Smalltime smile-makers

From left, Oliver, Danny, Eli and Terrie play their instruments on Saturday, May 29, at the Northwest Folklife Festival.

Left, Danny, 39, plucks the stand-up bass in his family’s band. The family is from Seattle and twang an old-time country style of music. Right, Terrie learned to play stringed instruments for her children because they showed a musical talent from a young age.

Jane Blanchard, Eli and Oliver’s grandmother, came from New Hampshire to visit and see the family play. She said they play old-time country because it makes people smile. “They all smile,” she said.

“Look over there — the woman, the man,” she said as she points to onlookers. “It makes people happy.” 

Eli, 7, foreground, strummed the banjo for most of the performance. Later on, he played the washboard hung from his neck. Eli said he practices eight or nine times a week. “I just get the melody in my head,” he said, “and then ‘BAM,’ I go into a dream or something.”

 Foreground, Oliver, 11, bows the strings of his fiddle. Terrie said Oliver picked up the fiddle at a young age and it fit him perfectly. Oliver ended the set by singing the old gospel tune “Amazing Grace.”

Oliver taps his foot on one of the hundreds of cement walkways throughout the Seattle Center, the home of the 39th Northwest Folklife Festival. The family band, dubbed “Smalltime Family String Band,” busked in front of an open banjo case.

Eli inspects his banjo case as Susan Haupt, center, and Elisa Haupt, right, look on. They traveled to Seattle from Bend, Ore. “This has been our highlight of the day,” Susan Haupt said.