Fit to Fiddle : Festival-Goers Join in Fun at Agoura Hills Folk Music Gathering

Beneath the Santa Monica Mountains, thousands of folk music lovers gathered Sunday at a small, Western-style ranch to hear the strumming and toe-tapping tunes of bluegrass and old-time musicians.

Some took their acts onstage, competing for prizes of up to $150 during the 35th annual Topanga Banjo-Fiddle Contest at Paramount Ranch. Others preferred to join in impromptu jams, drawing crowds of appreciative listeners.

Bill Taylor and his Torrance-based band, the Panther Mountain Ramblers, sang gospel lyrics to a bluegrass tune. For him, the annual festival of folk music is nothing short of a spiritual experience.

“This is like a religious trip, like going to the Vatican,” said the 61-year-old McDonnell Douglas engineer. “This is Mecca.”

“It just kind of grows on you,” said his guitar-playing partner, Glen Mason. Perched on a stool with a beer can in his hand, Mason added: “You kind of have to have a likin’ for it to play it or listen to it. Playin’ comes natural for some, wouldn’t you say, Bill?”

Taylor replied: “You gotta have a feel for it.”

Since the festival first came to Paramount Ranch in 1990, many said it feels more and more like a small-town jam session--thanks to the ranch’s natural outdoor setting.

Seen as a backdrop in the television show, “Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman,” Paramount Ranch features a make-believe town with a livery stable and saloon, among other things. Getting there means traveling along a dirt road.

Previous festival sites included UCLA and El Camino College in the South Bay. But organizers said Sunday that Paramount Ranch simply seems more suited to the spirit of the event.

“Look at the setting,” Gene Schwartz, a festival organizer, said with a sweep of his hand. “This is a natural place to have music. . . . This is basic, traditional folk music. It’s a strong expression of people’s feelings. Yes, there are love songs. Yes, there are religious songs. But it’s all about life.”

Though the one-day celebration was first held as a way of raising money for an organization called Santa Monica Friends, it also has become a way of preserving America’s musical roots.

Roberta Kirby, a 71-year-old elementary school teacher from Topanga who grew up on a Missouri farm, remembers some of the tunes well.

“A lot of those people remind me of my uncles,” she said. “We’d get around a piano with different instruments and start singing. The spontaneity of the music and everyone taking part--this . . . is wonderful.”