Marion, VA is a town you might miss, unless you are traveling on I-81 through Virginia’s Blue Ridge mountains. The area has a rich musical heritage, however, and is now the home of Song Of The Mountains, a live concert series which is recorded for broadcast television from Marion’s restored Lincoln Theater.

The show is the brainchild of Tim White, a well-known performer and radio personality in East Tennessee (Troublesome Hollow and The VW Boys), and Andre Burroughs, Production Manager at Blue Ridge Public Television in Roanoke, VA. They launched in the summer of 2005, drawing a local audience and filming several of the shows for airing on BRPTV.

These shows were also offered to PBS affiliates all over the US, and 26 picked the show up over the course of that first season. In 2006, shows were recorded for the 2007 broadcast season, and the show received a Telly Award for their work in season one.

The 2007 broadcast season will include live shows featuring Jesse McReynolds & The Virginia Boys, The Lost & Found, Roni Stoneman, The VW Boys with special guest “Tater” Tate, Mike Seeger, Paul Williams & the Victory Trio, Randy Waller & the Country Gentlemen, Wayne Henderson & Jeff Little, Heather Berry & Dominion Grass and many others.

Tim White tells us that they have 50 PBS affiliate stations carrying the show now, and that it is distributed for broadcast to members of the National Educational Telecommunications Association through the NETA Program Service.

Stations wishing to contact Tim for more information can do so by email.