Today is one week from hearing seven finalists play for three judges and you, in the Second Annual Suwannee Riverkeeper Songwriting Contest, at The Salty Snapper in Valdosta, GA, 1-5PM, Saturday, August 24, 2019.

Radio personality Chris Beckham will M.C. Headliners Joe Smothers and last year’s $300 First Prize Winner Laura D’Alisera will play before the contestants. There will be copious snacks, a silent auction, and a kayak raffle, and yes, speakers about the WWALS advocacy for which this is a benefit concert.

Here’s last year’s winner in the Blues genre, as well as the winner of the $50 prize for best finalist from within the Suwannee River Basin, Mike Tappan of Valdosta, playing Capt. Curries Blues.

One Week to Second Annual Suwannee Riverkeeper Songwriting Contest
Mike Tappan playing Capt. Curries Blues in First Annual Suwannee Riverkeeper Songwriting Contest
Video by John S. Quarterman for WWALS Watershed Coalition (WWALS),

Follow this link for who are this year’s seven finalists.

Tickets are $10 online or $12 at the door.

Or $150 per eight-seat VIP table right in front of the stage (email song@suwanneeriverkeeper.org). Yes, we have sold some tables.

After you buy your ticket, please click Going on the facebook event to encourage others to come.

1-5PM, Saturday, August 24, 2019
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All about the Second Annual Songwriting Contest here, including how you can be a Sponsor:
wwals.net/pictures/2019-08-24–suwannee-riverkeeper-songwriting-contest/

Thanks to our top level sponsor Georgia Beer Co., and to Battery Source.

The lyrics to Mike Tappan’s song:

My name is Capt. Currie, there’s a story I would tell.
About something most folk forgot about but I still remember well.
So if you care to listen, won’t you listen close to me
About the finest boat to blow a ring of smoke up or down the Suwanee.
She came down here from Abbeville back in 1886.
She’s the pride of Lumber City, she could fare the river Styx.
They’d never built her equal, i doubt they ever will.
She’s the jewel of the south in the rivers mouth
She’s “The City Of Hawkinsville”.

She’s 141 foot and every inch is fine
And she cut just like a cane blade for that Deepwater Line.
Then in nineteen aught the Gulf Trans. Co. chartered her to me
To haul heartwood pine from Bradford down to Cedar Key.
We lade her hold with yellow gold and sent her on down the stream
She never missed her landing, never scuffed a beam.
Chooglin’ on upriver just turning that paddle wheel.
Till the company man with a railroad plan started us hauling steel.

We built that bridge at Fort Fanning so the rail way could cross
And she came to realize her usefulness was lost.
With no more work to do her fire settled down
And they left her there to rot by the bridge in Old Town.
She weathered and withered till 1922
Till the orders came down that her time was through.
I let her sink right there to the murky dark below.
Sent her memory downstream to the Gulf of Mexico.

She came down here from Abbeville back in 1886.
The pride of Lumber City, she could fare the river Styx.
They’d never built her equal and I doubt they ever will.
She’s the jewel of the south in the rivers mouth.
She’s the “City of Hawkinsville”.
She’s a jewel in the mouth of the river south.
She’s “The City of Hawkinsville”.

 -jsq, John S. Quarterman, Suwannee RIVERKEEPER®

You can join this fun and work by becoming a WWALS member today!

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