So often they seem beyond belief, the yarns that are spun around town and around dinner tables, late in the night or in passing on the street. They are mostly told secondhand. Or third. Stories from the family lore too wild to think they could have actually happened, and so exciting and colorful we would hardly want to live in a world where they couldn’t.
Often a delightful dubiousness is added to these tales by the distance they traveled to reach our ears, the wine, and the festive manner of telling. This was not the case on the summery night when our friend, acclaimed 78 collector and producer Christopher King, shared with us his family fables. His were told firsthand, and with demonstrations to help us picture the action.
“Did we tell you how our daughter, Riley, was born?” He asked us later, nonchalant as he cleared our plates. After the stories his family had already shared, of ceiling snakes and hatchets and the town where they live in Virginia, we knew this legend, saved for last, must be the best one.
LISTEN: Christopher King “February 21, February 22″
http://the78project.com/family-story-hear-christopher-king-tell-the-birth-of-riley-at-78rpm/