Irish bodhran player and UCD graduate Brian Fleming recently found himself in Dollywood participating with the Irish contingent in the Festival of Nations, the largest international jamboree of folk music in the south, where he shared the stage with the legendary, lofty figure (in more ways than one) of Dolly Parton. Fleming speaks to CAHIR O'DOHERTY about warm southern hospitality, fine manners and all the unexpected surprises that lay in store for him.

BRIAN Fleming, 36, a traditional Irish musician, theater director and longtime member of Ireland's legendary Galway theater group Macnas, recently visited Dollywood, country legend Dolly Parton's Tennessee theme park, for the first time. He was there for the annual Festival of Nations and in the process he found himself, Borat-like, both fascinated and mystified by the culture and traditions of the south.

Set in the lush foothills of the Smokey Mountains of Tennessee, and spanning 125 acres, Dollywood is one of the most popular family vacation destinations in the south. Part amusement park, part Dixie concert hall, at its center you'll find one of the most charismatic country singers (and business managers) the genre has ever produced: no less a person than the Queen of Country Music, Dolly Parton herself.

And the crowds simply love her. When she appears among them for the nightly parade, they go wild, star struck, waving and cheering and that's before she even takes to the stage to sing a song.

The first thing that struck Fleming though, was the name of the town that Dollywood is set in. Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, located 35 miles southeast of Knoxville, sounds exactly like the kind of place where a sheriff might square off against Billy the Kid. In reality though, it's a lush little hamlet quietly enjoying the cash windfall that Dollywood brings.

Dollywood is no homespun country fair after all. The newest rollercoaster ride there cost $17.5 million to build (and a full five minutes of abject screaming terror to experience). But, as Fleming quickly discovered, it's really the music and the hospitality that brings the visitors back time and again.

"I came for the music too," says Fleming. "I was in Walton's famous music shop in Dublin and the lad working there (Martin Langan) mentioned they would be selling bodhrans (traditional Irish drums) at the Festival of Nations in Dollywood the next month. I went online and I discovered there would be folk groups attending the festival from Zambia, Trinidad, Peru and Russia.

"At college I had closely studied the connection between Irish music and the music of the Appalachians, so I decided to go along and find out all about it myself."

Fleming was amazed by the similarities between Irish traditional and southern folk music. "It was like reuniting with a lost tribe, actually. The musicians there were just so happy to meet us," he says.

"Every night they'd play tunes that I already knew, although in Ireland they usually had different names. We'd sing ours back to them with slight amendments and they'd be just stunned."

Another surprise was the famous southern good manners. "I could not believe how polite people were. It was just non-stop. They were so welcoming too. They'd ask you to talk just so they could hear the sound of your Irish accent."

But it wasn't all smiles. Privately, Fleming was aware that most of the people he was talking to were strong supporters of President George W. Bush and the war in Iraq, sharply contradicting his own views.

"At times I did feel there was an unreality to the place particularly because I was spending so much of my time in a big theme park and so I had to get out whenever I could. It wasn't always clear to me that the people who were visiting the park knew the difference between Dollywood and the real world."

When he was driving around the state on his getaways Fleming would turn on the radio and every second station, he discovered, was broadcasting a booming evangelical sermon. At times it became oppressive, so to let off a little steam he found himself hanging out at the local biker's bar.

"There was more tattoos than teeth at this place I went to, it was a rough joint, but even there I discovered the people didn't swear or get too rowdy!" he says.

Come to Tennessee where even the outlaw bikers say please and thank you? Fleming laughs at the suggestion, but he clearly doesn't want to sound like a sour or ungrateful guest, bad mouthing the hosts when he's taken his leave.

"I tell you what," he says candidly, "all the time I was there I never heard a single person say a bad word about Dolly. Not once. People just genuinely love her. When she was coming to the stage it was like the queen was arriving."

The reason for all the adulation over and above the fact that she gives back to the state and her employees in generous amounts is her enduring talent.

Says Fleming, "When it comes down to it Dolly is an amazing musician. She can play any instrument, and she's published over 3,000 songs of her own. There's real emotion and honesty in her sound. She doesn't take herself too seriously either."

Fleming's not joking. In a candid moment during the ceremony to open the new $17 million rollercoaster at Dollywood this spring Parton turned to him and said she would never get on the ride herself.

"She told me she had too much to lose," says Fleming, "her wig, her nails and who knows what would pop out!"

You can tell Fleming fell under the same spell that Dolly casts on everyone else who visits the place.

"I imagined Dollywood was going to be really tacky, but really she has the place halfway between a cultural center and a theme park. You'll see tourists yes, but you'll also see the locals too, and they're there for the music, and they're not going to be disappointed."

A tradition at the end of many sessions at Dollywood is to play the Tennessee official state song, "Rocky Top" - which means to the locals what "The Fields of Athenry" means to construction workers in a Queens Irish bar at the end of the evening home.

In homage, every international group performing in Dollywood developed their own version of it. Every night the Russian dancers from Moscow would dress up like cowboys at the end of their set and belt out these lines in heavily accented voices:

"Once there was a girl on rocky top,

Half bear the other half cat.

Wild as a mink, sweet as soda pop,

I still dream about that."

Other Dollywood highlights for Fleming included the nightly cattle stampede (you can watch them from your restaurant window).

There are live races on Emus and even pigs. And the waiters dress up in the uniforms of both sides of the American Civil War.

Marching up and down the wide streets the calvary fires and you cheer for your side - Confederate or Yankee. In the south, Fleming discovered, the legacy of the Civil War is still very much alive.

"Many of the people I spoke to told me their great grand fathers were involved. But that there would also be shows based on that war was a real surprise to me," he said.

At Dollywood, the long and glorious history of the south is celebrated nightly, but what Fleming calls the "sticky question" of where all that plantation money came from, for example, is overlooked. Instead everyone picks a side to cheer for.

"Coming from a theater background I wondered at the message they were trying to get across. Either the message was none of this is important and have a good old time, or the message was war is glorious and wonderful."

Since Dollywood is located close enough to Graceland, Fleming figured he would also take in the Vegas style home of the King of Rock and Roll himself, Elvis Presley.

"When I was a kid my idea of cool was Elvis. Graceland was a really strange place. If you can visit a house with shag carpets on the ceilings and floors and say that it was tasteful, then the tour was tastefully done," he said.

"The front rooms are quite classical, but then you reach the Jungle Room with the fountains on the wall and the whiskey bars and it might remind you of your swinger uncle's house in the 1970s. It was way over the top but kind of cool. Elvis the King was like Dolly the Queen in respect to the fact that they never left their hometowns, they both chose to keep it real. I loved them both. If you're ever down there, you shouldn't miss it."