Award winning banjo player and star of TV’s Hee Haw, Roni Stoneman is a unique performer who mixes music and comedy with ease. She was the first woman to play and record three-finger “Scruggs” style banjo. Her down-home brand humor has brought her to Las Vegas, Disney World and the silver screen.

Veronica Loretta “Roni” Stoneman is the youngest daughter of Ernest V. “Pop” Stoneman, patriarch of the Stoneman Family, one of the most famous family groups in early country music. Drawing on his Southern Appalachian heritage, Pop Stoneman realized as early as 1924 the commercial potential of traditional music, and carved a career from it. That year, he wrote country music’s first million-dollar seller, “The Sinking of the Titanic.” The Stoneman Family won the Country Music Academy’s “Vocal Group of the Year Award” in 1967. After Pop’s death a year later, Roni Stoneman, known as a virtuoso banjo player in both country music and bluegrass, pursued a musical career on her own.

In the 1970s Roni reached a national audience when she joined the cast of Hee Haw, the most successful syndicated program and country music show in the history of television. She picked banjo and sang from time to time, but it was the character of Ida Lee Nagger that made her unforgettable to millions of viewers.

Roni continues to entertain at numerous state and county fairs each year, and recent appearances include the UCLA Folk Festival, the Florida State Fair and the International Sport Show in Canada. Her CD, “First Lady of Banjo,” features various members of the Stoneman family.

Rutgers University