Two couples make up The Prairie Acre band; they play bluegrass music and call themselves an old-time string band.
There are four people in the group, but there have been two additional members that have been piggybacking on the band's popularity.
We’ve been playing music with babies on our back,” said Tricia Spencer, who plays fiddle in the group.
“They see Ruby and Tricia first and they kind of laugh and are smiling and you can see them looking and pointing but the bass is hiding and is blocking the view of Kellar and so it will take them a few minutes and then you can see them be like oh there is another one,” said bass player Virginia Musser.
Since 2002 the band has been working hard to do what they love. Plucking the strings didn't turn into pulling the straps until Musser's now four year old son Owen came along and after seeing another band make it work Musser thought, ‘Why can't we?’
“A lot of bands have spouses who can watch the kids when the play and we are in a predicament because our spouses are in the band,’ Musser said. “This has made it more possible for us to keep playing music which is really, really important to us. We have day jobs but the band is what we live for.”
“It is important for us to play,” Spencer added. “Its more than just a hobby, its something I have to do. If you have to do something you find a way to make it work and that is what we did.”
Spencer grew up playing the fiddle.
“All I did growing up was traveling to fiddling contests and different festivals and to me that is what being a kid was about,” She said. “Getting to go and visit all of these people that I had become extended families with and that's who I learned the tradition from and so it is what I want to pass on to my kids as well.”
Her daughter Ruby dances to the music, while five month old Kellar is notorious for sleeping during gigs, but that doesn't mean its all smooth sailing.
“I've had some weird moments where my hair has been pulled but I kept on playing,” Spencer said.
If things get really bad, the grandma groupies step in and help but for the most part people are loving the young and the old-time string band.
“We're trying to keep that style of music alive where people didn't have any entertainment and they can sit out on their porch with their families and play instruments,” said Musser.
For more information on The Prairie Acre band or for a schedule of performances, go to the left of our page and click on Newslinks.
Reporter: Kelli Stegeman
Photographer: Glenn Bartlett
