Bluegrass

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Term Paper Title	Bluegrass
# of Words	822
# of Pages (250 words per page double spaced)	3.29

Bluegrass

     Bluegrass is a style of country and western music that developed during the 1940s, based on traditional ballads, fiddle tunes, and gospel hymnody of the southern Appalachian Mountains in the United States.  It evolved from the backwooks, blue-collar music of the South, particularly Appalachia.  Bluegrass features acoustic string band instruments such as the fiddle, banjo, and mandolin, accompanied by guitar and string bass.  The lead instruments improvise virtuoistic solo choruses, somewhat like a country version of jazz.  The singing style, often characterized as the "high lonesome sound", is pitched quite high and can include four-part harmony with a high tenor harmony part above the melody line and baritone and bass voices below (Grolier Multimedia Encyclopedia).
     Mandolin player Bill Monroe is viewed as the father of bluegrass.  His band, the Bluegrass Boys, began to play regularly on the Grand Ole Opry radio program in Nashville, Tennessee in 1939.  By 1945, Monroe's band included Earl Scruggs, who popularized the characteristic three-fingered banjo picking style, guitarist Lester Flatt, and fiddler Chubby Wise.
The Scottish-Irish music of southern Appalachia was a powerful form of entertainment as folks gathered in the evenings to dance and socialize.  It was what people back then loved.  The people back then probably looked at bluegrass music in the same manner as I look at alternative music today.  It was just a style of music that they could relate to and express some of their ideas through.
     Bluegrass spread when Appalachians fled to the cities after the war to find  work.  These people maintained a link with their former culture through nostalgic songs of home, mother, and church.  Some of the early stars had charisma as well as a distinctive sound that attracted a more sophisticated audience who appreciated their uncanny musicianship.
By the 1960s, hippies and folkmusic enthusiasts had adopted bluegrass.  It spread to a younger generation through large outdoor music festivals, such as that at Bean Blossom, Ind.  While quite different from the "folk" music of that era, which usually contained a social message, bluegrass was viewed as "pure and authentic" because its roots were traditional and because it eschewed electronic instruments.  Above all, bluegrass music is acoustic, although there are plenty of vocal and instrumental microphones on the modern bluegrass stage.  The instrumental ensembles have become standardiz...

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