Biography:Marion Reece

Marion Reece
Given name:	William
Middle name:	Marion
Family name:	Reece
Place of birth:
Place of death:	Zionville, Watauga County, western North Carolina
Year of birth:	1874
Year of death:	1939
Profile:	Musician
Source of information:

Biographical notes

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WILLIAM MARION REECE (1874-1939) was a fiddler and fife player, farmer, blacksmith, and fiddle-maker from western North Carolina, who lived in various communities there such as Mabel, Cove Creek, and particularly Zionville, in Watauga County, in rugged country north of Boone and a few miles from the state line with Johnson County, Tennessee. He played the older Watauga County repertoire very well according to the older fiddlers of the area. He played in standard and cross-tuning, and was fond of drone notes. Reece came from a large extended family, whom he would visit often, and probably was a descendant of of Valentine Reece, who came to the western side of the Blue Ridge from Germany before the American Revolution with his wife Christina Harmon (Harmann). He is also possibly related to Manly Reece, one of the earliest documented banjo players from nearby Randolph County, North Carolina, who reportedly played frequently with Green Leonard, a near-legendary figure who was a mentor to southwest Virginia fiddler Emmett Lundy Marion's fife was an instrument that his father or grandfather played in the American Civil War. Many of the extended Reece family were Union sympathizers, and the "Mountain Yankee" 13th Tenn. Cavalry and 4th Tenn. Infantry units were raised in the area where they lived.

Reece was in his early 60's when he was recorded by John Lomax for the Library of Congress, on a WPA collecting trip. Lomax spelled his last name "Rees" on the recording note cards. [Information on Reese from public postings by Joe Wilson, and from Drew Beisswenger et al, Appalachian Fiddle Tunes, 2021, p. 92].

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