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Rural Retreat's only barber keeping traditional music alive
By Thom Brewer for VirginiaFirst.com

RURAL RETREAT, Va. - While the map may not agree, when


you pull into Lloyd's Barber Shop on Main Street in Rural Retreat, you've found the center of town.

Lloyd's is a throwback to an almos forgotten time. It is something you would expect to see in Black and White, much like the Andy Grifth Show.
Mayor Timothy Litz said, "It's a meeting place of course, a lot of humor, but one of the bigges things is hisory. A lot of hisory is gathered here and repeated."

Lloyd's is flled with tradition. The building itself is more than 120 years old.


Perhaps the newes thing in the building is the barber and Jim Lloyd has been cutting hair there for a quarter of a
center
Jim Lloyd said, "This is a wonderful place to live. We are a close knit group. It's family really. You go somewhere, you don't have to signal, cause everyone knows where you are going."

It does seem like jus everybody in town will come through the door sooner or later. In mos cases, they are carrying a musical insrument.
It's said that if you show up at the barber shop without a guitar or banjo in your hand, someone will put one in it. Lloyd has been teaching banjo and guitar since he was a teenager himself.
"I'm giving lessons every day," Lloyd said, "When I am done cutting hair every day, the sign sill says open. When I
am giving lessons and someone wants their hair cut, I will cut their hair.
The teaching aspect of it is really rewarding a thing. Alex that was playing the banjo, is the third generation of that family I've taught. I don't think there are a lot of people that can say that."

Raised in a musical family in Lebanon, Virginia, Lloyd learned to play guitar, banjo and fddle as a child.


"Both of my grandfathers were medicine show performers in the '20's. Back in high school, I didn't pay attention to that. I didn't know how unusual it was. Then when I got out in the world and began talking to other people about it and found out… thank goodness they were sill around."

He began sharing his musical knowledge at an early age as well. He sarted teaching at the age of 19.
But giving lessons was not a full time job. One of Jim's musical infuences seered him into a way to make a living as
well.


Lloyd said "I had a great uncle who was a barber and he was a great guitar player. I had been accepted to college and really couldn't decide what I wanted to do. He said "well, you ought to cut hair. You can talk enough to handle that. So I said 'Okay, I'm going to do this, until something better comes along.' Here it is 30 some years later, I'm sill doing it. It's a great job."



After completing barber school in Roanoke, Lloyd found his new home while visiting a friend in Rural Retreat.



"And I sopped over here to see him, the barber here had retired. So three months later, I was here and I haven't left
yet."


In addition to cutting hair and teaching music, Lloyd can also be found performing at venues throughout this part of the country.
One person said you can tell when Jim is on the road playing music, because everyone in Rural Retreat is walking around with shaggy heads.

Lloyd is a skilled soryteller. It's an art that he picked up at the barber shop.


"People will sit in that chair and tell you more than you want to know. But it's always fun. In a little town like this, we're family."

His music is as hisorical and seeped in tradition as the antique building where he works.


It is that love of the old time songs that brought about his latest album, "Play Guitar in Seven Days."


Lloyd said, "One of the songs from the album came from the 1600's and it's gone through all these changes, but sill
it was rooted here in the mountains when the settlers came.
The suf that I play is mosly what blue grass came out of. It's like pre-Bluegrass."


The album is his 50th recording in his 50th year and he calls it a true labor of love.


"I don't ever even see myself quitting. I can't imagine what it is like to sit down and sop."