The way Ronnie Waters tells it, he pointed at a map, bought a bus ticket and left Tarboro with his guitar and $40 in his pocket.
That was 33 years ago, but Waters, 50, is back in town. He owns several guitars now after a lifetime of work on stage and in the studio.
His plays lead quitar in Sara Dew's Dew Point Rising Band that will debut Friday night, June 19 at Keihin Auditorium on Edgecombe Community College's campus.
The 8 p.m. concert is a benefit for Relay for Life sponsored by the Masonic lodges of Rocky Mount, Scotland Neck and Tarboro. Concord Lodge No. 58 of Tarboro is donating its share to Relay For Life in memory of Mike Alford who succumbed to cancer last year.
Sara will release her new CD that water produced. He wrote three songs for the album, helped with four others and wrote all the music for those seven songs.
"He helped me out a lot," Sara said. "He put the music to our songs."
Water has been making music all his life. He remembers entering a battle of the Bands event in Tarboro when he was only 14.
"I think I finished next to last," he said, "but I had fun.
"I developed because I was hungry."
He as looking for fun when he left his hometown and headed to Florida years ago. He wound up playing his guitar seven nights a week. He went on the road with Doug Clark and the Hot Nuts out of Chapel Hill.
"We would not know where we were going when we got on the bus," he said, shaking his head. "We played mostly frat parties."
Waters has an impressive list of entertainers he has played with, on stage and in the studio. George Strait, Maurice Williams and the Zodiacs, the Louvin Brothers, Jay and the Techniques, Joe Simon, the Tams, the Band of Oz.
"He's one the best guitar pickers around," said David Mayer, who manages Dew and her band Dew Point Rising.
Waters and drummer Martin Parker of Edenton played for Patty Loveless.
"I've been around a long time," Waters said.
What about Sara Dew, the 17-year-old from Tarboro who went all the way the finals in Nashville, Tenn., the Colgate Country Showdown last fall?
"I think she'll be fine," he answered. "She's got the talent and pulled off the studio work pretty good.
"I have been on stage with her when she sang backup, and she did a good job then, too. I think she's the right package. She sings well and has the things going that people like these days."
When Waters is not performing with Dew Point Rising or Diggerfoot, a popular local rock band, he's in the studio with the Band of Oz, a beach music outfit.
"I'm always writing," he said.
"And I am a part-time farmer, too," Waters said.
Tickers to the Sara Dew and Dew Point Rising concert are $10 and available in Tarboro at the Keihin Box Office, Ace Home Center, Suburban Grill, 33 Grill and Piggly Wiggly, or by calling Hartwell Fuller at 883-0112 or David Mayer at 883-9826.
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Ronnie Waters wrote three songs and most of the music on Sara Dew CD
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