Music on the lawns

After being postponed the week before due to a low turnout from nasty weather Jim Stauffer got a chance to let his music shine under the bright skies in front of the Plains Library on Tuesday.

After being postponed the week before due to a low turnout from nasty weather Jim Stauffer got a chance to let his music shine under the bright skies in front of the Plains Library on Tuesday.

Playing a mix of country western music with his acoustic guitar Stauffer played both songs of his own creation and well-known songs for 15-20 music lovers who were lounging on the library lawn.

During his session, Stauffer explained that many of his songs were inspired during his trips into the Bob Marshall Wilderness where he would accompany and cook for a group of outfitters and hunters during an annual trip.

One of his songs that drew laughter from the audience was "Raindrops Falling on the Outhouse Roof." It was inspired by the well-known hesitancy that hits hunters when they hear raindrops on their tents in the morning. When they hear the raindrops on this case hitting the outhouse roof they are not so eager to go out into the woods and get wet.

So far Stauffer is the third artist to serenade the library lawns this summer during their "Music on the Lawns" program. Earlier this summer Heidi Mack with her piano students performed at the library for the first performance. This was followed by Taloni DuBois who played the fiddle and then of course Stauffer.

Upcoming musicians will be Lisa French who played the electric guitar and sang yesterday and then on Aug. 10 Sanders County Undersherfif Rube Wrightsman will play the guitar and sing vocals. Darin King will wrap up the summer program on Aug. 24 by playing guitar and signing vocals as well.

The Music on the Lawns program was started four years ago behind the driving force of Judy Stephens, a Plains library member and Carrie Terrell who works at the library. Terrell first heard about another library outside of Montana who played music and she knew the Plains area had enough great musicians to support the program.

"I knew we had phenomenal people that are very musical," says Terrell. "We've had really good success with people wanting to do it."

Although some years the program has enough musicians to hold performances once a week, this summer they scaled back to hold performances twice a month.