The Crooked Road in Kentucky... Americana at its best ?

[bluemtgrass]

While perusing a Smithsonian magazine a few months ago I was pleasantly surprised to see a nice write up about the road meandering across Kentucky with a lot of Blue Grass music along the way. Unfortunately I misplaced/blame the wife/ or otherwise lost the magazine for future reference. From what I remember it seemed to be like stepping back in time.

Anyone have experience with this road ? Was it worth the couple of days it probably would take to traverse this section ? Any suggestions what to bypass and more importantly when and where to stop ?

[PrincessCaryn]

While perusing a Smithsonian magazine a few months ago I was pleasantly surprised to see a nice write up about the road meandering across Kentucky with a lot of Blue Grass music along the way. Unfortunately I misplaced/blame the wife/ or otherwise lost the magazine for future reference. From what I remember it seemed to be like stepping back in time.

Anyone have experience with this road ? Was it worth the couple of days it probably would take to traverse this section ? Any suggestions what to bypass and more importantly when and where to stop ?

The Crooked Road is absolutely positively worth the trip to Southwest Virginia. I have been to all and it is REALLY hard to pick a favorite. If you have never been, a show at the Carter Family Fold is a must as is a Friday night at The Floyd Country Store. If you are able to go for the Fiddler's Convention in Galax your life will be forever changed. Of course, you can't miss with any of the venues - they are all amazing and the towns are just as great. You can easily spend a week exploring sites along The Crooked Road. You can plan your trip at www.myswva.org/maps/music. This will also let you see what is going on at each of the venues.

And, you can find that Smithsonian article at http://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel...oked-Road.html

Have a great time!

[sunburst]

Nathan, I think I know what you're talking about, and I don't think it is the same "crooked road" that is in Virginia. I think it is called something else, and the homes (original homes?) of a bunch of country music stars, like Keith Whitley, Dwight Yoakam, Patty Loveless, and a surprising number more are close to it's path. Perhaps you are confusing the names of the two designated highways, because I believe they are called by different names.

[bluemtgrass]

I thought the road was mostly in Kentucky but it is indeed mostly in Virginia. So much for my elephant type memory. I was hoping to get first hand reviews as in the 2nd post. I'm more interested in the downhome real life small town experience than in the homes of the stars and superstars... unless of course they invite you in and tell you to " take your shoes off and sit a spell. " And PrincessCaryn, I'm flattered to be your first post. And thanks for finding that article. As I said, it was refreshing to see it prominently displayed in the Smithsonian.

[Justus True Waldron]

This seems like good fodder for the music themed motorcycle trip I'm starting to plan for this summer...

[Bluegrass Boy]

Yeah, Crooked Road, mostly in Virginia, overlaps some with Country Music highway in Kentucky. I was on much of both in the last two years. Highpoints for me were Butcher Hollow and the Clinch Mountains, including stalking Ralph Stanley (sorry Ralph) and finding his house.

[Mouse ear Mike]

There is a road in Kentucky about 12 mile from where I live(southern Ohio) called The Country Music Highway.It is Rt 23.The Judds,Billy Ray Cyrus,Ricky Scaggs and a bunch of others are from this area.

[mommythrice]

We did this two years ago and I would love to go again. Here's the official website: TheCrookedRoad.com
But I've got to tell you, we didn't get very far on the "official road". As a family band, we all brought our instruments and were hoping to jam along the way. I tried to plan it all out ahead of time to hit as many jams as possible, but most of these places don't have websites or internet (and AT&T has no coverage in that part of the country, so my iPhone GPS was useless). After we found our first jam, we were given directions to the next jam the next night - which wasn't on The Crooked Road map - and so on every single day. We had at least one, an sometime two, jams every day. We kept getting more directions and offers of places stay and even offers of money. It was like the underground railroad for bluegrass. We played on stage, we played on the radio... I had no idea where we were half the time, but we were loving every minute of it.

I even blogged about it. It's a little old, but here's my blog.