[lively bluegrass music] - I wouldn't be anywhere else on Friday night except at The Depot.

- The Depot is free, open to the public, and welcomes visitors from everywhere to get a true mountain experience.

- The Depot is a local cultural icon.

Most of our pickers here have been coming for generations and been playing for generations.

And a lot of their families, when this was a real train depot caught the train here - In the 1980s, the Marshall Depot was gonna be torn down by Norfolk Southern Railroad, because the train didn't haul freight or passengers anymore here.

Mr. Jarrett's mother, Linda, got wind of it.

And she called her son who happened to be the chief law enforcement officer for Norfolk Southern Railroad.

She said, "Forrest, you can't let them tear down that depot.

That's where your daddy used to ride the train up from Hot Springs to visit me, to court me.

If it hadn't been for the depot, we never would've got together."

The end result was Norfolk Southern leased this building to the town of Marshall for $1 a year, and they appointed a committee to decide what to do with it.

And that committee decided to make this a music venue.

- Marshall has become known as an artist's community.

The old high school on the island was saved and turned into artist venues.

There's a public art project, murals and medallions throughout downtown.

There's lots of reasons to come to Marshall.

- The Depot is a community stage.

If you say you're a band, we'll believe you and give you a 30 minute spot.

Now we've had some hard 30 minutes go by a few times, but not many.

If you come to The Depot on Friday night, the music starts at seven o'clock, the doors open at six.

We've put on a band every 30 minutes and, believe it or not, we have enough local bands to be able to schedule about six different groups in the course of an evening.

You never know what you're gonna hear when you come to The Depot.

I tell people that we don't charge an admission, and if you don't like the music, we don't have to return your money.

- I would say a lot of it is older country music, but of course we get a lot of bluegrass and gospel and even to a little bit of blues.

- People have confidence in playing music here, and that's really appealing, especially to somebody who's played for a living.

I just felt all that soulfulness come out.

- It's a family friendly venue.

It's a good place for the kids.

They always have fun, and the audience is invited always to get up and and dance.

We have dancers that get up that are, one person comes to mind, she's 89 years old.

She has her dance shoes on with the taps, and she gets right up there and clog dances with the rest and has a ball.

- [Pat] We have people from all over the place come here, and they'll ask me what a cakewalk is.

And sometimes they think everybody's getting up to leave [chuckles] when it's a cakewalk.

It's $1 a person.

That's how we pay the light bill.

And you know, we'll walk around the room, and when the music stops, you stop.

And the number you stop on may be the very number that'll win you a cake.

- Five.

[slow country music] - [Pat] We also have a 50/50 ticket.

Basically you buy a ticket for a dollar, and at nine o'clock we draw the ticket numbers, and if you win, you get half of what's in the pot.

The most we've ever had in the pot was $500.

Can you believe that?

- [Logan] The fact that so many of the musicians here are native to the area and have grew up here and grew up together makes it a very authentic mountain experience.

I think.

- [Peter] This place is a treasure.

If you haven't been here, you gotta get here.

- You know when you come in here and the music starts and you cakewalk it or you get up and dance or you watch dancers, you know, you can't be down and out [chuckles].

I mean, because everybody's in a good mood.

We don't care who you love, who you pray to, who you vote for, who your daddy is, what you think about a pistol.

We love everybody.

Everybody's got a place here.

[audience applauding] - The depot is at 282 South Main Street in Marshall, and they have live music every Friday night.

To find out who's playing, visit them online on Facebook.