“One day when I was in middle school I took home a cassette tape of like Run DMC or something and was playing it in my room. My dad came in and said something like,’What is that? That’s not music. Come with me,’ and he took me to the living room and pulled out this dusty collection of records,” said Johnny Scroggs, explaining what inspired him to pursue the study of music. Those dusty records? Classic rock like Crosby Stills Nash and Young’s “Four Way Street.” Scroggs still remembers the first time he heard Neil Young sing on the track “Ohio.” “It was pretty cool,” he said.
It didn’t take Scroggs long to teach himself to play guitar and write songs. He purchased his first guitar, an electric one, from George Kelischek in Brasstown. Kelischek is well known in the area and internationally for creating beautiful, resonant stringed instruments. “I ordered it from him and then he hated everything I played on it,” he said with a laugh. Scroggs won a songwriting contest at age 11 at Clay’s Corner and from there he just kept teaching himself more and more.