Facebook Tracking Pixel
Blue Ridge National Heritage Area Mobile Logo
Stoney Creek Boys

Stoney Creek Boys

Mountain music band Buncombe County, NC
(828) 645-3400

Stoney Creek Boys
Point of contact: Boyd Black

For over forty years, the Stoney Creek Boys have been ambassadors of mountain music. Bass player Boyd Black explains that their music is a mixture of “bluegrass, country, western swing, and mountain folk tunes, because people are all different, and we hope to do something that everyone will enjoy.”

Arvil Freeman, a master and teacher of mountain fiddling, is a relative newcomer to the Stoney Creek Boys, having joined the band in 1993. Guitarist Leonard Hollifield, a prominent Nashville studio musician and former member of the gospel Kingsmen, and banjo player George Banks joined in 1975. But Boyd Black is the most senior Stoney Creek Boy, having been with the band since its founding in 1969.

Their first job was a dance on a tennis court in Montreat. Black says that the band has played for so many hundreds of dances since that it has long been impossible to recall exactly how many. Though always a great band to listen to in concert and on recordings, the Stoney Creek Boys are most often associated with playing for dancers, whether as the music for square and big circle dances or as accompaniment for cloggers.

For decades, the Stoney Creek Boys have been the host band for Shindig on the Green. In their role as the house band for the Mountain Dance and Folk Festival, they provide inexhaustibly lively, up-tempo tunes for dancers. On the recent album, Celebrating the 75th Mountain Dance and Folk Festival, the band provides the first and last tunes, “Grey Eagle” (Bascom Lamar Lunsford’s favorite), and a fast, swinging “Liza Jane.” The band has played for over thirty years at the Mountain Dance and Folk Festival. “We enjoy it, and we’ve been at it a long time,” says Black. “The Lord’s been good to us.”

Availability:

The Stoney Creek Boys are available to play for dances, concerts, and festivals, as well as conventions, parties, wedding receptions, and many other events.

Available Services