Appalachian Music Research Paper

In 1964, President Lyndon Johnson declared an unconditional war on poverty in the United States and the most photographed area was the Appalachia region. Many of the photographs intentional or not, became a visual definition of the Appalachia region. The images have drawn from the poorest areas and people to gain support for the war on poverty, but came to represent the entirety of the region. The point of the Looking at Appalachia project is to explore the diversity of Appalachia and to establish a visual counter point. (Home - Looking at Appalachia.) The three images I am going to analyze are challenge some of the stereotypes put on the Appalachia region. I believe my images challenge the stereotype that all Appalachian people do is work hard, go to church, and don’t have time for anything besides those two things.

Country music originated in the 1920s in Tennessee. The genre was influenced by folk music from the Appalachian Mountains and revolved around themes of love, faith,

Appalachia is a culture based upon the ancient traditions and customs that have made its way through the years. Appalachia is a descriptive term referring to things in the Appalachian region. The style of dance or music would be a prime example of things in that particular region. The culture of the people began as really poor people who went West to survive on their own and avoid tax and toleration of the Eastern States. People who are from there or native to the region are generally close-knit, and fiercely defensive of friends and family and skeptical of outsiders. Yet, despite the lack of educational education, they had a lot of pride for who they were and their mark in history. According to popular beliefs on Appalachia, many people are led to believe that Appalachia is a poor and uneducated region.

Southern music known today as country music became popular in the 1920’s. This was music that was based on folk music of cowboys in the southeast (Collins English Dictionary, 2003). In most of the early music the artist played stringed instruments like fiddles, guitars, banjos and some were even playing harmonicas. When this type of music started some people called it

always been what we recognize it as today. Country music began in the 1920’s in a town in Tennessee called Bristol and was recognized for its hillbilly and folk format. Country music artists like Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, and Jerry Lee Lewis are each responsible for creating this music format that was written mostly about everyday life. Today country music is recognized as a more modern contemporary version of music. Today’s country artists have started to change their sound in order to appeal to the mainstream audience in order to make more money. Miranda Lambert said “there’s been a shift: country music is popular now. Every other genre wants to come over to our land.”

“When first entering in America, British folk music was distinguished by three-chord tunes, sparse instrumentation (with some fiddlers), mostly male performers, improvisation, the singers’ sporadic shouts (Scottish “yips”), Christian themes served up in hundreds of hymns, and a secular collection of songs that told stories, generally about love and lost love, using metaphor and symbol to tell those stories” (Allen 101). By the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, British music changed and became Americanized. Vocal harmonizing slowly evolved, and fiddlers were accompanied by those who played banjo, an African American opening. “Tambourines and “bones” (tapping out rhythms using pork rib bones) were a minstrel show contribution” (Allen 102). When African Americans were forced into slavery and brought to North America in the 1600s, they brought their own musical traditions and sounds. Slaves who were on the Mississippi River Valley delta soil developed what will later be introduced as blues music. On the plantations, slaves greatly changed British American hymn singing. They took non-religious British American songs and turned it into their own forms of music that followed their culture and taste of music. Blues emerged in the early twentieth century at the same time country music became settled from its folk roots. Blues music talked about the indifferences African American slaves were going through at that time. “The blues voiced human

Music was also an important part of the minstrel show. Minstrel music was established in the late 1830's with the development of the five-string banjo. This new form of music became very popular as the performers, working usually in pairs, toured from town to town. In 1843, Dan Emmetts of the Virginia Minstrels performed the first minstrel show with banjo, fiddle, bones, and tambourine. From this point, "minstrel mania" swept the nation as hundreds of minstrel troupe

For this music analysis project, I would like to discuss the oral nature of the legacy of Appalachian music. I would like to complete this project to bring attention to the amazing history of Appalachian music and the distinct ways it lives on. I plan to use research to study the different manners in which Appalachian music has continued to survive throughout the years despite the general modernization of the world.

In the pine belt Country Music is King while Gospel is best loved. Music and the South just go together. Wherever you go in the Southern part of the United States, like Georgia, Kentucky, North and South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, or Mississippi you will hear music on the radio, on the front porch, in restaurants and cafes, and on the street corners. We love a good tune. Italian’s love music too. There in Italy you hear opera and accordion music. Accordion are a big part of Zydeco music. In other words, the Italians and Southerners have lots of things in

The collection consists of 15,000 pages of original historical material documenting the land, peoples, exploration, and transformation of the trans-Appalachian West from the mid-eighteenth to the early nineteenth century. The collection is drawn from the holdings of the University of Chicago Library and the Filson Historical Society of Louisville, Kentucky.

In James Lane Allen’s Through Cumberland Gap on Horseback, the mention is made to the beauty of the land and that the climate was just the same but that traveling to the mountain region was not only difficult as they had to take a train then a wagon ride, followed by a trek on horseback, but a lengthy process. Among the experiences recorded Allen describes the meeting of several locals and this is where his responsibility for Appalachian

Charlie Pride did it in 1971. Darius Rucker did it in 2009. That’s it. Two black men, spanning thirty-eight years, are the only black artists to win a Country Music Association Award. With country music rooted in bluegrass and rhythm and blues, why aren’t there more black country music stars? When considering the roots of country music, and how closely related country is to blues, bluegrass and honky tonk music, an examination of what happened to all the black musicians seems warranted, no? This paper examines the dearth of black artists in country music and the careers of one of the few black artists who has had commercial success in this genre of music.

The roots of modern american rock and roll music, are firmly planted in Africa. As the native Africans were torn apart from their family’s and brought to the new world their lives were immediately and drastically changed forever. Finding themselves immersed in a completely new environment with a foreign culture, they thankfully persevered and carried on with their own traditions and most importantly to this paper, musical ones. Most American slaves originated from Western and Central Africa. The West Africans carried a musical tradition rich with long melody lines, complicated rhythms (poly rhythmics) and stringed instruments CITATION. The West Africans music was also strongly integrated into their everyday lives. Songs were preformed for religious ceremonies and dances and music was often a

American Music is a melting pot of different cultures, emotions, experiences, and therefore genres. It is incredible to see how as music evolves and changes with the time, so does The United States. We are a mixed bag as a country, accepting all different cultures and backgrounds. This has led to many breakthroughs and innovations in music throughout history. We are all influenced by our experiences in life and this is no different in the evolution of music in American History. The Blues was created from African American Slave songs, with lyrics that narrate the hardships of the human experience at the time. These rhythms and forms carried over and eventually created what is now Rock and Roll. Over the next five weeks, we will explore and discover five key genres and artists who are known to specialize in that genre as a way to reconnect with our history and explore the possibilities for innovation in music in the future.

American Indian life in the present time can be characterized as one big melting pot. Some societies try to preserve their own identity, while other groups came together in some way and brought their cultures together. A lot of what is known about their music has come from the past century when technological advancements were just beginning to take place. It was also during this period of time that there was a lot of turmoil between the whites. It was obvious that each tribe had its own musical identity, whether it dealt with style, uses of, or ideas of what music was. At that time there were thousands of groups, all speaking their own language, and each had several songs to accompany ceremonies, dances, and to divide society. Anthropologists have put them into categories according to their ways of life.