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Community Corner

Who's Who: John McCord, General Manager at Down Home Music

McCord has been working at Down Home Music almost since the beginning. A coworker hinted that he's also more of a musician than he lets on.

Name: John McCord

Age: “The backside of 60”

Occupation: General manager at

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And are you a musician as well? Oh, vaguely. (In the background, a coworker exclaimed, "Vaguely?!")

And you’ve been here since day one? We opened in 1976 and I started in 1979.

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A couple of years shy, then. What brought you to music? I’ve always loved it and been interested in all its different facets, and different ways of making music. This place focused on especially the traditional or rootsy way of making music and how it’s evolved into all the different kinds of musical expression that we have now.

So here you can follow music from its beginning to where the stuff we’re listening to now came from. Yes. Sometimes we make an abrupt stop and say, “Well, we’re not going there…”

What are your favorite genres of music? I certainly like just good songs. That’s the basic criteria. Within that I like Cajun, country, blues is a favorite, and a lot of the international styles, African, British Isles — all kinds of stuff.

What do you do for fun? Sometimes I see music, play (music) a little bit and see movies and read and hike.

Do you have a favorite movie? Hard to choose. O Brother (Where Art Thou?) is pretty good as far as going way back. 

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