[piano intro] - [Announcer] It's sweet music to our ears.

[lively blues music] Come hear North Carolina's musical range and some songs like you've never heard.

♪ That good dog won't give ♪ ♪ No answer at all ♪ - [Announcer] It's all on "My Home," coming up next.

[mellow music] - [Narrator] All across the state, we're uncovering the unique stories that make North Carolina my home.

♪ Come home ♪ ♪ Come home ♪ [music concludes] [light music] [record crackling] [upbeat music] - [Jeff] Just don't let anything fall, okay, honey?

- Alright.

- I mean, I've been going to gigs my entire adult life.

Been seeing people I love perform.

It gets to a very different level with these three together.

- One, two, check, check, check.

Secret Monkey Weekend.

Yay.

- That's good for now.

- [Laura] I'll have strangers come up to me all the time and say, "You must be one proud mama," and it's like- - Check.

- You just don't even know the half of it.

[laughing] [upbeat music concludes] - All right.

We're a Secret Monkey Weekend.

We're a family rock trio from Durham.

It's our first time here.

Looking forward to playing for you.

- [Laura] Music was always a part of my life.

There was always music around.

[upbeat rock music] I was in academia and Matt was pretty much a full-time musician.

He really was a drummer who played and practiced a lot.

And we often lived an apartment, not conducive for a drummer to be practicing, and so he was very excited when we moved into this house.

- Definitely remember instruments everywhere.

There still are.

- [Laura] In the front of our house, in the music room, the same place where he had his drums set up and would play all the time.

- Matt played in Kink cover band with me.

In fact, he was the one who named the band The Kinksmen which is sort of a play on the Thamesman from Spinal Tap.

[all laughing] I just laugh and I think about him when I think about that.

Then we started playing duos together.

He had a suitcase drum kit.

We played a lot of ill-attended shows.

There weren't too many people there, except sometimes it would be the family.

- I always thought of you as the Yellow-Submarine guy, so you'd say like, "Do you wanna sing 'Yellow Submarine' with me on stage?"

And I'd be like, "Yeah, yeah," yeah, so I was like, "This is the nice man who plays 'Yellow Submarine' with me.

[slow rock music] - [Laura] In April, 2012, in the middle of the night, Matt asked me to call an ambulance.

Matt had some pain in his chest area.

And so we went to the emergency room and they took him in to get a CAT scan.

He was having heart failure and while he was having the CAT scan, his heart stopped.

He was only 42 when he died.

Heart disease ran in his family.

[discordant music] Yeah.

I was absolutely devastated.

"What am I gonna tell my children?"

- [Interviewer] What were your girls then?

- So, Lila was four and Ella was nine.

He was a devoted father and he relished that role.

My very first thought, as broken and as devastated as I am, I recognized almost immediately that I really needed to be there for them in a very intense way.

Despite whatever our normal family life was, it had just fallen apart, but I was determined to keep two things going.

We read aloud, the three of us, and that was very much a bonding experience.

And then that music continues.

I wanted them to have something that they could have and enjoy and share with others all of their lives.

Ella's School had a Save Our Arts event where they put together little kids bands and had an event at Motorco.

So many of the musicians that Matt had been playing with came to see Ella and to support her and Jefferson was one of them.

- I used to do guitar at school, but the club disbanded and so we needed a new guitar teacher.

Mom was like, "Hey, I know someone who teaches guitar."

- [Jeff] Seriously really did think I was gonna be a pro baseball player.

Senior year of high school, music took over.

I just went headlong into that.

I feel like I have to play every day to keep my chops.

[upbeat rock music] It used to be lyrics, but the older I get, I feel like I'm more in tune with the whole song.

The whole thing has to hit me.

You know?

I want to at least keep it exciting somehow.

There's gotta be something in there, whether it's a guitar hook or a chorus that's a hook.

Then it adds to the song, moves it forward.

[upbeat blues music] And it makes me happy.

I feel like it'll make other people happy.

[mellow music] You always remember teaching guitar.

Said, "If you can just practice 10 minutes a day."

I think I taught her for about a year and a half.

Lila would come to the lesson and hang out with her mom.

♪ I wanna rock and roll ♪ - Over time, we'd go get pizza.

♪ All night ♪ - We became closer friends.

♪ And party every day ♪ - [Laura] I couldn't help but notice how wonderful Jeff was with the children.

♪ Paddle this, paddle this song ♪ ♪ Couldn't even hear a sound ♪ - [Jeff] Something inside Ella said, "I want to learn bass."

- I do remember thinking, "That is the coolest-looking instrument I've ever seen."

- I taught her three songs and she's been on her way ever since.

Completely just ran with it.

Ella knowing a certain amount of songs, and me on guitar, we would sit and play and Lila wanted to join the fun as well.

- [Ella] At first, I was like, "Is Lila gonna do it?"

Cuz you know, Lila's a little kid.

Is this gonna work?

- Funny cuz at that Save Our Arts event, one of the musicians that played with Matt came up and jokingly said to me, "Oh, what instrument is Lila gonna play?"

I just unfiltered, said, "Drums."

I just knew that Lila was a drummer.

[Lila playing drum set] After living with a drummer for 20 years, I just sensed it.

- [Lila] Jeff started teaching me a little bit more about drums.

I took some drum lessons - [Jeff] Well she picked it right up.

Fearless.

- Jeff and I created a little suitcase kit.

[Lila singing indistinctly] I enjoy playing them.

I just think it's really special to have that connection with my dad.

[mysterious music] - [Jeff] Both of them just took to this music thing.

You had to go baby steps and then, "Oh, I can play.

Now I can play with others."

- [Ella] You have to kind of take the cues and learn from each other.

- [Jeff] I don't know if we actually decided to call it a band right away.

We were just making music in that room.

- It was kind of more of a slow build, but over time, you were about 12 or 13, I was starting to be like, "Yeah, you got it."

- That late?

[Ella laughs] [hard rock music] - [Jeff] My taste definitely had a lot to do with some of the covers we did.

- [Ella] Isn't this the band that Mitch Easter produced?

Pavement?

- Yeah.

[Ella blows raspberry] - There's so much music I love and I've been introduced to a lot of music through Jeff just being like, "Hey, let's play this song."

[upbeat music] - Doing something fun, something creative.

[slow rock music] I mean, that taps into another part of your brain.

Maybe it was a way for them to grow and help with that grief.

I could see it with my own eyes.

[slow rock music continues] It is powerful.

It's just magic.

[waves rushing] [upbeat rock music] - [Laura] And so we just became better and better friends.

I started going to baseball games together.

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

- Over time, just all of us hanging out, it started to feel like a family.

- My dad was from Baltimore, and during the summer we always went to an O's game and I was a huge fan and then lo and behold, I meet this guy and he is a longtime Orioles fan.

♪ 'Cause you're my best friend ♪ ♪ You're my best friend ♪ ♪ And I love you ♪ - I just didn't see it coming.

♪ Laura Joe ♪ ♪ Laura Joe ♪ - [Jeff] We enjoy being with each other and they're my favorite people.

What could be better?

♪ You're my bestie ♪ ♪ You're my bestie ♪ ♪ Let's get married ♪ ♪ Let's get married ♪ ♪ Laura Joe ♪ ♪ Laura Joe ♪ ♪ Laura Joe ♪ ♪ Laura Joe ♪ [music concludes] [upbeat music] - [Jeff] Initially, I thought maybe they should be playing with kids their age, somewhere in that range.

And then Laura said, "This is a family band, and that's a pretty special thing, and I think that maybe we should keep it that way."

It got to the point where we could play parties cuz we had so many songs.

♪ Half moons and all the stars ♪ ♪ Half of the town may seem too far ♪ ♪ Half of the sky is in the dark ♪ ♪ No matter where you are ♪ - I think our first show, which was probably around four or five songs only, I was like, "Whoo, that's a long set."

Because I'm just like eight or nine at the time.

[upbeat music concludes] [audience applauding] - Up until the 60s there was one magazine that was a Tiger Beat and it had the band The Monkeys on the cover and it was like, "Win a date with The Monkeys."

That contest was called Win a Secret Monkey Weekend.

That's a good band name.

- Yeah.

[upbeat rock music] ♪ Secret Monkey Lila sitting in a tree ♪ ♪ Banging on tambourine and waving back at me ♪ ♪ She did the monkey ♪ - [Ella] I think it just fits us well.

- [Lila] Yeah, and it's goofy and it stands out but it's not like too goofy that nobody takes us seriously.

♪ Monkey to the right ♪ ♪ Do the secret monkey and hang on tight ♪ ♪ Now do the monkey ♪ - It kind of flows off the tongue.

♪ The secret monkey ♪ [light guitar music] - Hauling the gear, you know, there's no way around that.

Really laborious and daunting task but the music is always the best part of the day.

- [Laura] I hear the rehearsals, I hear all of that.

And so, when I see them perform them live, it's like nothing else.

I feel a lot of pride.

- [Jeff] Sometimes we are playing for the other band.

Even if there's not a big crowd, not only do we play for ourselves, which is really important, cuz we're just trying to have fun but we hope that will rub off on whoever's watching.

- [Laura] And that to me was always the point.

For the rest of their lives, to be able to play music together is an amazing gift.

♪ How we arrived at this moment ♪ ♪ Defies my comprehension ♪ ♪ You deserve nothing less ♪ ♪ Than the focus of my full attention ♪ - [Laura] It'll evolve.

It'll change a lot but it'll always be at the core of how we came together.

[bright music] - I gotta be honest, I'm so thankful our neighbors haven't ever complained about us playing.

- That we know of.

- That we know of.

- That we know of.

♪ Ah ♪ [music concludes] - Music is pollen and it floats around in the air and it lands on stuff and it changes things.

It makes new things grow.

I'm just a happy flower waiting for some to land on me, you know?

[Lipbone scatting] Music is a magical thing.

Music can change somebody's life, it can send an army off to war, it can like make somebody all better if they feel bad.

I feel like that's what music can do easily.

My name's Lipbone Redding and my home is Tarboro, North Carolina.

Hold on a second, lemme turn this thing off, right here.

Oh yeah.

You see, this is the beautiful part about having a wooden spoon strapped to your foot.

You just keep it tapping and everything you say while the foot is tapping and the wooden spoon is going, is music.

[Lipbone scatting] ♪ I been talking to the wall ♪ I like my music to be happy.

You can't always have everything happy though.

But I'm a silver-lining person.

I really am.

Everything that I've always done and worked for, I try to keep a positive attitude in all of my music.

[Lipbone scatting] ♪ Dog won't give no answer at all ♪ ♪ Whoot ♪ [music concludes] [gentle music] I am originally from Greenville, North Carolina, and I grew up sort of a normal kid.

Took piano lessons and violin.

That's kind of how I got my start playing music.

But then I was mostly raised by my grandmother who was an artist, but she was just kind of an oddball but a very strong person.

So that was my upbringing.

I was singing in the choir in high school and then one day my chorus teacher, she shows up and she has this James Taylor album, like the old vinyl.

The album was, "Dad Loves His Work," but the very last track is "Walk Down That Lonesome Road" and she said, "I just want you to listen to it and take it to heart," and I did.

And I think that was the moment when I really...

I was lifted up.

I rose in love for music.

After being in the same town all your life, at some moment I convinced myself that I really needed to go somewhere bigger, somewhere with more action.

After my fourth year of college, I just packed up everything up like a fool and went to New York City.

I had no idea what I was getting myself into.

All through college, I had this notion in my head that I was gonna move to New York City.

It was just, the dream and the reality, there's such a disparity between those two things.

[mysterious music] I think the first big change in my career happened when a friend of mine took me into the subway in New York and said, "Hey man, why don't you play down here?

You can make some money."

I was like, "Ugh, subway?

I don't know."

And I started playing and people started giving me money.

And I was like, "Oh, this is some encouragement.

I can really, you know...

Okay, I'll come back tomorrow night.

Let's see what happens."

So I was a subway musician in New York City.

[inhales sharply] [soft music] Kind of funny how it started.

A friend of mine asked me to go down in the subway one night and start playing some music.

And then as that was happening, I started to discover things about myself.

[imitates bell ringing] Stand clear of the closing doors, please.

Not just about the music, but how I thought that I was, what is my real purp...

I mean, all these big questions.

They started to kind of bubble to the top.

And also, the music started to get really interesting.

♪ Greenville, North Carolina ♪ ♪ You go to Rocky Mountain ♪ ♪ Your cat said, oh, the F-track train, oh ♪ I think I wanted to do like acting and went auditioning for commercials and all kinds of stuff like that.

I didn't know.

And all the while I had my guitar and I was playing every night, and so I decided, "Well, I'm just gonna write my own stuff in this crazy business of music."

So what I didn't realize was, well, I soon came to realize I was on a mystical journey.

I believe I was looking for my spirit guide.

I didn't even know what a spirit guide was.

Everything is semi autobiographical.

It's all pretty much happened to me, but I put myself through a lot of experiences on purpose.

I think that's a really important part of what I'm doing.

♪ Baby child ♪ After that, I decided I really needed to go travel.

Thus began kind of this other chapter and then I'd come back and I'd have all these stories and adventures to share with people, and I guess folks found it interesting.

And so I got more work.

I like story songs, I like stories, I like to highlight emotional life as well.

I think as an artist, we deal with feelings.

Like, that's really our main medium ultimately.

[gentle music] And it's a brand new song.

I wrote it on my porch.

You know, 2020?

The year that wasn't?

[chuckles] Well, it was for some.

It was for songwriting.

Oak Grove Retreat, which is where we are now, it is a laboratory for sound and for healing and for understanding.

So what we've done is started organizing a non-profit organization and we're really into sound and there's all this, you know, physical, but there's this metaphysical stuff too that happens with sound.

we do concerts and music and sound healing.

♪ Yeah, they do ♪ This place has been like a nurturing bubble.

As an artist, as a creative person, it was a extremely soft landing in a suddenly hard world for a musician.

My career has changed dramatically over the years and it changes every few years.

At first it was alarming, because you reach a point of change in your career and you're like, "Oh," you're scared, "I don't know what's gonna happen.

Is at the end?"

But after a few sort of turnabouts, I learned to kind of expect the change and embrace the change.

I learned that in order to survive as a musician or as a creative person, you have to change.

♪ Doo, doo ♪ This is your part right here.

I'm happy where I am.

Something happened when I kind of decided to just be and it's like all these opportunities started to open up, to come into my life and all these amazing people.

And it's from following that feeling of bliss.

And if you feel it, you should investigate it at the very least, cuz that's our human experience and that's what we all have in common.

You don't even know the power that you have in this world.

And the key to getting that is to be very thankful, to have gratitude for what you already know that you have.

And you know, you have to ask yourself, "Hey," [chuckles] how does it get any better than this?"

♪ I'd like to know ♪ ♪ I'd like to know ♪ [lively blues music] [lively music continues] - Well, I became interested in the piano when I was very young.

My dad had a music store in Boone, North Carolina.

It was an area where there was a lot of musicians and there'd be a lot of people in there playing all the time, and he had great friends like Doc Watson.

And as a matter of fact, my dad and Doc used to play together back in the 50s before I was born.

I just started sitting in.

I was kind of picking out tunes by the time I was probably five or six years old.

At least that's what they tell me.

[lively music continues] My name's Jeff Little and my home is Summerfield, North Carolina.

I think that area of the mountains up there, it was just part of the culture that that's what people got together and did.

They got together and played music.

And I was so blessed because Doc and all the other musicians in there, they were just patient, you know, even if I was eight or nine years old and everybody was playing something, when it came time to improvise and take a break, they'd say, "Take one, Jeff."

Being around that and being around some really great players, I think, was a great place to kind of figure out a pathway for being a musician.

[upbeat banjo music] Being a piano player, we have the freedom to play most any song, but the great part is there's always a certain fiber of where you're from when you play and when you come back to play here, it's kinda like coming back to play home in a way for us.

[audience applauding] And this is his first time to ever play real Merlefest.

He's only been playing a short time, but you gotta hop on the horse some time, right?

So please welcome my son, Mr. Luke Little to the stage.

[audience cheering] [audience applauding] You wanna do Lonesome Fiddle?

- Yep.

- [Jeff Little] All right, let's do it.

Music is more than just playing music.

It's kind of a community in a way.

[lively music] For me, it's been really cool to be part of the little bit of the history of where I'm from, even though I'm a piano player.

[lively music] That was good.

[laughing] - [Announcer] Next time on "My Home," it's all about pushing the limits for innovation, personal growth, and a ripple of change.

[mellow music] It's all on "My Home."

[mellow music concludes] [thoughtful music] ♪ [music continues] ♪ [music continues] ♪ [music continues] ♪ [music concludes]