Where is bluegrass popular

Bluegrass tunes can largely be described as narratives on the everyday lives of the people whence the music came. Aside from laments about loves lost, interpersonal tensions and unwanted changes to the region e. Some protest music has been composed in the bluegrass style, especially concerning the vicissitudes of the Appalachian coal mining industry.

Railroading has also been a popular theme, with ballads such as " Wreck of the Old 97 " and "Nine Pound Hammer" from the legend of John Henry being exemplary. Bluegrass artists use a variety of stringed instruments. Bluegrass, as a distinct musical form, developed from elements of old-time music and traditional music of the Appalachian region of the United States. The Appalachian region was where many English and Ulster-Scots immigrants settled, bringing with them the musical traditions of their homelands.

Hence the sounds of jigs and reels , especially as played on the fiddle, were innate to the developing style. Black musicians infused characteristics of the blues to the mix, and in a development that was key to shaping the bluegrass sound, introduced the iconic banjo to the region. Template:Citation needed. The music now known as bluegrass was frequently used to accompany a rural dancing style known as buckdancing , flatfooting or clogging.

As the bluegrass sound spread to urban areas, listening to it for its own sake increased, especially after the advent of audio recording. Although amateur bluegrass musicians and trends such as "parking-lot picking" are too important to be ignored, it is touring musicians who have set the direction of the style.

Radio stations dedicated to bluegrass have also proved influential in advancing the evolution of the style into distinctive subgenres. Bluegrass was initially included in the category of folk music and later changed to hillbilly.

All four of the seminal bluegrass authors - Artis, Price, Cantwell and Rosenberg - described bluegrass music in detail as originating in style and form, in one form or another, between the s and mids.

However, the term "bluegrass" did not appear formally to describe the music until the late s, and did not appear in Music Index until Kretzschmar, The first entry in Music Index mentioning "bluegrass music" directed the reader to "see Country Music; Hillbilly Music" Kretzschmar, , p.

Music Index maintained this listing for bluegrass music until The first time bluegrass music had its own entries in Music Index was Stratelak, The topical and narrative themes of many bluegrass songs are highly reminiscent of folk music. Many songs that are widely considered to be bluegrass are in reality older works legitimately classified as folk or old-time music that are performed in the bluegrass style.

The interplay between bluegrass and folk forms has been academically studied. Folklorist Dr. Neil Rosenberg, for example, shows that most devoted bluegrass fans and musicians are familiar with traditional folk songs and old-time music and that these songs are often played at shows, festivals and jams Rosenberg, A large region in central Kentucky is sometimes called the Bluegrass region although this region is west of the hills of Kentucky.

Exactly when the word "bluegrass" itself was adopted to label this form of music is not certain, but is believed to be in the late s.

Due to this lineage, Bill Monroe is frequently referred to as the "father of bluegrass". Monroe's to band, which featured banjo prodigy Earl Scruggs , singer-guitarist Lester Flatt , fiddler Chubby Wise and bassist Howard Watts also known as "Cedric Rainwater" —sometimes called "the original bluegrass band"—created the definitive sound and instrumental configuration that remains a model to this day.

By some arguments, while the Blue Grass Boys were the only band playing this music, it was just their unique sound; it could not be considered a musical style until other bands began performing in similar fashion. In , the Stanley Brothers recorded the traditional song " Molly and Tenbrooks " in the Blue Grass Boys' style, arguably the point in time that bluegrass emerged as a distinct musical form.

First generation bluegrass musicians dominated the genre from its beginnings in the mids through the mids. The invention of the phonograph and the onset of radio in the early-to-mid s brought this music out of the hills and into the homes of people all over the United States.

Bill grew up working and playing music with his siblings on the family farm known as Jerusalem Ridge in the early s. His musical foundation was shaped by the singing and fiddle playing of his mother, the fiddling of his uncle Pen Vandiver, and the fiddling and guitar playing of his friend Arnold Shultz, a popular black musician who played extensively around Rosine.

Bill and his brother Charlie left the family farm after they became adults and moved to Chicago to work, but eventually they formed a band known as the Monroe Brothers. The band became one of the most popular acts of the s. Charlie played guitar, Bill played mandolin, and they sang in harmony. When the brothers split in , both went on to form their own bands. After experimenting with various instrumental combinations, Bill settled on mandolin, banjo, fiddle, guitar, and bass for the core of his band.

While some bluegrass fans date the genre to when Monroe first appeared on the Grand Ole Opry, most believe that the classic bluegrass sound came together in December when Earl Scruggs joined the band.

They typically appeared clean-cut and dressed in matching formal wear. On the other hand, progressive bluegrass bands experimented with the style, incorporating new instruments, electric instruments, or unique techniques. They wore their hair long and dressed in the casual style of the counterculture of the era.

Older fans would frequently pack up their folding chairs and head back to their tents or campers when they saw long-haired bands setting up electric equipment on the stage at festivals. Younger fans were often less enthusiastic about more classic performances.

Bluegrass festivals seemed to consist of two separate events sharing the same space at the same time. Interestingly, as the 70s rolled into the 80s, the lines between the groups began to fade. Artists such as Sam Bush or the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band are now widely regarded as bluegrass canon and representative of the genre.

The 80s and 90s presented a cyclical repeating of history in many respects. Bluegrass would slowly fade back into obscurity only to be thrust into the limelight again by a new cultural touchpoint—movies, events, or music. These resurgences in popularity brought in younger audiences.

Some of these musicians became mainstays and changed the direction of the genre as a whole. The emergence of the internet has served to amplify these conflicts, however. Bluegrass is changing faster than it ever has. The internet has brought bluegrass to a wider and more nicely targeted audience than ever before. Innovation in bluegrass is happening, not just in a few directions, but in dozens of ways.

Bluegrass is being blended with everything from rap to electronica. While some of these combinations are taken more seriously than others—they are all viewed as a threat to the core of the bluegrass by its most diehard fans. Women, racial minorities, and LGBTQ people are all fighting for a seat at the table with varying levels of resistance. Bluegrass is once again being used as protest music for the young, progressive wing of American politics.

The International Bluegrass Music Association IBMA , an organization that gives out Bluegrass music awards and nominates inductees to the International Bluegrass Hall of Honor, once acted as a gatekeeper for what was and what was not bluegrass.

However, in the mids, the IBMA decided to take a big tent approach and not attempt to control the direction bluegrass moved in so much as respond to the movement. This has proven quite controversial. The executive director of the IBMA has since justified this decision by arguing that all bluegrass is connected and that newer, more innovative bluegrass inevitably leads new fans back to more traditional tunes.

The debate over whether or not bluegrass is dying or not boils down to a more philosophical question of what bluegrass is. Cellist Yo-Yo Ma is one of a number of classical musicians who have reached out to embrace instrumentalists whose virtuosity is a mirror image of their own.

Bluegrass is the folk tradition of the south. As improvisatory as jazz, it has a competitive spirit that derives from the way solos are passed around, each instrument trying to one-up what came before.

But despite the machismo, it remains a fundamentally democratic and social music. The idea that bluegrass is a rural, southern monopoly has been a myth for almost as long as it has existed. It was the folk revival on the east and west coasts that rescued it from an early grave as country radio stations abandoned it for a smoother, more mainstream sound. The genre found a new audience just as it was threatening to pass into obscurity.

No trendspotter could have predicted the peculiar cultural exchange that followed. The middle-class city kids encountering bluegrass at college gigs shared little common life experience with the blue-collar performers who had worked in mines and factories, or grown up on dirt farms.

Not just their upbringings: their political and religious beliefs — not to mention their manner of speech and sense of style — were poles apart. They could play them, too. This influx of outsiders had consequences that have been fought over ever since. Bluegrass became a fiercely contested definition, with strict rules covering everything from rhythm must have a dominant offbeat to instrumentation no electric instruments, no drums — only guitar, banjo, mandolin, fiddle, Dobro resonator guitar and bass are allowable.

The irony is that Monroe and the bluegrass pioneers were the avant garde of their times, and the improvisational spirit that lives in the music was always going to attract the kind of artists who want to take it somewhere new.