A crowd of students and Boone residents gathered to watch Cajun and Creole artist Cedric Watson’s solo performance at the Mast General Store Community Room on King Street Tuesday. The concert was held as part of the Roots in the Garden Concert series, put on by the Appalachian Theatre of the High Country. The sound of an upbeat accordion and fiddle filled the room, and the crowd listened intently, hanging on every note.
Watson is originally from Texas and now lives in Lafayette, Louisiana. He came to perform in Boone for the fourth time in his career. Alongside performing alone, he also has a band, Bijou Creole, for which he writes about 50-60% of the music.
Starting at age 13, he began fantasizing about playing Zydeco music, a genre that originated in Louisiana and mainly features accordion and fiddle. At 16, Watson’s grandmother expressed her wish for him to play guitar, so he began. He later received his first fiddle from his grandmother for Christmas.
“When I was 18, she got me one. I found one. It was in the Musician’s Friend magazine. And it was a Palatino violin, you know, $75 for my Christmas special,” he said.
Watson said his grandmother raised him for half of his life and had a huge impact on his music career, as she was the one who started supporting it.
Watson said he is self-taught on both the fiddle and accordion; he never learned how to read music.
“I just learned by ear, you know, playing. What I do is I take the song, and I was telling them earlier, I listen to it, and I dissect it and take the pieces of the melody and I just put them together,” Watson said.
He said he had mentors in the past who helped him learn his instruments better. One of Watson’s mentors was Edward Poullard, who is also an established Creole musician. Poullard is an honoree of the National Endowment for the Arts, being named a 2025 NEA National Heritage Fellow and, due to health reasons, asked Watson to receive it in his honor in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday.
One of Watson’s friends, Perry Hasland, who is also a musician, visited Boone with him. Haaland performed the triangle with Watson on two of his songs during his Boone show. Halland said he is still an amateur but loves to go to shows with Watson and help him on the road.
During the show, Watson not only played music, but he also gave the audience some history on Creole music and Louisiana. He said Creole music originated in Louisiana, and the French settled the area.
Watson talked to the audience as if they were a group of friends, rather than just people watching him perform. He furthered this intimate setting by taking questions from the crowd, listening to anyone willing to talk and answering everything he could.
Watson says his favorite part of performing is seeing the smiles on people’s faces, knowing he made them feel that way. The performance ended with a solo accordion piece and the artist wishing peace and love to the audience.
