Two years ago in July 2023, Elliot King, at age 11, attended a Billy Strings performance at the Koka Booth Amphitheater in Cary, NC. Elliot is 13 today, and a budding lead guitarist who takes lessons from Zeb Snyder, guitar man with The Appalachian Roadshow.
King was near the front of the stage when the Strings performance ended, and Strings apparently noticed Elliot’s rapt attention to every song and tune he played. Before Billy left the stage, he reached down and took up the taped set list, walked over to the stage edge, and handed it to the youngster.
It became one of Elliot’s prized possessions. He bought a frame for it and enclosed the set list and the tape that held it to the stage floor.
This past week, Elliot and his dad went to World of Bluegrass in Chattanooga because he plays bass for Denim & Plaid, who were selected to be one of the Youth Stage performers. He also played lead guitar and sang in one of the Kids on Bluegrass bands there. He knew Billy Strings was at IBMA as the keynote speaker for the annual conference, so he took the framed set list in the hope that he could get Strings to sign it.
“On Thursday, someone called me and told me Billy Strings was hanging out in the Exhibit Hall,” Elliot said. “So I grabbed the set list and ran from the hotel room to the Convention Center to find him.”
The photos below tell the rest of the story.
