LEWISBURG, WV (WVNS) — Knock, knock, who’s there?
Or rather, who’s climbing way up high in the air at the State Fair of West Virginia? If you’re looking up, you’re most likely seeing Angelina and Michelangelo Nock.
59News was able to get a word with Angelina Nock, 30, and her father Michelangelo Nock, 56, the daredevil stunt performers who amazed the crowd with their risky and daring feats. Such stunts include climbing and balancing on the sway poles, freelance twirling on a wheel, and cage driving on a motorcycle.
These two are pretty well known in the performance world, which is why it was a perfect choice by the State Fair of West Virginia who seek specific talent out.
“We’re here to perform our daredevil thrill show,” said Angelina, in which her father also added, “The fair board goes out to the national convention and they see the great talent that they want to bring to the people of West Virginia with something new, so they say ‘HEY! The Nerveless Nocks! and we’ve been pretty high profiled lately being on America’s Got Talent twice and getting standing ovations, and a handshake from Simon Cowell, so we just love performing. There’s a great crowd here in Lewisburg, the people just love live entertainment.”
Performing feats isn’t anything new to them, perhaps it’s just something that they were born to do since this act has been in their family for generations, starting internationally and bringing it to the states.
“So orignally our family comes from Bern, Switzerland, and we’ve been performing many generations now. My father is the seventh generation and we now live in Sarasota, Florida. We came from Florida to come perform at the state fair,” said Angelina.
Her father added a little more history to their famous and fearless family saying, “Nerveless Nocks since 1840s Switzerland…but what we share is the love of living up in the mountains,” said Michelangelo when mentioning why the state fair was a great choice to display their talents, and happy to be bringing a family legacy filled with history to West Virginia. “What we share is Swiss alps and the West Virginia mountains. I love it.”
The history of the Nerveless Nocks started from Michelangelo’s father who apparently performed for the Ringling Brothers carrying on the tradition and rich family legacy.
“Sarasota, Florida, that was the headquarters for the Ringling Brothers Circus. My father was the headliner, the star, from 1954 to 1957, so I’m happy my son and daughter are performing now and carrying on the family tradition,” Michelangelo adding proudly.
But it didn’t just stop there. They’ve been performing on television, including the Ed Sullivan Show, to America’s Got Talent displaying their feats and talents worldwide.
“My father performed for Ed Sullivan in 1964. It just happened to be the episode that the Beatles [debuted] were on. 74 million people saw that, so all these years later the equivalent Ed Sullivan is Simon Cowell on America’s Got Talent. That’s a worldwide hit,” explained Michelangelo.
“Earlier this year we were on America’s Got Talent Extreme. We made it to the finals, but my father got sick, so we were unable to go on in the competition, but because of that we were able to go on to the next season of America’s Got Talent, in which our episode had just aired about a week ago,” Angelina said explaining how noticeably big they’ve been getting worldwide.
Aside from the growing fame that they’ve been obtaining from hard work and fearless feats, they talked about the act that really wows the crowd.
“It’s the head first slide down when Angelina slides down head first 80 miles an hour,” Michelangelo chuckled.
“Our signature act is the sway pole, That is our favorite act to perform,” Angelina mentioned with a big smile on her face.
You can check them out on Facebook and Instagram by looking up the Nerveless Nocks or at nervelessnocks.com.