Floyd, Virginia
Near Roanoke, Virginia
Floyd, Virginia sits atop the Blue Ridge Plateau where the Blue Ridge Parkway crosses Floyd County. The town has been a gathering place for old-time string music since long before anyone called it a scene. The Floyd Country Store, open since nineteen ten, became the center of that tradition when a local bluegrass band started holding Friday night practices there in the early nineteen eighties.
Passersby knocked on the door to get inside. The doors stayed open. The Friday Night Jamboree has packed the store every week since, drawing flatfoot dancers, fiddle players, and listeners from across the country.
By the nineteen seventies, back-to-the-land arrivals brought new energy and opened galleries and workshops. Floyd today is one of the few small American towns where rural Appalachian tradition and contemporary arts culture genuinely coexist.
