In these unprecedented times, humankind is seeking something to unify, to heal, to provide a sense of stability. Well, society needn’t look any further than one of the oldest artistic traditions known to humans: storytelling. According to the University of Tasmania, vocal relaying of information likely began with the Palawa (Tasmanian Aboriginals), and this form of communication quickly spread from its antipodean beginnings.
Today, however, the practice of humans telling stories is being replaced by technology. Artificial intelligence (AI), a virulent form of machine learning, has commandeered the zeitgeist. AI has become so advanced that, based on simple prompts, it can construct stories, produce films and write music.
Investors are pouring a significant amount of money into this, and it’s progressing rapidly, all the while eliminating the need for genuine human stories. It is no longer difficult to imagine a future where human talent is obsolete, and humanity is reduced to a species of consumers.
Deep in the Ozark hills, though, there lives a woman who refuses this fate.
Marideth Sisco, who celebrates her 82nd birthday this month, has been recounting flesh-and-blood experiences her entire life and continues to tell her stories through various mediums, including music, oration and the written word.
Recently, Sisco was one of four individuals to receive a Missouri Living Traditions Fellowship. The award, which honors lifetime achievements of living traditional artists and community scholars in the Show Me State, encapsulates crafts, dance, music and visual arts.
Music, though, is Sisco’s preferred vessel, and has been ever since she was a little girl.
Sisco first made a name for herself in the small township of Butterfield, in Barry County, where she was born in June 1943 to Paul and Marguerite Sisco.
“Population was 125, or so it said on the sign, but we never found those 125 people,” she joked.
At the age of 3, her great-uncle Tom discovered she could carry a tune when he overheard her singing. Tom was employed at an auction house, and when his niece was left in his care, she’d accompany him to work.
“Usually, I’d sit on his knee, or play on the floor in front of him,” Sisco said. “But every time the auction slowed down, he would stand me up in front of everyone and say, ‘Sing for ‘em.’”
There at the auction house, little Marideth Sisco would break into song, serenading the crowd with hits such as “Far Away Places.” These performances took place around the country; the family followed Paul, who worked as an electrician, from job to job.
Due to the nomadic nature of her father’s vocation, Sisco attended nine different schools before reaching the eighth grade. However, it was this traveling, this exposure to the variety of cultures the United States has to offer, that engendered her passion for storytelling.
“I was there, saw it all, and met all those people. A great bunch of them were way different than anybody I’d ever met before,” she said. “Everybody had stories to tell. And I have a good memory.”
Sisco recalls the hot summer evenings when her family would gather on the back porch to tell stories. Even at a young age, she was astute enough to know that as the sunlight faded and the night grew darker, the more interesting the stories got. So, she’d curl up under her grandmother’s chair and pretend to be asleep.
“That’s when they’d tell the good stories. The ones I wasn’t supposed to hear,” she whispered.
Eventually, Sisco grew tired of the peripatetic lifestyle and returned to the Ozarks to live with her grandmother in Butterfield. She graduated from Cassville High School in 1961. Briefly, she attended Missouri State University (then Southwest Missouri State), where she majored in music. She wanted to narrow her focus on orchestration but dropped out due to discouragement from instructors.
“They laughed at me because they didn’t think a woman could make a living doing that,” she said. “I left that day and didn’t come back for 20 years.”
In 1965, Sisco headed to California with a guitar in one hand and a big dream in the other. She landed in San Francisco first, arriving just before the emergence of the hippie counterculture movement. During her first years in California, both her parents died.
“I became an orphan with a little bit more money,” she said. “So I just played music.”
Sisco’s sojourn in the Golden State took her from San Francisco to Santa Cruz, right down to Los Angeles. She mingled with starlets and wannabes, fell in and out of love, and even briefly co-founded a bar called “The Grass Cookie,” though she’s still embarrassed by the nomenclature.
During these wild and effervescent times, a past injury came back to haunt her. In her youth, Sisco was involved in a hayride accident that left her hand permanently injured. The subsequent nerve damage had returned with a vengeance, hindering her ability to play the guitar, which served as a wake-up call: one to consider a different career.
Around this time, Sisco received a call from her aunt, Juanita, who also resided in California in the Sacramento Valley. Sisco’s uncle, Leonard, had fallen into poor health and needed assistance returning to Missouri. Sisco volunteered, fully intending to return to California once her aunt and uncle were settled. Little did she know, she’d stay in Missouri the rest of her life.
Upon returning to her home state, Sisco moved to the Springfield area. After working various odd jobs, she re-enrolled at Missouri State University, ultimately receiving a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Photography and Graphic Design with a minor in writing. Before graduating, she distributed her resume to local employers and eventually received a call back from the West Plains Daily Quill. She scheduled an interview and was hired on the spot, but was given the option to complete her schooling before starting work.
“I packed up and moved down [to West Plains] after graduation and I’ve been here ever since,” she said.
Sisco worked as an investigative journalist and environmental reporter for the Quill for two decades. She was also a columnist, authoring the “Crosspatch” gardening column, which would later serve as the material for a book. She retired from her journalistic career in 2005 following heart surgery, but still made time to cement herself in the local arts scene. She even found herself hosting “These Ozark Hills,” a local culture program on KSMU, an NPR affiliate serving the Ozarks.
Despite her hand injury, Sisco didn’t turn her back on music. She continued playing music at local gatherings, through which she became involved in the 2010 film Winter’s Bone, directed by Debra Granik. The film, based on the book by West Plains author Daniel Woodrell, is set in the rural, poverty-stricken Ozarks and stars Jennifer Lawrence as a teenager on a quest to find her missing father.
Sisco served as a musical consultant for the film, contributed to its soundtrack and was even featured performing in a scene.
“I learned more about filmmaking than I ever thought I would,” she said. “It was a glorious experience that turned into a spectacular movie.”
Following the film’s release, Sisco embarked on a national tour with the Blackberry Winter Band, formed after the movie's success — a tour she dubbed the “Amazing Geriatric Hillbilly Tour” — and has since become somewhat of a niche celebrity (just look her up on Google or YouTube).
In addition to her many contributions to the art of storytelling, Sisco has long been an advocate for equal rights. Sisco is openly lesbian and has been actively promoting awareness for LGBTQ+ groups in the area for decades.
“Marginalized people have stories to tell,” she said. “I just so happen to be one of the ones telling them.”
For her accomplishments, Sisco received the Quill Award for lifetime achievement from the Missouri Writers Hall of Fame, and the Missouri Folk Arts program has designated her a master storyteller and a community scholar.
Follow @MOFolkArts on Facebook to learn about special events honoring the Living Traditions Fellows. Over the coming weeks, the 2025 Fellows will participate in public events and contribute to recorded oral histories that document their achievements.
For more information on the Missouri Folk Arts Program, contact Lisa Higgins, director, at mofolkarts@missouri.edu or visit mofolkarts.missouri.edu.
