Rhonda and Sparky Rucker: Live in Bryson Gym
Jordan Hoban | Febraury 24, 2022
On Wednesday, February 2, Bryson gym was transformed into a foot-stomping music hall thanks to the Warren Wilson College (WWC) Music Department’s concert series. Students were treated to the music and stories of Rhonda and Sparky Rucker, two artists who are staples of the folk scene.
Special to The Echo | Pam Zappardino
Sparky and Rhonda Rucker sitting together.
Sparky started his career in the early 1970s, inspired by the protest songs of his childhood. Rhonda was a medical student with an interest in sound engineering. They met at one of Sparky’s concerts, where she asked Sparky to teach her to play blues guitar. They hit it off, and soon she became his manager and eventually his wife.
As we arrived in Bryson gym, Rhonda and Sparky were already at their places on stage. Sparky wore a nearly all-black get-up with silver fringe and a black cowboy hat. Rhonda wore an ankle length skirt and a victorian blouse, jet black with a tight collar riding high up her neck. Sparky opened the show with a bluesy rendition of “Welcome Table,” running the steel slide up and down the guitar with ease. Rhonda accompanied him on harmonica, and belted out a melody, rich and twangy with the blues, that belied her conservative dress.
Every performance was an unfolding of talent as they swapped guitar and harmonica for banjos (Sparky remarked that there must be a law against having two banjos on stage at the same time), the banjo for bones and spoons, and eventually an arrangement of keyboard and guitar. Sparky routinely kept time with his feet, which at one point caused a guitar to nearly fall off the stage.
When it was discovered hanging half off the stage, he quipped, “I’ve got to keep time or I’ll sound like Lawrence Welk!”
Rhonda and Sparky wove together stories about slavery, the Civil War and the Civil Rights movement into an educational and entertaining evening. By the end, after having sung our hearts out, we were left with the distinct impression that through music of hope and struggle, Rhonda and Sparky were keeping our eyes and ears open to the never-ending injustices of the world. Rhonda and Sparky’s message of persistence will be heard, sung, and lived, by all who have the chance to see them perform.
“I’ve been fighting this my whole life, and I’m still fighting,” Sparky said.