It has been more than 25 years since Bob, Marianne and I started playing music together, just for fun. Bob, who grew up in Cleveland, Tennessee, had been playing fiddle for several years, but had never played and sung with anyone who did vocal harmony. Marianne and I, who were childhood sweethearts, had been playing music together since we were... well, childhood sweethearts. We grew up in West Tennessee, singing harmony at home, in church, and in folk and rock groups in high school. But we had never played music with a fiddle player! Bob was excited about the harmony; Mari and I were excited about the fiddle. We were all ecstatic after the first evening of sharing songs together, and were sufficiently hooked that we continued getting together on a regular basis. Marianne and I learned Cajun and Bluegrass songs from Bob. Bob learned some of the old folk material that Marianne and I had done for many years. And, since we were all about the same age, we also had fun putting together some of our favorite rock and pop tunes of the 50's, 60's and 70's. Eventually, the repertoire expanded to include swing and pop music from earlier periods, going back to the 20's, 30's, and 40's. After a while, someone said that we should try to see if we could perform somewhere. In a pretty short period of time, we were performing regularly at several Knoxville venues. Eventually, the gigs became frequent enough to become a burden on three people who worked full- time. So we quit our "day jobs" and earned a living performing in and around Knoxville, including at the 1982 World's Fair. After about three years, we took a hiatus to re-join “the real world”, raise kids, etc. That hiatus lasted about 22 years, but finally the urge to sing harmony again got the best of us. We're back, and we're having a great time. We hope you will join us soon!
Bill Gurley
June, 2007