43 f Mountain Soul
Meet Elizabeth LaPrelle, quite simply the best young Appalachian ballad singer to emerge in living memory. Sarah Coxson makes the introductions.
I
t’s not every day that you hear a singer who can perform a song with a weight and truth and know- ing which quite literally makes the hairs stand up on the back of your neck. Enter Elizabeth LaPrelle – singer of old songs and ballads from the Appalachian mountains which grab you by the throat, hook you, spin you around and reduce you to a pulpy mess. She conveys something ‘other’: a timeless, raw honesty and humanity.
Don’t take my somewhat incoherent word for it. The 24-year old from Cedar Springs, Virginia, was the recipient of the Mike Seeger Scholarship at this February’s International Folk Alliance Conference… an honorarium previous- ly awarded to such tradition bearers as fiddlers Violet Hensley, 95, from Arkansas and the late Paul David Smith from Kentucky. “I think part of the idea of the award is to reaffirm the presence of traditional music at Folk Alliance, which is dominated by singer-songwriters,” reflects Eliza- beth. “The more we keep our defini- tion of ‘folk’ diverse, the better!”
Elizabeth has ‘genuine article’ writ through her like the letters through seaside rock. Her three albums – Rain And Snow (2004), Lizard In The Spring (2007) and Birds’ Advice (2011) – bear testimony to this. As do the words of one of her own inspira- tions, seventh genera- tion ballad singer, Sheila Kay Adams, who has said of her: “Anyone can learn the old ballads… but Elizabeth is interested in the feel, the sound, the ornamenta- tion of the songs. She is, in my opinion, one of maybe a handful of young singers able to capture the rhythm, the intensity, the breaks and sighs that make this style of singing authentic. The
only problem I have while listening to Eliz- abeth is that I’m always listening through tears. She reminds me so much of my older relatives – the same profound feeling for the ballad, yet with such a clear voice.” There’s an old soul in that young voice.
Foiled by technology in our attempts to speak to each other, Elizabeth and I entered into a written correspondence to discover more about her life in song to date; exploring her passion for the tradi- tion of old-style singing in which she is
clearly immersed and to which she is devoted. I’m keen to understand how she came to this place and to own such a worldly voice at such a tender age. What emerges is a familiar tale of a childhood steeped in a culture of music-making – whilst not specifically mountain music – including being sung to constantly by her mum (or hearing ballads and folk songs on records played at home) and being absorbed in her parents’ shared interest in the string band music of rural Virginia where she lives.
No surprise that Elizabeth started entering folk song contests at fiddler’s conventions at an early age. She recalls that in those competitions, ballads were few and far between. “There would be a lot of versions of Wayfaring Stranger and Red River Valley!”
Singer Ginny Hawker heard Elizabeth
at a fiddler’s convention and got her to go to the traditional music camp at Augusta Heritage Center in Elkins, West Virginia where the touchpaper was lit.
Photo: Mike Melnyk
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