America's Music Film Series: Country and Bluegrass

While on a Nieman Fellowship at Harvard, journalist and novelist Paul Hemphill wrote of that pivotal moment in the late sixties when traditional defenders of the hillbilly roots of country music were confronted by the new influences and business realities of pop music. The demimonde of the traditional Nashville venues (Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge, Robert’s Western World, and the Ryman Auditorium) and first-wave artists (Roy Acuff, Ernest Tubb, and Lefty Frizzell) are shown coming into first contact, if not conflict, with a new wave of pop-influenced and business savvy country performers (Jeannie C. “Harper Valley PTA” Riley, Johnny Ryles, and Glen Campbell) and rock performers (Bob Dylan, Gram Parsons, the Byrds, and the Grateful Dead) as they took the form well beyond Music City. Originally published in 1970, The Nashville Sound shows the resulting identity crisis as a fascinating, even poignant, moment in country music and entertainment history.

California has been fertile ground for country music since the 1920s, nurturing a multitude of talents from Gene Autry to Glen Campbell, Rose Maddox to Barbara Mandrell, Buck Owens to Merle Haggard. In this affectionate homage to California's place in country music's history, Gerald Haslam surveys the Golden State's contributions to what is today the most popular music in America. At the same time he illuminates the lives of the white, working-class men and women who migrated to California from the Dust Bowl, the Hoovervilles, and all the other locales where they had been turned out, shut down, or otherwise told to move on.

Kealing here emphasizes the distinctly Southern roots of country rock pioneer Gram Parsons (1946-73). He details the musician's journey from early admirer of Elvis to "urban folkie" to his ultimate musical explorations of what the author refers to as "cosmic America" as a member of the Byrds and the founder of the Flying Burrito Brothers. In the late Sixties and early Seventies, Parsons helped integrate the distinct, though related, strains of rock and country music, creating a new kind of sound that changed the trajectory of rock. From his brief but influential stint with the Byrds to the formation of the Flying Burrito Brothers and further solo work with Emmylou Harris, Parsons's career as a guitarist and singer/songwriter was cut short when he died of an overdose at age 26. Using interviews with his friends, family, and fellow musicians and contemporary visits to the primarily Southern sites associated with Parsons, Kealing mines the cultural geography of a region and time period while narrating the story of a musician who has remained influential over the past 40 years.

Since its first publication in 1968, Bill C. Malone'sCountry Music, U.S.A.has won universal acclaim as the definitive history of American country music. Starting with the music's folk roots in the rural South, it traces country music from the early days of radio through the first decade of the twenty-first century. This third revised edition includes an extensive new chapter in which new coauthor Jocelyn R. Neal tracks developments in country music in the post-9/11 world, exploring the relationship between the current scene and the traditions from which the music emerged.

Malone here presents a lucid study of the relationship between country music and the Southern working class. Delving into the history and sociology of such topics as country humor, the relationships between country music and politics, the urbanization of the South, and the contradictory tendencies in country music toward religion and rambling, Malone covers much ground. He obviously loves the music and understands its relationship to the people who originally gave it life. The casual fan of country music, especially contemporary commercial country music, might not find much of interest present-day "hat acts" have relatively little to do with Malone's subject but readers looking to go beyond today's stars and into the very heart and soul of the music will not be disappointed.

Some maintain that country music is the country's music and reflects traditional American concerns. That's English professor Tichi's position, anyway, as she explores the links between country music and American literature and art. In country, she argues, story is paramount and told through lyrics that amount to folk poetry. With this thesis in mind, she examines in detail such common country themes as home, the road, loneliness, spiritual pilgrimage, and nature. She manages to avoid the academic's pitfall regarding pop music--condescension--but often seems to lack the longtime fan's empathy (she admits ignorance of country until just a few years ago). Also, she draws too many of her musical examples (some of which are heard on an accompanying CD) from younger performers whose accessible but watered-down styles have sparked country's recent resurgence but whose very popularity stacks the deck in favor of her argument that country remains firmly in the American cultural mainstream. Still, Tichi makes a compelling case for country music as a legitimate object of American studies.

Book One of the most bizarre stories in all of popular music is the history of "Orange Blossom Special," arguably the century's best-known fiddle tune. The man credited with its ownership, Ervin T. Rouse, endured tragedy, alcoholism and mental illness. He spent his last years fiddling for tips in isolated taverns at the edge of the Florida Everglades, and died all but unknown. The man who claimed co-ownership, Chubby Wise, achieved fame as the seminal fiddler of the bluegrass genre, but struggled to overcome personal demons and to heal the scars of childhood abandonment and abuse. This fascinating book uncovers how their legacies are forever linked with the legendary diesel streamliner which inspired the tune six decades ago, as it roared through American history, bringing wonder and hope to every stop.