Our Founder: Dwight Diller

(August 17, 1946 — February 14, 2023

Dwight was a father, a friend, an ordained Christian minister, and a performer, and teacher of clawhammer banjo and fiddle in the traditional Old Time Appalachian tradition.

Dwight Diller devoted decades to documenting, performing, teaching, and preserving traditional West Virginia music. Beginning in the late 1960s and early 1970s, he recorded members of the Hammons family and other Pocahontas County musicians, collected stories and cultural material, and made hundreds of photographs. Over the years he also performed widely, produced numerous recordings, developed banjo teaching materials and instructional videos, organized Hammons-focused gatherings, and created audiovisual presentations such as Yew Pine in Mountain. His work consistently emphasized not only the tunes themselves, but also in the syncopated rhythm, bodily pulse, cultural memory, place, and the life experience carried by the people who made it.Dwight’s biographer, Lew Stern, writes an insightful summary.

In 2003, Yew Pine Cultural Traditions was incorporated to help preserve and carry forward that body of work. YPCT preserves Dwight’s recordings, photographs, teaching materials, and Hammons-related collections for future generations to come.