THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, April 27, 1996 TAG: 9604270348
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY MASON PETERS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: ELIZABETH CITY LENGTH: Medium: 78 lines
For a long string of whole notes, Claymon Sawyer will echo in the minds of Elizabeth City music lovers as a-one, a-two, a-music store proprietor and guitar player who had a barn-red place of business on Main Street.
Earlier this year, municipal building inspectors condemned Sawyer Music Company. The little red store on the busy highway also had been the Sawyer family home for more than 20 years and . . . well, the inspectors decided the place should no longer be occupied.
So a couple of months ago, Sawyer and his wife and kids packed up everything they couldn't sell and took off for Florida, where they hoped Claymon's nagging cough would improve.
It didn't.
Instead, Sawyer's friends found out this week that the 56-year-old guitar-picker has been told he has cancer. ``We're told things don't look good for Claymon,'' said Vince Chory, a local musician who played many a gig with Sawyer.
Chory and Bill Durham, another guitarist who operates a local auto body and radiator shop, are arranging a daylong benefit concert of country and bluegrass music May 5 at the Elizabeth City Shrine Club to help out with Sawyer's huge medical bills.
``The Shrine Club has donated its premises and, if the weather is nice, we'll have bluegrass and country out on the lawn,'' Chory said. ``If it's bad, we'll be inside.''
Durham recalled the cheerful - and free - teaching time that Sawyer often extended to young musicians.
``There's no telling how many kids stayed in music because of Claymon or his wife, Karen,'' said Durham. ``This will be a chance for many of us to express our thanks.''
Karen Sawyer taught piano in Elizabeth City almost as long as her husband has been playing his guitar.
Musicians from all over the Albemarle and Tidewater Virginia areas are expected to participate in the jam session at the Shrine Club on Church Street and Hughes Boulevard. The music will start around 2 p.m. and continue until at least 7 p.m., Chory said.
``Claymon Sawyer is nationally known for some of the stringed instruments he built - everything from guitars to old-time country fiddles,'' Chory said.
``One of Claymon's closest friends is Chet Atkins, the virtuoso guitarist. Whenever Chet came through Elizabeth City, he'd visit Claymon and they'd make marvelous music in that little red music store on Main Street.''
Sawyer played many instruments, but he preferred the guitars he built so well. His red music store may have meant different things to different people; but to musicians, it was a home away from home.
The decor at the Sawyer Music Company was Chez Orpheus and watch-your-step. The walls were covered with guitars and fiddles. Woodworking tools and shavings held down sheet music. And bass drums worked fine as coffee tables.
Even the traffic cooperated with his time-keeping.
Often when Sawyer's flying fingers reached the shrill coda of a guitar solo, an 18-wheeler would rumble past the Sawyer Music Company and the building would rattle in perfect time.
``Claymon has been one of us, a musician's musician, and now he needs our help,'' said Vince Chory.
``We hope the community shares our feeling.'' by CNB