|
Family accepts national award for Mary Jane Queen
By Lynn Hotaling
The legacy of Caney Fork’s Mary Jane Queen, who died June 29, was honored last month when members of her family traveled to Washington, D.C., to claim a final award for the legendary local musician.
Word came on the day of her death that Queen, a renowned ballad singer and banjo player, had won the nation’s highest honor in folk and traditional arts.
Queen, 93 when she died, is one of this year’s 12 winners of the National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowships. Four of her children – who perform as The Queen Family – along with one grandson and a close friend represented Queen during a Sept. 18 awards ceremony.
The Queen Family also stood in for their mother to perform during the Sept. 20 NEA National Heritage Fellows concert at the Music Center at Strathmore in Bethesda, Md.
Members of the late Mary Jane Queen's family traveled to Washington, D.C., two weeks ago to accept a National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellow Award (bottom photo) on her behalf. Queen, a noted banjo player and ballad singer, died June 29, just prior to the official announcement of this year’s honorees. Queen's family and friends, including, from left (left photo) son Henry Queen, daughter Kathy Hayes, friend Dianne Gholson and grandson Mark Queen, sang in Mary Jane Queen's stead as part of a Sept. 20 concert by this year's Heritage Fellows.
Holding the award given to their mother during a Sept. 18 ceremony on Capitol Hill are Mary Jane Queen's daughter Kathy Hayes and son Henry Queen. Also present on Mary Jane Queen's behalf are sons J.R., third from left, and Albert, far right; grandson Mark Queen, fourth from right, and close family friend Dianne Gholson, third from right. On hand for the presentation were National Endowment for the Arts Chairman Dana Gioia, left, U.S. Sen. Richard Burr of North Carolina, second from left, and Rep. Heath Shuler of Waynesville, second from right. During the ceremony, Gioia said Mary Jane Queen Òwas a keeper of the stories and wisdom of her mountain-made heritage, and that her music will live on in memory and practice.
Though the official award announcement came on the day of Mary Jane Queen’s death, she was aware she had won the honor, her youngest son, Henry Queen, said.
“She thought it was a great thing,” he said. “She was real excited because of what it would mean to her children and because of her great love for mountain music and heritage.”
According to Henry Queen, his mother would have approved of the week’s events.
“Mother would have thought it was the most beautiful thing,” he said. “She’d have had a good time.”
Attending and performing along with Henry Queen were one of his sisters, Kathy Hayes; two of his brothers, J.R. and Albert Queen; a nephew, Mark Queen; and family friend Dianne Gholson.
After the awards ceremony, the Queen contingent attended a banquet at the Library of Congress where Hayes spoke on behalf of her family:
“Our mother, Mary Jane Queen, loved life and lived it to its fullest each and every day of her 93 years. She shared her time, her wisdom, and her infectious laugh with everyone she knew.
“A quote from George Bernard Shaw sums up our mother’s life: ‘I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no brief candle to me. It is a sort of a torch, which I have hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it over to future generations.’
“Our mother’s torch burned brightly her entire life. She was the keeper of the flame. Now she has passed the torch to her children to carry on her legacy.”
The Queen Family then spent a couple of days rehearsing for the concert, according to Gholson and Henry Queen.
They opened with “Sourwood Mountain,” which was one of Mary Jane Queen’s favorites, and followed that with Henry Queen’s original tune, “Grandpa,” which he said was inspired by Mary Jane Queen’s father, the late Jim Prince.
“I learned a lot from him,” Henry Queen said. “Grandpa Queen was a great musician too, but I didn’t know him. Grandpa Prince lived so many years – I think he was 93 when he died – that I got a lot of music from him.”
The next number was the most emotional, according to Gholson, because Mary Jane Queen herself started it off during a scene from Neal Hutcheson’s 2006 documentary “The Queen Family.”
“They began with Mrs. Queen singing ‘Will the Circle Be Unbroken.’ We joined her on the chorus, and they froze her image on the big screens while Kathy finished the verses. The entire audience of around 1,800 people sang along. It was really neat the way she got to perform with her family anyway.
The Queens and Gholson closed their portion of the show with ‘Liza Jane’ during which Hayes and Gholson showed off their clogging while Henry, Albert, J.R. and Mark Queen played.
“I think Mrs. Queen would have been proud,” Gholson said.
“I felt good about it,” Henry Queen said. “We represented Mother well.”
Queen was chosen for the award after two of her daughters, Hayes and Dot Connor, nominated her. Gholson helped with the paperwork, and Carrie Gates of the N.C. Center for the Advancement of Teaching and Suzanne McDowell of Western Carolina University’s Mountain Heritage Center wrote letters of support.
The fellowships include a one-time award of $20,000 each; this year’s winners were chosen on the basis of their artistic excellence, cultural authenticity, and contributions to their field, according to information on the NEA Web site. Previous winners include guitar-player Doc Watson of Deep Gap and bluesman B.B. King.
Mary Jane Queen grew up and lived her entire life in Cullowhee’s Caney Fork community. Her parents’ home on Brown Mountain was a hub of musical activity, and family members sang at church and social events. In addition to learning tunes on the banjo, much of the singing repertoire that she absorbed included the old ballads and story songs sung around the house to accompany everyday work.
After raising eight children and following the death of her husband, Claude Queen, in 1984, she began singing some of those family songs at local and regional festivals, often accompanied by some of her children. Maggie Greenwald, who wrote the script for the feature film “Songcatcher,” based the character of Viney Butler on Mary Jane Queen after a visit to her Johns Creek home. Butler performs “I Wish I Was a Single Girl Again,” Mary Jane Queen’s signature song, in the film.
Among the honors Mary Jane Queen received are the N.C. Folk Heritage Award (1993), WCU’s Mountain Heritage Award (1999) and the Brown-Hudson Award (2001). Queen recounted her experiences in her 2006 autobiography “The Life and Times of Mary Jane Queen: Her Art, Her Heritage, Her Music,” and she and her family were featured in N.C. State University film-maker Hutcheson’s documentary, which was shown on UNC-TV and distributed nationally.
Additional information on the NEA Fellowships is available online at www.nea.gov. Click on “Lifetime Honors,” then choose “NEA National Heritage Fellowships” and finally click on “2007 Winners.”
|
