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Mountain Stage: Where the musicians come to play

CHARLESTON - West Virginia’s Larry Groce has a knack for pickin’ em. Artists, that is. Musical talents with true star quality. And he’s able to find a star early in its formation, when the pressure and temperature and gravitational pull of the body is so strong that it begins to glow, eventually becoming large, bright and hot. Sheryl Crow, Lyle Lovett, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Counting Crows. All major players who hit the West Virginia Mountain Stage on their way to stardom. Four stars from the Mountain Stage galaxy that now includes over a thousand.

Mountain Stage is an award-winning, live two-hour performance produced by West Virginia Public Radio. The program is heard over more than 100 Public Radio International affiliates of public, college and commercial stations. It is also heard on Radio Anna Livia in Ireland and throughout the world on the Voice of America “Music Mix” satellite service. Although the number of listeners is hard to track, estimates range between 180,000 and 240,000.

Its creators strive to showcase a mixture of styles and cultures – “intelligent, contemporary music seasoned with traditional and roots performers.” The show features many well-known artists, but also delights in the discovery of intriguing un- or lesser-knowns.

How do they find these artists? Typically it’s the artists who find the Mountain Stage. Host and co-producer Larry Groce receive on average 1500-1600 CD’s a year from agents, record companies and the artists themselves. “I listen to them all,” he says. While he won’t necessarily listen to a CD in its entirety, every artist has a chance to capture the attention of Larry Groce. Only about 20 to 30 percent of the artists who perform for Mountain Stage already have large commercial labels.

“Larry listens to everything,” confirms Andy Ridenour, producer of the show. “And we have our fair share of people who have never had record deals.”

So just what musical genre is characteristically Mountain Stage? There really isn’t one. “The show varies from week to week and from performer to performer,” says Groce. The first featured artist on a show might be a 75-year-old Cajun crooner; the next might be a 50-year-old Appalachian folk singer; the third in the line-up might be a group of 20-something alternative rockers.

And what is the show’s target audience? There really isn’t one. The producers don’t think in terms of marketing to a specific segment of the population. There are, however, general demographic characteristics of Mountain Stage audiences. Presently, a typical audience member is male (statistics slightly favor males), early 40’s (slightly younger than the typical public radio listener), educated to well-educated, and makes pretty good money. Which certainly doesn’t mean that Mountain Stage audiences are strictly homogeneous. Sixty-year-old women and Generation X-ers listen, too.

Another non-typical facet of the Stage is its staying power. It has been on the air since its local production in 1984 and its inaugural national broadcast in 1985 from the Piccolo Spoleto Festival in Charleston, South Carolina, touted as one of the best fine arts festivals in the United States. The burnout factor among other radio and television show cast and crew members, not to mention their audiences, is high. Mountain Stage has managed to remain relatively untainted by an industry that can yield a lethal mixture of temperaments.

Groce also attributes the show’s vitality to the fact that on the Mountain Stage, the guest is the star – not the host. “We’ve changed, grown, evolved. The show stays fresh because it’s focused on the artist.”

The “on the road” aspect of the show helps give listeners a change of scenery in the audio and visual sense. From Boston to San Diego, the cast, crew, production people and house band travel four to five times a year with a 24-foot truck and 2 ½ tons of equipment. Recently their road shows have been working West Virginia, making a real effort to re-connect Mountain Stage with the Mountain State.

The average audience size of a performance varies from 350 people at its home at the Cultural Center Theater in Charleston to an audience of 2,000 in Boston. While the size of an audience can increase dramatically when they play at a big city venue, they prefer keeping it small. Ridenour says, “There’s an intimacy to the show that we want to keep. We like a small venue so that each person in the audience feels like they’re at the feet of the artist.”

So how does Mountain Stage go global, yet still remain true to its West Virginia roots? Groce’s heart is in West Virginia. He has lived in West Virginia for 27 years and has visited all 55 counties in the state.

“Even though our music reflects many different cultures from regions around the country and around the world, we like to feel that we present it in a West Virginia way.”

And what is a “West Virginia way?”

“We reflect a personality of the state. There are a lot of different flavors in the state, but the West Virginia persona is typically warm, good-humored, straight-forward, unpretentious.”

Just like many of the stars in the Mountain Stage galaxy.