Music & Dance

Visitors to Mountain Heritage Day will find two stages of mountain music and dance, with plenty of clogging and toe-tapping fiddle and banjo music. Festival attendees are invited to join in for two sessions of shape-note singing, where singers from all across the Southeast take part in one of the mountains’ most sacred traditions.

Crafts, Food & Fun

The Mountain Heritage Day arts and crafts midway offers juried, handmade items ranging from woodwork and pottery to paintings, clocks, and quilts. Food booths feature fare such as ham biscuits, cider, lemonade, barbecued chicken, Cherokee fry bread, peanuts, popcorn, beans, cornbread, and the like. (Sorry, no soft drinks or fast food.)

The festival also includes hayrides, exhibitions of Cherokee stickball and several just-for-fun competitions, including a 5K footrace, antique auto show, costume contests, and preserved foods contest. The festival woodcutting contest is always a crowd favorite, with chainsaw and crosscut saw masters from across the nation competing against one another. Demonstartions of folk arts and skills will be going on from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and an addition this year will be our Children's Tent, with activities for kids all day long.

Close parking at Mountain Heritage Day is limited, but shuttle services are available. Special parking is available to those with physical disabilities.

Comfortable shoes are a must.

Pets are not allowed on festival grounds, but service animals are welcome.

Mountain Heritage Day is held outside, rain or shine. For more information about the festival, call (828) 227-7129.

Lodging and other tourist information is available by calling the Jackson County Travel & Tourism Authority at (800) 962-1911, or visiting http://www.mountainlovers.com/.

Photos: Top - A clogger keeps time at MHD 2007.
Bottom - Festivalgoers take a turn at cornmeal grinding.