The Bessie’s Creek Band and the Tuscaloosa effort to preserve Bluegrass
“When I was nine, I got a blue guitar, and it's like, y'all play fiddle. I've got a guitar. We can just make this happen,” said fifteen year old Izzy Arnold on how the Bessie’s Creek Band came to be.
“And that didn't work,” Izzy continued. “Stella started the guitar, and it's like, ‘Ooh, I want to play the mandolin.’ Then Scarlett got the mandolin. It's like, okay, I'll just take banjo,”
Her sister and bandmate Stella is 14, and then there's…
“I am Scarlet Arnold, and I am… and I think here, yeah, almost 12,” she said.
That's about all Scarlett had to say during our interview. We'll get back to her in a bit. Here's Stella.
“We started, first started playing when, like on as a group,” she said Stella. “When we joked to some guy at a show, oh, we were band, and he's like, ‘Oh, do you guys want to open the show for the Purple Hills?’ The Purple Hills are a professional music group. I'm not sure where they live, but if I did, I would sound professional and tell you where they live.
The Arnold sisters aren't the only family act at the 10th Annual Southeast Fiddle Championship. Gordon and Mary Parker are at the entrance of Shelton State Community College. He's on the mandolin and she's on guitar. Both have an eye on the $10,000 in cash prizes inside musicians line up for their chance to perform traditional Bluegrass or show their best Buck dancing moves.
The Arnold sisters say it's tough.
“I'm nervous to get on stage,” said Izzy. “The five minutes before you get on stage is the worst. You then once you're off stage, it's just like relief, and then we have to get back on stage to get your prize money, or if you don't get called, you kind of ‘just feel like I'm about to die.’ This is not cool!”
The competitors on the mandolin and banjo could collect up to $300 for the best performance at “Fiddle Fest.” Adult bands could get $1,000 and the open fiddle contest had a top prize of $1,500 For the people who first put “Fiddle Fest” together. The question was whether anyone would show up.
“We were really nervous,” said Sharon bounds. She's one of the founding members of Fiddle Fest.
“Okay, so our first year, we were, you know, brand new at putting on a contest,” said Bounds. “We knew what a contest was supposed to run.”
She teaches music now and has placed in the top 10 a total of seven times at the National Grand Masters championship. Despite this expertise, starting a contest was a daunting task, but 11 years later, the contest welcomes people from as far off as California.
“But now you know, we know what. We know the ropes. We know what to expect, and it just, it just makes it a whole lot easier these days, and we are just so excited that we have large crowds that come out to to visit this,” Bounds added.
“You know us fiddle players. We're pretty tight knit, and so word got out and just showed up,” said Justin Branham. He’s part of that crowd. Branham was the grand champion at Fiddle Fest 2025, and teaches music lessons out of Nashville. He even encourages his students to come down and compete.
“It's a great contest,” he said. “It's really well run. It's in a nice place too, nice facility. So that's why we keep going back.”
Prize money is one thing. Preserving the Bluegrass tradition is another.
“I've played that music since I was seven years old,” said Glenn Taylor. He’s the president of the Southeast Fiddle Championship Committee. Taylor is one of the musicians who helped get fiddle fest going from the beginning.
“You know, it would make me sad to think that a generation or two down the road that nobody would know anything about that music,” he said.
Taylor played when Tuscaloosa held a bluegrass competition at the old McFarlane Mall back around the year 2000. That shopping center is nothing but a vacant lot now, but Taylor and Sharon Bounds agreed that the annual event should go on.
That led to the lobby of Shelton State Community College. A stage is set up. Vendors sell instruments, and musicians fill the school halls with their warm up melodies. That's where we met, the Arnold sisters.
“So it started out as the Texas Fiddle Gals,” said Izzy Arnold, talking about how they settled on the Bessie’s Creek Band as the name for the three member group.
“Our grandma's like, ‘Okay, that was back when you had that one friend with you that y'all are no longer friends with. Here's this list of 30 other names y'all could use,’” said Izzy. “And Bessie’s Creek runs by our house and. Like, Oh, that fits. Let's just do that.”
Our next contestant is Scarlett Arnold from Fulshear, Texas. Scarlet Arnold,” the Fiddle Fest announcer boomed overthe loud speaker.
Remember Scarlet? The Arnold sister who didn't talk much?”
She was apparently saving it up for the solo mandolin contest in her age bracket. And even before they announced the winners, Izzy, Stella, and Scarlett, knew how they were going to end the day.
“Well, after contests, we usually go out with our family for like a treat, like, Here you go. You did good at the contest, having ice creams, and we didn't die… good us,” said Izzy. “So, I'm looking forward to going out with my family and just having a good time with them.”
And organizers of the 2027 fiddle fest say they'll be claiming the last Saturday in February again next year, so long as people are ready to pick up a guitar, a mandolin, a banjo, or a fiddle and celebrate Bluegrass.
