This year’s Fourth of July celebration at Graves Mountain Lodge in Syria will have residents tapping their toes and snapping their fingers. The Michael Wayne Project – featuring Madison County native Dennis Weaver – will provide jazz music starting at 6 p.m. Friday, July 4 at the Sycamore Pavilion. 

The band opening this year’s Music on the Lawn series has its roots in old-time Appalachian string band traditions, but if you’re going to its June 12 concert, be prepared to hear the unexpected. The Web site for the Charlottesville-based band – Mando Mafia – says, “A typical performance might, in addition to old-time hoedown music, include calypso, reggae, rockabilly, klezmer and bluegrass, together with the occasional Finnish wedding march, Chilean sikureada, Puerto Rican or Argentine waltz and Italian polka.”

Audiences attending the Graves Mountain Lodge Festival of Music have heard multi-instrumentalist Randy Kohrs play in a number of bands over the years. This season, it’s his turn in the spotlight. Kohrs will be leading his own band, the Lites, in two performances Thursday, May 29, to help open the Syria resort’s 16th annual bluegrass festival.

Where can you find a homemade, local, fresh, budding community with a party atmosphere? The Madison County Farmers Market, which is now in full bloom showing off the county’s fresh produce, meats, herbs and honey every Saturday morning at Hoover Ridge.

Saturday, May 17, hundreds are expected to spend the day scoping the sights of Madison County on two wheels.
The area’s expansive scenery and minimal traffic are just two reasons why the Tour de Madison, now in its 21st year, has become such a success with bicycling enthusiasts from Madison County and across Virginia. 

This past spring, nearly 500 people made their way to Madison County’s first ever Business Expo. This year the Madison Chamber of Commerce – which sponsors the event set for 1-7 p.m. Thursday, May 15 at the Madison County Volunteer Fire Company fire hall – hopes the business affair will be even bigger and better than before. 

In the early 1900s, the buzz of a dentist’s drill sounded more like a quiet hum. A century-old pedal-powered drill is among the tools once used by Dr. Lee Taliaferro, who treated Madison County residents in the early 20th century. In addition to the drill, Taliaferro’s polishing discs and vials of tablet triturates (a precursor to the medicinal pills used today) are currently on display at the Arcade museum in downtown Madison.

You don’t have to be drop dead gorgeous to be a pageant queen. The Madison County Scholarship Pageant – set for Saturday, April 12 – isn’t just about looks, according to the pageant’s co-director Erin Stickler of Locust Dale.