I grew up in the 50’s and 60’s, loving and dancing to everything from the Peppermint Twist to MoTown. And I still love dancing to it all. Yet these days, living my retirement years in the Blue Ridge Mountains, I have discovered and truely love mountain music. It has it’s roots in the music of the people who came to settle here years ago, and unlike the canned country music you hear on the radio, it makes me happy and helps me to forget for a while the chaos our world has become. A sampling.......
https://youtu.be/n5usI4hmSGw Bela Fleck. “When Joy Kills Sorrow”
https://youtu.be/FVIaiADsyYo. Carolina Chocolate Drops. “Country Girl”
https://youtu.be/RBN12Aki39Q. Balsam Range. “I Hear the Mountains”
https://youtu.be/TVB9PfzAQAk. Bing Futch on the Mountain Dulcimer. I learned to play the Mountain Dulcimer (arthritis has made it too difficult to play my guitar) and Bing was my first teacher.
The 1950s were incredibly innovative and creative musically, apart from the sappy ballad pop music then. ‘Bluegrass’ is actually modern, innovative and complex, the same characteristics as bebop and cool jazz that developed at around the same time.