Roger Howell Documentary Selected for Longleaf Film Festival

A documentary film profiling celebrated fiddler Roger Howell of Madison County, North Carolina was selected to screen at the North Carolina Museum of History’s Longleaf Film Festival, May 13th-14th,  2016. Titled A Mighty Fine Memory:  Stories and Tunes from the Fiddler of Banjo Branch, the half-hour documentary was produced by the Liston B. Ramsey Center for Regional Studies at Mars Hill University. The film will be shown at 4:00 on Saturday, May 14th.

Known for his skill as a musician and generosity as a teacher, Roger Howell has also dedicated much of his energy to documenting the music for posterity. He spent years recording the “Memory Collection,” a compilation of 532 fiddle tunes donated to Mars Hill University’s Southern Appalachian Archives. He was honored with a Brown-Hudson Folklore Award in 2015.

Watch the trailer on YouTube.

The film was supported by a grant from the Blue Ridge National Heritage Area Partnership.

Congratulations to filmmaker Rebecca Jones, to producer Hannah Furgiuele, and to Roger!