GETTING TIED UP IN OLD WEST LORE COWBOY FESTIVAL CELEBRATES AREA'S HERITAGE.

Byline: Susan Abram Staff Writer

NEWHALL - Songs of winding trails and poems about gunslingers shot and buried on the range filtered through the dusty streets of an Old West town on Saturday during this year's Cowboy Festival.

Set inside the Melody Ranch Motion Picture Studio, where John Wayne, Roy Rogers, Dale Evans and Gene Autry were captured on film, thousands of Old West-era enthusiasts strolled down Main Street for the three-day festival, to take in the sights and sounds of California's history.

Musical cowboys and cowgirls sawed on fiddles, squeezed accordions and crooned songs of adventures on horseback. Costume-clad visitors in boots and hats feasted on plates of barbecue beef and Dutch-oven peach cobbler, and dozens of booths featured western wear, gear, jewelry and art.

Along Main Street, spurs jingled as they hit the wooden planks outside the mercantiles and children teased a lasso performer, daring him to catch them in the rope.

``We're attracted to this because it's our heritage,'' said a man who identified himself as a gunslinger named Cody Blackburn. ``The 1800s is not so far back.''

Dressed in full outlaw gear minus the pistol, Blackburn and his partner ``Lillian Russell'' were first timers to the local event, even though both work as western-era re-enactors in Pioneertown, another movie ranch 115 miles east of Hollywood.

Both said the festival brings out the Old West in everyone.

``I love it,'' said the costumed Lillian Russell from under her dainty lace umbrella. ``That era was rough and tough and lawless, but also down to earth.''

The 12th annual festival, sponsored by the city of Santa Clarita, celebrates the area's western heritage and honors the movies and the stars that are still revered today around the world.

Those old pictures lured Rosario Fuentes and Marco Chavez from Chatsworth to the event.

Both remember those Westerns shown in their native Peru.

``We really enjoy the music, and it reminds us of those Westerns,'' Fuentes said.

``Those Westerns were shown all over Latin America,'' Chavez said. ``It seems like most of the people here are really part of that cowboy culture.''

The festival, open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., will wrap up today with music performed by Wylie and the Wild West, Waddie Mitchell, Dave Stamey, Ginny Mac, Hot Club of Cowtown, Sons of the San Joaquin, Don Edwards and Juni Fisher.

Susan Abram, [phone]

susan.abram(at)dailynews.com

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(color) Rope-trick artist Jim Townsley lassoes a young cowboy during Cowboy Festival Saturday at Melody Ranch. The festival is open 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. today.

Gene Blevins/Special to the Daily News