Cover Photo: Image of J.J. Reneaux from the 1990 Augusta Catalogue.
As I sift through Augusta’s thousands of recordings, there are a few tapes that stand out. They teach me new songs, tell me about new parts of the world, and open my mind to the rich cultural and musical experiences that Augusta has fostered for over 50 years. Today, as I sat at my desk, I pulled up a tape from Augusta’s Cajun Week in 1990. With a simple title, J.J. Reneaux – Cajun Storytelling, I thought to myself, “Well, this might be interesting” as I popped it into the cassette deck. “Might be interesting” was an understatement. This cassette from almost 35 years ago contains the best parts of what I have come to love about Augusta: good music, good stories, and that warm feeling you get when someone is sharing an art form they love. It features J.J. Reneaux, a first-class Cajun storyteller, telling stories and singing songs. Her infectious humor, beautiful voice, and attention-grabbing stories pulled me in. I was sad when the tape ended, wishing she could have reached through time and kept telling me stories all day. I invite you to listen to this tape with me:
According to the 1990 Augusta summer catalogue, J.J. Reneaux was raised in Louisiana and southeast Texas in a family of storytellers and musicians. She learned many of her stories as a child from family and neighbors, and conducted research and oral history interviews in an effort to preserve her Cajun oral tradition. In addition to Cajun folklore, Reneaux collected and told Southern ghostlore and international tales. Mixing the voices of Acadien, Spanish, Indian and Creole ethnic groups of the bayou country, she served up her cultural “gumbo” with heart and humor, to create a lively performance. She was an artist-in-residence throughout the South, and was featured at the National Storytelling Festival, Wolf Trap, the Vancouver Folk Festival, and on National Public Radio, PBS, and ABC World News, as well as festivals, schools, colleges, prisons and clubs across the U.S. and Canada.
As I went to look up J.J. Reneaux, I found that she had sadly passed away from cancer in 2000. While I was sad to learn that her lively spirit and oral histories were gone, save for the tapes she recorded, I was glad that Augusta had captured one of her performances that could be shared with future generations like me. Let me know what you think of the tape, if you remember J.J., or if you were at the Cajun storytelling class in 1990!
Madeline Ricks is an AmeriCorps member with the Appalachian Forest National Heritage Area serving at Augusta. She is using her year of service to continue the mission of digitizing Augusta’s large archive, as well as adding to the collection through new recordings and blog posts about Augusta happenings and stories of West Virginia culture. While she was born in Georgia, raised in both Indiana and Montana, and has traveled around the world, she has a special place in her heart for West Virginia, as her mother’s side of the family still lives in Kanawha County. She received her BA in English Literature and a minor in Italian Studies from Gonzaga University and recently finished a Master of Research in Social Anthropology from the University of St Andrews in Scotland. She hopes to leave a lasting, positive impact on the organization and community during her short time at Augusta.