Art With Heart: Jack-of-all-trades stays on the go to fill niche in Stokes County

As the executive director of the Stokes County Arts Council, Eddy McGee seldom has whole days off -- it's more like a morning or afternoon here and there.

That's fine with him.

"The arts council is not a job to me -- it's a life," McGee said. "In the rural arts world, there is no shutting down."

During the course of a year, the arts council puts on more than 70 programs for children and adults. Along with the annual Stokes Stomp music festival, there are music and theater performances in the schools, a winter dessert-theater series, art programs for seniors and for developmentally disabled adults, gallery exhibits, and arts programs put on in conjunction with town parades and other holiday events.

"Eddy has taken the arts to the people," said board member Nancy Markle.

To make it all work, McGee has to keep moving.

"He is never still for a moment," Markle said.

The Stokes County Arts Council has only two paid staff members -- McGee and the administrative assistant, Sharon Williams. It has a small budget and no performing-arts space of its own. McGee finds the additional money he needs by writing grant application after grant application and by cultivating relationships with foundations, and he finds the necessary places to perform by setting up events at American Legion posts, schools, retirement homes and the old county courthouse.

Earlier this month, almost 2,000 elementary-school students and other Stokes County residents headed to Reynolds Auditorium in Winston-Salem to see a Carolina Ballet production of Swan Lake.

"If there is an event, he is always there," said board member Paul Kindley.

In exchange for working a lot, McGee does have a lot of freedom in the way he does his job, Kindley said.

Partly because a Stokes County arts program might show up just about anywhere, the people at the N.C. Arts Council have taken to referring to the Stokes arts council as the "guerrilla arts council." And because it serves as an example of what a small arts council can do, they send people from other small arts councils to McGee for advice.

In talking about the work of the arts council, McGee repeatedly emphasized that he is just one of many working to make things happen.

"This is a team effort," he said. "I'm part of the team."

That's true.

About 130 volunteers work to bring off the programs that the arts council sponsors.

Plus, the council has the support of a 13-member board and the governmental bodies in the county. For instance, the county provides much of the money for arts-council salaries, and the city of King provides money for programs in King.

That said, if not for McGee, the arts council wouldn't be operating at near the level it is, members of the board said.

"He brought an enthusiasm for the arts that is unparalleled," said Ellen Peric, the board chair. "His connections are just unbelievable. He will call anybody. We have never had anyone who was willing to go and sell Stokes County outside the county."

Board member Kris Jonczak said that one of McGee's gifts is the ability to work comfortably with people of all sorts of backgrounds.

"He really can relate to everybody and has a nice demeanor about him," Jonczak said.

Because his work day may include a meeting with members of a foundation and helping to set up the sound system for a performance, McGee takes jeans and a sweatshirt with him if he leaves the house in a sport coat and tie.

McGee is married to Anna McGee, who teaches first grade at Mount Olive Elementary School. Each year, McGee organizes a rafting day down the Dan River, and they met when she showed up one year with a friend.

Looking at some of McGee's previous jobs -- mail carrier for the U.S. Postal Service, tennis pro at Bermuda Run -- it looks as if he took a circuitous path to the arts-council world.

From other perspectives, though, much of his life was leading up to this.

McGee, 45, said that, when he was growing up, his parents -- Bob and Martha McGee -- emphasized the importance of nurturing relationships and of serving others. His family includes lots of musicians, and music has always been a big part of his life. He writes songs and plays guitar, drums and trumpet.

McGee grew up all over -- his father was in the Air Force. After his father retired, the family settled in Stokes County, and McGee graduated from South Stokes High School in 1981. At Gardner-Webb University, he received a bachelor's degree in business management in 1986 and went on to get a master's degree in business at High Point University in 1997.

He carried mail for the U.S. Postal Service, first in Winston-Salem and, later, in Elkin. He played tennis in college, and, all along, he taught tennis on the side. (He still does.) When he was offered a job as the tennis pro at Bermuda Run Country Club, he took it.

He lived in King all along, and, when he heard that the Stokes arts council was looking for an executive director, he applied. Even before he got the job, he had lots of ideas about what could be done.

"When I was interviewed for this job, I laid out a plan for what they needed to do to grow the arts," he said.

Future plans include turning the Dan River Arts Market in Danbury, which, at the moment, is closed for renovations, into a combination arts market and welcome center for the county.

"We would also like to build a small amphitheater out back," he said.

Part of the idea with that would be to give people who have spent the day at Hanging Rock State Park and place to go for an evening of music or theater.

"You want to create a destination and a personal experience for people," McGee said.

■ Kim Underwood can be reached at 727-7389 or at kunderwood@wsjournal.com.