about working with a professional football team, being a female entering two So I wrote them back and said, “Yeah, sure! Give him my male-dominated fields of sports photography and pro name!” sports. I felt that maybe there was going to be a lot of There were a couple of phone calls with a couple of macho attitude and sexism, and that I would constantly people there, and they wanted to bring me in to do a trial run/audition where I would shoot Fan Fest right before be reminded of being a female. the 2013 season. So I came in and shot Fan Fest and edIn a lot of ways, the Panthers are such an amazing ited a few photos they would put online. They really liked organization. The culture within that stadium that’s been developed and taught by [Panthers what I shot, and they offered me an owner] Mr. [Jerry] Richardson is that internship.

For the full interview — At the end of that season, they every single person — not just the kept me on as a freelancer. They had including the story on how players and the coaches, but in every some extra work in the off-season, single department — they all have Melissa broke her leg — wonderful attitudes and everyone because that’s when they did a lot visit triad-city-beat.com. works together like a family. of renovations to the stadium. And When I was there for the first then I transitioned into all the stuff season, it seemed so weird. I had that that builds up to the season: The sense everyone was working together in a really cohesive draft, training camp, mini-camps, OTAs. way that seemed like a family, but I thought, Could this But even then, I wasn’t traveling with the team. I was be an act? And it hasn’t been. just doing home games, community events and practices.

I’ve been there; I’ve been behind the scenes, and it’s not In May of this year, they brought me on full time. It’s an act. It’s the culture within that stadium. It’s amazing kind of the same, except I’m there all the time. [laughs] to be a part of that and to see how it affects the people in all departments and the decisions of which players to pick and how they all work together.

Of course, as a photographer, it’s pretty amazing for me to be part of a team and get to document an entire season and some of these moments in between. To be there every single day, to travel with them, to get some of the access that I have — that’s what photographers want.

You want to get close. You want to build those relationships with people so they trust you and they know that, when you take a picture, it’s not going to be something that’s going to put them in a bad light. I’m there to make them look good. I’m there to capture their great moments, their great plays, their deeds around the community. And I’m happy to be there to do that. I feel lucky.

Triad City Beat: When did your career in photography start?

Melissa Melvin-Rodriguez: In 2010, I decided to go back to school for photography. It had really grabbed my interest around that time, and it just got to the point that it was less than a hobby and more of a career pursuit.

I enrolled at the photographic technology program at Randolph Community College in Asheboro. I’d taken some classes at the Sawtooth [School for Visual Arts] in Winston-Salem, and the teacher I had there, Will Parham, was a graduate of that program. He said it was one of the best photography programs you’ve never heard of, and having been through it, I completely believe that.

It was two of the hardest years of my life, but also two of the most rewarding, and it definitely helped me get to where I am today.

TCB: How did you get the gig as team photographer?

MMR: I’d been interning at newspapers in North Carolina. The concentration I went through in the program was photojournalism, and I had the feeling that’s what I wanted to do. That’s why I was going from newspaper to newspaper, in hopes of getting enough experience and exposure to find a job with a newspaper.

In 2013, during my fourth internship — which happened to be with the Winston-Salem Journal — I got a message from a Charlotte-based Associated Press photographer. They said they were at training camp, and someone with the digital media team had mentioned to them that they were looking to have a photo intern. They said they’d given [the team] some names, and mine was one of them. They asked if that was okay, was I interested in anything like that?

Melissa Melvin-Rodriguez is the team photographer for the In all honesty, when I Carolina Panthers. got the message, I thought

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1 Letterhead illustrations 6 Key holder 9 “Your Movie Sucks” author Roger 14 “I’m on ___!”

15 Anonymous Richard in court cases 16 Where it’s happening 17 Like some French sauces 18 Observation from one person to another, part 1 20 Observation, part 2 22 Street of bad dreams?

23 “Ice Age” sloth 24 Allow 25 Stick (out) 28 Singer who dropped “McEntire” from her performing name 30 Last name in cartoon skunks 32 Appease fully 33 Possible pigeon perch 35 Baseball Hall-of-Famer Tony 36 Observation, part 3 40 “Oh ___! -- it’s full of stars!” (line from the novel “2001”) 41 “And there you have it!”

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Happy Holiday’s And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.” Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.”

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