You can always find Carl Stacy, Jr. behind the long shop counter at Stacy's Music Shop on the Downtown Mall. Since the store's opening in 1945, Stacy has watched the people of Charlottesville and the nature of music and musicians change with the times. He remembers when people would trade a pie or a side of bacon for guitar strings, when people put more time into learning an instrument, and when the downtown mall had a whole different feel.

Recently, leaning over the counter with a hand in his rear pocket, Stacy recalled some striking moments. " I remember right after the war, when I was ten years old," he said. "All the old veterans used to come in wanting to trade all their 45s and samurai swords and German Lugers for guitars. You know-country boys that had come back and picked up souvenirs over in Germany." Word must have gotten around, because people continued to come in, offering to make swaps for records or strings. "There's a couple of old families up here in the hollows, not so much now as 10, 15 years ago. They would come in and trade," he said. "In those days you could butcher a hog in September and they'd bring a side of bacon in and give it to me and I'd give them some guitar strings. I had some old guys who wanted to trade shotguns for a banjo." Stacy smiled and shook his head, twirling his glasses between his fingers. " There was one lady who came in about once a month with an apple pie, or a peach pie in the summertime. These were all fresh, no frozen stuff. She used to love the blues. The old Muddy Waters, Jimmy Reid-you know, low-down New Orleans blues. Her name was Miss Annie. I'd always trade her a record for a pie. That was fun."

The downtown area used to be a farmer's hangout, the main action in town. "There was an old black guy, a reverend," Stacy said. "He'd come down every Saturday morning. And he'd take a nail and knock it into a telephone pole and hang his frock and his hat and then he'd preach for about a half hour, beat on his drums, and people would put money in, and then he'd put on his coat and walk on. Right down there where the Omni is now. All the farmers would come in on Saturday-that was their day off-and they'd just park their cars and stay all day, siting around talking and spitting on the sidewalk."

The store itself preserves remnants of history. Sports trophies line the shelves and photos of long-gone bands hang on the walls. The moss green carpeting and wood paneled room are products of another era, as are records and music books housed between homemade wood dividers and boxes. Mingled among the crafted guitars, mandolins, and fiddles are instruments with more recent origins-keyboards and electric guitars.

Changes in technology have altered the world of music, and Stacy has watched these changes firsthand. "I don't think making music has declined. What has declined is people's ability or desire to sit down and learn to play," he said. "This is the age of instant music. People want a keyboard where they can push their finger down and they've got a chord, or they want to play right away. Both my boys teach guitar down here. First thing people say is 'I want to play this song tomorrow.' It wasn't that way when I was growing up. You planned on playing that song in two or three weeks."

Although life is faster paced and full of more distractions, people are still playing music. "We've been through two or three generations of families. Fathers come in here to get their sons guitars," Stacy said. And despite all the mail order business and shopping mall discount stores, people still like to go someplace where they can have a seat and play the instruments. "Musicians want to feel the guitar that they buy. There'll always be a music store where people can go and try something out. Musicians are like that - they can't keep their hands off the instruments," Stacy noted. "I tried an experiment one time-I put a drum by the door, a congo drum, and kept count. Of 700 people who came in the store, 600 hit that drum. They had to do it. I even did it myself. It's amazing, really. People do like music."