Pictured above is Patrick Crouch with The Avett Brothers and family at Merlefest 2015. Kay & Patrick Crouch are two folks/musicians we very much respect and look up to. If ever there was a model for the kind of class and musicianship we try to bring to Hickory Arts, the stage as "Hartman" and as husband & wife, then it doesn't get any better than Kay & Patrick. — Jeff Hartman, Artistic Director Hall of Honor: Musician Credits Caldwell schools for His Success Apr. 24, 2015 Lex Menz, Lenoir News-Topic LENOIR — This is one in a series of stories about the five people who are to be inducted May 1 into the Caldwell County Schools Hall of Honor. P. Patrick Crouch said he believes that if it weren’t for Caldwell County Schools, he could not have had the amazing career in music he has enjoyed, including helping start the Caldwell County Traditional Musicians Showcase. “If I had not received the education that I received in Caldwell County Schools, I would have had a future in a cotton or furniture factory. But, there’s nothing wrong with that,” Crouch said. “I felt like the experience I got from the school system, really, it set a pattern for my life. Basically, I was supported. I was allowed to do things that I wanted. … It gave me a sort of open-minded approach to music and the arts. “ Growing up, Crouch spent a lot of time with his parents and neighbors playing traditional folk music. His parents, who worked in factories, encouraged his love of learning and a love of music that last a lifetime. “I’ve been recording since I was 14. I’ve been in band since I was 11 years old. There wasn't a weekend since I was 11 years old that I haven’t been in a band playing somewhere. I’ve been involved in music at both ends of the spectrum,” Crouch said. At school, he dived into marching band with two teachers, Robert Love and Claude Cogdell. He took inspiration from Love and Cogdell to bring to his own students as the band teacher at Granite Falls Middle School from 1980 to 2009. “I used the knowledge that Mr. Robert Love, that he passed along to me about instrumental music, I used with my string music (at home). Mr. Claude Cogdell, he was a fine singer. Not only did he inspire me with the chorus work that he was doing, he was a man that was singing with power and authority, so that really impressed me when I was learning to sing from the folk side of things,” Crouch said. Crouch graduated from Hudson High School in 1974 and pursued a bachelor’s in music education at Appalachian State University. He spent his entire career at Granite Falls Middle teaching band. “My teaching career is that as a teacher you have many challenges. A lot of times I was confused and didn’t know what to do. I would turn to my past and think of a teacher I had in the past. What would this teacher do, or that teacher would do? I (felt) like I wasn’t lacking anything. I had confidence in myself,” Crouch said. After retiring, Crouch continued to pursue his love of music, starting the Caldwell Music Project with the Caldwell Arts Council in 1998. Out of that, the Caldwell Traditional Musicians Showcase, formerly known as Music with a Southern Accent, was born and has continued for 17 years. “What we basically did was prepare information about different music going on in Caldwell County. We just tried to look at an overview of all the music that was going on and tried to make students aware … make the people proud of the music the community had,” Crouch said. “It’s about bringing the arts to each and every person.” Crouch recorded a set of 10 CDs with 128 out of 162 artists that have played in the showcase over the years in his recording studio, Ticknock Studio. “Basically, when we talk about traditional music, most of the people I use aren’t the ones that learned (through school). Music that we call ‘traditional American music’ was born in these mountains. One-hundred years ago, a banjo and a fiddle was a band,” Crouch said. “That’s the work that I’m most proud of, to make people aware of our musical heritage and to try and preserve it in some way.” Crouch has lived in Lenoir several years and even brought his bride, Kay, to Caldwell County from Alexandria, Va., and she also fell in love with the area. “Some people look at a place like Caldwell County where we don’t have a lot of things going on, on the surface, they might think it’s dull. Instead of saying ‘dull,’ I’d say it’s ‘serenity,’” Crouch said.