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Curly Seckler: A 'Foggy Mountain Troubadour'

Host Frank Stasio speaks with Curly Seckler's biographer Penny Parsons.

Curly Seckler grew up a farming kid in the tiny town of China Grove, NC and liked to listen to the Monroe Brothers on the radio.

Eventually, he became one of the forebearers of bluegrass music as a part of the Foggy Mountain Boys. Seckler's iconic mandolin style and tenor harmonies carved a music career that spanned more than 50 years.

In her new book, "Foggy Mountain Troubadour: The Life and Music of Curly Seckler" (University of Illinois Press/2016), Penny Parsonsrecounts Seckler's journey from the cotton fields of North Carolina to the International Bluegrass Association Hall of Fame.

Host Frank Stasio talks with Parsons about Seckler's life as an influential bluegrass musician. Parsons reads at 7 p.m. on Saturday, September 10 at Scuppernong Books in Greensboro and at 2 p.m. Sunday, September 11 at the Mount Airy Museum of Regional History.

The Trail Riders, ca. 1940.  L to R: Front: George Sechler, Murray Belk (comedian), Duard Sechler; Rear: Marvin Sechler, Curly Seckler.
Curly Seckler /
The Trail Riders, ca. 1940. L to R: Front: George Sechler, Murray Belk (comedian), Duard Sechler; Rear: Marvin Sechler, Curly Seckler.
Lester Flatt, Curly Seckler and Earl Scruggs, 1949.
Curly Seckler /
Lester Flatt, Curly Seckler and Earl Scruggs, 1949.
"Foggy Mountain Troubadour: The Life and Music of Curly Seckler"
University of Illinois Press/2016 /
"Foggy Mountain Troubadour: The Life and Music of Curly Seckler"

Copyright 2016 North Carolina Public Radio

Longtime NPR correspondent Frank Stasio was named permanent host of The State of Things in June 2006. A native of Buffalo, Frank has been in radio since the age of 19. He began his public radio career at WOI in Ames, Iowa, where he was a magazine show anchor and the station's News Director.
Charlie Shelton