30 January 2007. Jet with upturned wing tips, gleam of sunlight on its nose--veering across whispy bank of clouds. The rest of the sky a milky blue. Dark-haired fellow in gray sweatshirt--a builder--climbs into heavy maroon pickup with incongruous silver panels along the sides... Ralph Stanley...a shy man before his brother--the extrovert--drank his liver away. "A dram drinker," they called it--at least according to Nicholas Dawidoff--who does usually seem to get it right. The way the voice--high and lonesome--corresponds so closely to those hills and hollows. Clinch Mountain country... An unpainted cabin--weathered gray wood--lived in for seventy years. Iron pump handle, sloping porch, tool shed and barn. One cow, a few rows of corn. Hardscrabble... House Carpenter, Barbara Allen, Banks of the Ohio, Omie Wise...
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