Blacksburg’s own “Americana Music with Appalachian Roots” group, often playing bluegrass among its offerings, includes (from left) Rusty May, Keith Webb, Cathey Bassett and Joe Bassett. From gospel to Appalachian old-time, the mountain heritage is alive and well in their music.
Larry Hypes
Contributing Writer
It’s World Bluegrass Day today, Wednesday, Oct. 1, and the New River Valley is smack-dab in the middle of the movement.
Draw a string circle from around Knoxville to up near Charleston, West Virgina, out past Lynchburg and somewhere down below Charlotte, North Carolina, and that would just about include the original musical “Bluegrass Land.”
Plenty of debate about when bluegrass started – although all loyalists agree that Rosine, Kentucky’s Bill Monroe started it. On Monroe’s mandolin case was a sticker referring to”1927” while many believe that when Monroe came to Nashville’s Grand Ole Opry in 1939 that marked the true beginning.
Bluegrass, a namesake of the famous perennial plant that has powered many great racehorses. For music fans, it’s the energetic fuel of string music, high lonesome singing tones and sweet harmony.
The genre typically features guitar, fiddle, mandolin, banjo, upright bass, mandolin, dobro (Hawaiian steel guitar) and sometimes harmonica. Don’t be surprised, however, to notice in progressive circles that drums or perhaps a keyboard might be added to the mix.
Monroe (Mandolin), Earl Scruggs (banjo), Doc Watson (guitar), Kenny Baker (fiddle), and Josh Graves (dobro) are among the more famous names associated with instruments which have captivated audiences for decades, with the sound emigrating from the middle Appalachians to become a world-wide sound.
Yet there are many who wonder if “bluegrass” as a genre actually exists. Noted scholar and author Neil V. Rosenberg quotes authority William Henry Koon as saying, “No such thing as pure bluegrass exists” and Rosenburg adds that the term is more often used by fans than the musicians themselves.
Many local standouts, such as Jack Hinshelwood of “The Crooked Road” fame, who grew up near Riner and contemporary groups like “Riley & the Rootabagas” from Blacksburg, play a variety of styles including bluegrass, which is why scholars like Koon say the music lends itself to such a variety of styles it is often impossible to pin down.
Although Monroe (1911—1996) developed the original style and dubbed his band “The Blue Grass Boys,” a group that at one time or another included nearly all of the big names of early bluegrass, he was likely the true purist who never strayed from the roots of bluegrass.
Perhaps the best-known group of all, Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs and the Foggy Mountain Boys, who started their own group in 1948 after leaving Monroe, branched out into folk and even some rock styles in the mid-1960s when Scruggs wanted to work more with his sons and the new sound eventually forced their breakup in 1969.
A host of well-known bands, from The Osborne Brothers, Jim and Jesse and the Virginia Boys, Ricky Skaggs and Kentucky Thunder, The Stanley Brothers, Jimmy Martin, Don Reno and Red Smiley, Alison Krauss, Rhonda Vincent, Molly Tuttle and Sierra Hull, among others to Roy Clark of nearby Meherrin, Virginia, the style has thousands tap their toes and join in.
Scholars say the first organized bluegrass festival was in nearby Fincastle, the county seat of Botetourt County and now such events are common from coast to coast. An indoor event, “Doc at 100” held at the Moss Center for the Performing Arts at Virginia Tech two autumns ago, drew a huge crowd while the nearby Galax Fiddlers’ Convention combines all of the talents needed in bluegrass and a new generation, the Montgomery Junior Appalachian Musicians (MJAM) is already bringing string music skills forward in the 21st century.
Just about everyone agrees it’s impossible to ignore.
Even Elvis Presley, the King of Rock and Roll, used Monroe’s old bluegrass tune “Blue Moon of Kentucky” among his very first recordings.
