{"id":37485,"date":"2025-04-23T14:31:56","date_gmt":"2025-04-23T18:31:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/?p=37485"},"modified":"2025-05-02T14:26:53","modified_gmt":"2025-05-02T18:26:53","slug":"magazine-its-a-furman-family-affair","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/magazine-its-a-furman-family-affair\/","title":{"rendered":"It’s a Furman Family Affair"},"content":{"rendered":"

Before an Allman Brothers concert brought them together, Brandon Smith \u201901 and his wife Tara \u201900 both came to Furman University as athletes.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Tara was recruited to Furman to play soccer under coach Brian Lee, and she fell in love with the opportunities to engage on campus.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe size of the school was perfect, and Greenville was obviously a much different place 25 years ago,\u201d Tara says.<\/p>\n

She rushed Alpha Delta Pi her sophomore year, which was when she met Brandon in his first year. Brandon came to Furman to play tennis, then rushed Tau Kappa Epsilon. Quickly, the two found themselves spending more time together.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou really find out who you naturally gravitate toward,\u201d Brandon says.<\/p>\n

Sparks flew after the two unexpectedly ran into one another at an Allman Brothers concert. Suddenly they saw each other in a new light, and the soundtrack to their budding relationship started to take shape.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of our early days revolved around the Allman Brothers, Widespread Panic and Grateful Dead-type bands,\u201d Brandon says.<\/p>\n

Brandon had always noodled with various instruments; his grandfather was a professional pianist who wrote a popular music textbook. After he and Tara graduated and their wedding neared, he decided to buy his first banjo.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t claim to be someone who mastered any instrument,\u201d he says. \u201cI started playing banjo when I was 21, and while I\u2019ve been in a band before I kind of learned to play alongside our boys.\u201d<\/p>\n

He and Tara have three children together: Jarratt, 19, Witt, 17, and Benjo, 13. As the boys grew up, Brandon and Tara shared their love of music with their boys. Jarratt picked up the guitar, which gave him the freedom to experiment and think abstractly when he played. Witt had a sharp mind for math and patterns, and
\nthe rhythm of a bass appealed to him.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd Benjo, he\u2019s like Animal from The Muppets. He comes in like a wild man on the drums,\u201d Brandon says with a laugh.<\/p>\n

While Brandon and the boys have tried to get Tara to sing with them, she\u2019s adamant that she\u2019s no singer. Instead, she\u2019s helped manage and support the band.<\/p>\n

The boys started their own youth band when the youngest was 6 years old. During COVID-19 shutdowns, Brandon began playing alongside them at home, and their family band emerged from those garage band sessions. Surrender Cobra \u2013 named after the pose sports fans make after a bad play, hands on their head with elbows splayed out like a cobra\u2019s hood \u2013 has since gone from playing cover songs at local events to recording original music for their album, \u201cUpstate Sound Patterns.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been such a pleasure to be on that journey with them. Even though I\u2019m their dad, I\u2019m their musical peer as well,\u201d Brandon says.<\/p>\n

Greenwood, Brandon\u2019s hometown that first elected him mayor in 2018, has been fertile territory for their sons. The South Carolina city has a musical legacy as home of beach rock legends the Swingin\u2019 Medallions, and established local musicians have been very supportive of younger generations.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s something special in the water in Greenwood,\u201d Brandon says. \u201cYou can find live music four nights a week anywhere here, and it\u2019s been a catalyst for the boys to really do what they\u2019ve wanted.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Furman alumni couple’s longtime love of music fosters family band<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":401,"featured_media":37488,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3343,1963,3342],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-37485","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-around-the-lake-spring-2025","category-furman-magazine","category-spring-2025"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37485","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/401"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37485"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37485\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37772,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37485\/revisions\/37772"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37485"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37485"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37485"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}