Concert now set to take ClayPAC stage on Saturday, September 13

EDITOR’S NOTE: This article, which was published using submitted information, has been updated since appearing in print to reflect a new concert date of Saturday, September 13, after organizers of the event requested the change. More details about the concert will also be released in the coming weeks.

CELINA-The sounds of local legendary blues musician and marble maker/player Bud Garrett are set to fill the Clay County Performing Arts Center (Clay PAC) here inside the Historic Clay County Courthouse later this summer.

As announced in last week’s HORIZON, Clay County Government received a $1,700 grant from the Tennessee Arts Commission, and it will be used for the production of “Way Out in Free Hill,” a concert featuring the late Garrett’s traditional blues recordings performed by a full band.

The show will be staged at ClayPAC’s E.W. and Anna Lee Fox Family Theater Saturday, September 13 at 7 p.m., and an admission of $10 per person will be charged.

“Over his career, Bud wrote numerous songs and recorded dozens more,” courthouse curator Thomas Watson said.  “Bud’s work will be performed with a full backup band, giving them appeal to a whole new group of fans.

“We invite everyone to come out and enjoy the show.”

Watson explained Garrett started from humble beginnings in the Free Hill Community, before becoming a world-famous bluesman, as well as the inventor of a marble-making machine.

Garrett ironically passed away playing marbles in 1987, but not before he received broad attention throughout the South during his heyday as both a musician and marbles mainstay.

While on music tours and at festivals performing his music and demonstrating flint marble-making on his machine constructed from an assemblage of spare auto parts, Garrett’s following grew beyond the Tennessee Upper Cumberland/Southern Kentucky region, where the game of Rolley Hole marbles still remains king.

And a large part of the legacy he built was due to his ingenuity when it came to fashioning marbles, a craft he learned from his father—a tobacco farmer who took a piece of flint with him to work every day and filed away at it until it became round, before he placed it in a creek to allow the water to turn the marble until it became smooth.

This process could take years to complete, which led to the younger Garrett inventing his now-famous marble machine in the late 1940s.

Powered by an electric motor, the homemade apparatus could churn out marbles in minutes with its inventor at the helm.

But it wasn’t just about production, as the Bud Garrett flint marble became sought after due to its durability and they all came with a lifetime guarantee from their maker.

Garrett also established his own marble yard here in the Free Hill Community at his home, where he died at the age of 71.

Garrett’s famous invention is now on display at the National Rolley Hole Marble Museum inside the Historic Clay County Courthouse, where it will remain as one of the feature exhibits of the collection.

Those attending the concert in September, can also see Garrett’s invention and learn much more about the folk game at the museum.

About the

museum

For more information about Garrett and Rolley Hole, visit claycountycourthousetn.com/the-game and follow the Rolley Hole Marble Museum Facebook page.

Artifacts or other materials can also be donated or loaned to the museum for display and educational purposes.

Those interested in doing so should contact Waston at [email protected] or 931-243-3464.

The National Rolley Hole Marbles Museum showcases a treasure trove of informational materials, photo albums, Rolley Hole Tournament posters, artifacts, and audio-visual displays in the two east-side rooms of the courthouse.

The museum planning and design was funded by the Tennessee Arts Commission, and renowned museum designer Rusty Summerville served as the design consultant.