Tim Hicks - Managing Editor

The face of Sheila Kay Adams becomes a canvas of emotions as she tells stories from the western mountains of North Carolina.

Tim Hicks - Managing Editor

The face of Sheila Kay Adams becomes a canvas of emotions as she tells stories from the western mountains of North Carolina.

Tim Hicks - Managing Editor

The face of Sheila Kay Adams becomes a canvas of emotions as she tells stories from the western mountains of North Carolina.

Tim Hicks - Managing Editor

The face of Sheila Kay Adams becomes a canvas of emotions as she tells stories from the western mountains of Nrth Carolina.

Tim Hicks - Managing Editor

The face of Sheila Kay Adams becomes a canvas of emotions as she tells stories from the western mountains of North Carolina.

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Like the stories themselves, storytelling has many layers and can bring many results.

The stories spilled forth in humor and heartache during "Barnwell County's Boil," the local version of Salkehatchie Stew.

Salkehatchie Stew is a project to culturally and economically develop Allendale, Bamberg, Barnwell, Hampton and Colleton counties through music, drama and storytelling.

The region is defined in that all the counties are connected by the Salkehatchie River.

The two-day event began June 12 in Barnwell at the Circle Theatre with the Barnwell-oriented scenes from "Dig Deeper," the Stew's play about the events and people of the area. Many of the scenes in "Dig Deeper" dealt with the coming of the Savannah River Site and people displaced by it.

That night's event also included performances by local musical group Sleytown and a short teaser performance from professional storyteller Sheila Kay Adams, who was the headline act at the next day's events at the Edisto Research and Education Center in Blackville.

For the uninitiated, storytelling is often misunderstood as being just for children or a bunch of tall tales or lies, said Frances Chavous, the head of Salkehatchiee Stew.

Storytelling is personal memories that have been refined for a wider audience or to see history through one person's eyes, she said.

"In storytelling - if a person sits and listens to a storyteller - they will come back with more people. It's an act of faith," Chavous said. "You've got to come on faith. You've got to believe storytelling is worth it."

For Sheila Kay Adams, storytelling has a simple definition.

"It's just having a conversation," she said.

However, Adams "converses" with roomfuls of people at a time.

Growing up in the little community of Sodom in Madison County, music and storytelling were chief entertainments for the people of the western North Carolina mountains.

Adams is also an accomplished 5-string banjo player.

Adams said she is a seventh generation balladeer, having learned the Appalachian ballads and their Irish, Scottish and English heritage.

Since November, Adams has performed at seven storytelling festivals and this June and July are booked nearly each week with appearances, said Andrew Barnhill, her son, who was with Adams during her Blackville visit.

Barnhill is a singer and songwriter and has been helping her mother on her tours.

Storytelling has been a healing art for Adams as well, she said.

In March, her husband and fellow musician and performer Jim Taylor died.

Two weeks later, Adams was back on stage.

Adams said she enjoyed her time in Barnwell County.

"I feel like I'm at home. That's the best compliment I can give is if I feel at home," she said.

During her headline act, Adams told two humorous tales: one about taking her large, polyester-wearing, purse-toting aunt to a snake-handling Holy Roller service and another about family members personally trying to refit a deceased relative into different burial clothes.

Adams's hometown of Sodom (now renamed Revere, N.C.) is rich with characters that are the fodder for her stories, she said.

"That's what I discovered on travelling around storytelling - you have to live in a town where there's characters. I'm trying to be a character myself so my children will have something to talk about their mother," she said.