For over a quarter-century, as a non-profit organization, the Orchard has diligently worked to “save the good stuff”—the regional traditions, culture, and the land on which all was created. We propagate the best heirloom apples possible (with the least amount of chemicals), create a pollinator-friendly environment, and host activities for all ages that both educate and entertain.
Sheila Kay Adams with Donna Ray Norton and William Ritter in a special evening performance on the Pavilion.
Sheila Kay Adams is the seventh-generation bearer of her family’s two-hundred-year-old ballad-singing tradition, and is the mother and teacher of the eighth generation.
One of the best-known living ballad singers in North Carolina, as well as a fine old-time banjo player, she has recorded prolifically and performed at many dozens of venues and festivals in the United States and Great Britain.
Adams won the 1997 North Carolina Society of Historians’ Clark Cox Historical Fiction Award, and received the North Carolina Folklore Society’s Brown-Hudson Award for outstanding contributions to the folklore of her home state.
In 2013, Sheila Kay Adams received the National Heritage Fellowship, the nation’s highest honor in the folk and traditional arts. The North Carolina Arts Council honored her with the prestigious North Carolina Heritage Award in 2015.
We invite you to spend a couple hours listening to Sheila Kay Adams and her friends Donna Ray Norton, considered a new generation balladeer and William Ritter, a long-time Orchard musician who plays many instruments and with a story for each. The three take to the stage and perform a night of traditional Appalachian ballads (including a story or two) in this second of a series of evening Orchard “fun”draising events. Support our mission by supporting our music program. Tickets are $10.
