Registration opens November 11th, 2024.

For the fifth year, we will offer virtual classes to keep you progressing in fiddle, banjo, guitar and songs from Kentucky. Each class meets for one hour each week for 8 weeks via Zoom. All class times are listed in US Eastern Standard Time. Tuition is $160 and scholarships are available! A Nancy McClellan Scholarship is available for students 11 years old and up. To secure a scholarship, click the "scholarship" button when registering. If you need help with registration or have questions, please contact the CCMMS coordinator, Stacy Dollarhide at CCMMS@cowancommunitycenter.org or (606) 335-5350. Class size is limited to 15 so register soon.

Winter Cowan 2025 Class Offerings

Int./Adv. Fiddle: A Tune is a Feeling II

John Harrod

Tuesdays, 7PM (EST)

Course Level: The tunes taught in this course will fall within a range from intermediate to somewhat advanced.

Harrod’s Cowan Creek winter session this year will be an extension of the theme that he and Blakeley Burger began exploring in their 2023 summer class “A Tune is a Feeling I.” Fiddle styles are not confined to state political boundaries. Sometimes to follow these sounds we are led across state lines. In this class students will learn a variety of tunes in different styles from Kentucky and the surrounding states. They will listen for the differences in feeling that come from a particular place and reflect its environment, its people, and its history. We hope to bring these tunes back into circulation among serious fiddlers. “A Tune is a Feeling I” is not a required prerequisite. The subject matter is connected, but they do not necessarily build on each other.

Int./Adv. Banjo: Southeast Kentucky Old Time Banjo

John Haywood

Thursdays, 10AM (EST)

Course Level: The tunes taught in this course will fall within a range from intermediate to advanced. That said, the playing styles may be unfamiliar even to advanced students, so be prepared to take it back to the basics for certain portions of the course.

This class will build on Haywood’s personal experiences playing with and living near some of east Kentucky’s greatest old time banjo masters. He played in the Lee Sexton Band for many years and was apprentice and neighbor to George Gibson. Under these masters, Haywood studied the banjo playing of Banjo Bill Cornett, Rufus Crisp, Coy Morton, Morgan Sexton, Roscoe Holcomb, Henry Bunch, Jack Bunch, Rudell Thomas, Virgil Anderson, Dock Boggs, Grandpa Hudson, Buelle Kazee, and so many more regional players. He has also had the chance to play with some of Kentucky’s greatest old time fiddlers including Paul David Smith, Jimmy McCown, Roger Cooper, Jesse Wells, and more. In addition to specializing in east Kentucky banjo music, Haywood incorporates repertoire from outside of the region into his East Kentucky banjo playing tendencies. In this course, students will focus on overhand techniques, left hand plucking, two finger banjo, up picking, back thumbing, and ways of incorporating multiple techniques into one tune.

Early Int. Fiddle : Tunes of Southeast Kentucky

Sarah Howard

Wednesdays: 7PM (EST)

Course Level: This course will be best suited to fiddlers who have the basics down and are looking to get a handful of tunes under their belt.

This class draws upon Sarah's personal experience growing up in Southeastern Kentucky, where she learned music directly from Ray Slone as his apprentice. During her apprenticeship and over the years, she had numerous opportunities to play alongside and learn from Lee Sexton and other regional music masters. At seventeen and eighteen, Art Stamper selected her for his Advanced fiddle class at Cowan Creek Mountain Music School. Tunes and stories gleaned from these masters will be passed on in Sarah’s early-intermediate class, so, that mixed with Sarah’s personality will ensure students feel comfortable sharing and learning in the online community, making it an enjoyable experience. She can’t wait to meet you at Winter Cowan.

Songs of Kentucky

Anna Roberts-Gevalt

Mondays, 7PM (EST)

Course Level: any

"Us poor folks haven't got a chance / Unless we organize*" : songs of struggle, justice, protest & grief in Appalachia.
This class dives into the incredible legacy of truth-telling songs in Appalachia; from old ballads with hidden messages, to strident songs for rallies and marches, to story-songs about struggle and injustice. Together, we'll learn a group of these songs, with some time spent on its history, and about the struggles and injustices that inspired it.We'll focus in on musical techniques as well -- zooming in on unaccompanied singing techniques and styles, projection, breath-work, and creative accompaniment (for any instrument). Our deep dive into songs will be supplemented by a series of film screenings from the incredible Appalshop catalogue, as well as some (not required) readings.
*From Florence Reece's Which Side Are You On

Carter Style Scratch Guitar

Shohei Tsutsumi

Tuesdays, 7PM (EST)

Course Level: The tunes taught in this course will fall within a range from intermediate to somewhat advanced. Preferred experience with thumb-pick and finger-pick playing, but it is not required.

This class is designed to guide students in establishing their own style while learning the Carter Style Scratch Guitar technique, which was made famous by Mother Maybelle Carter. Shohei considers the guitar a "melo-rhythmic" instrument with tremendous influence over melody and rhythm, and the Carter Scratch style shines within this realm. Although often associated with vocal pieces, Shohei believes it can also be applied to fiddle tunes. Students will explore a wide range of tunes, from simple vocal pieces to fiddle tunes like "Skip to My Lou" and "Rock the Cradle Joe." Guided by Shohei’s insights influenced by Chester McMillian, students will gain a deep understanding of rhythmic patterns and methods of melodic ornamentation. Students will use a thumb pick, finger pick, and a capo.

Faculty Bios

John Harrod

John Harrod has been documenting, playing, and teaching Kentucky music for 50 years. Although he started out playing bluegrass in high school, he credits Mark Wilson and the late Gus Meade with introducing him to the world of pre-bluegrass traditional music. With them he produced a series of field recordings that are available from Rounder Records and the Field Recorders' Collective. He has taught fiddle at the Cowan Creek Mountain Music School, the American Festival of Fiddle Tunes, the Augusta Heritage Center, Swannanoa Old Time Week, and Centre College. He performs with Kentucky Wild Horse, a band that brings together many strands of Kentucky music including old time songs and fiddle tunes, bluegrass, original songs, and hillbilly swing. His recordings include “Living in the Promised Land,” "Spirits of the Lonesome Hills" and “Wild and Free” with Kentucky Wild Horse and a fiddle CD "Johnny Come Along." (johnharrodmusic.com)

John Haywood

In Letcher County Kentucky, John Haywood, is a tattooer, painter and musician. He performed banjo on the Grammy nominated Tyler Childers Album “Long Violent History,” later contributing vocals and banjo to Childer’s version of “Two Coats.” He also performed with Childers at Radio City Music Hall, Bonaroo, and Red Rocks Amphitheater. He recently released a solo banjo cd of old time east Kentucky songs and a 12” lp with his rock band Appalachiatari. His art and tattoo work draws from the experiences, culture, and music of the hollers and coalfields, and has been collected by diverse individuals from across the globe, earning him numerous awards and honors. He was apprentice to banjo master/historian George Gibson, and a regular member of the late Lee Sexton’s band. In 2011, he established the Parlor Room Art and Tattoo in Whitesburg, a gathering place for local heathens, art enthusiasts, and music lovers.

Sarah Howard

Sarah Howard is a singer, musician, and songwriter from southeastern Kentucky. She began playing fiddle at the age of eleven, and by the time she was fourteen, had developed a love for Old-time fiddle tunes. She was a fiddle student and apprentice of the late Ray Slone. She was also an advanced fiddle student of the late Art Stamper at CCMMS 2003 and 2004. She worked her way from student, to teacher's assistant, co-teacher, and finally teacher at CCMMS. She spends much of her time teaching elementary students by day, and music students by night. She also sings in her family’s Gospel music band, The Howard Family.

Anna Roberts-Gevalt

Anna Roberts-Gevealt first learned old time fiddle and banjo at Cowan Creek over 15 years ago; she spent a decade touring the US and Europe with her ballad-singing duo Anna & Elizabeth: their record on Smithsonian Folkways was dubbed "a radical expansion of what folk songs are supposed to do" by The New Yorker. She is an artist with

Shohei Tsutsumi

Shohei Tsutsumi is from Osaka, Japan. From 2016 to 2019, he resided in North Carolina and became the first non-American to earn a Master's Degree in Appalachian Studies at Appalachian State University in 2018. He won awards in various local contests for different instruments, including winning the Mountain Dulcimer competition at the Galax Old Fiddler's Convention for two consecutive years, in 2018 and 2019. Shohei has a deep appreciation for traditional and old-time styles from Western North Carolina and Southwest Virginia, and he constantly seeks to explore and play these old styles on each instrument.

Wanna see these instructors in action?

Join them in the virtual Pickin' Party! Register to join!