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Thread: Classic Bluegrass

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    Default Classic Bluegrass

    I'd like to lobby the Bluegrassers on the Cafe like Willie to use the appellation "Classic Bluegrass". Classic Bluegrass is Bill Monroe, Flatt & Scruggs, Jim & Jesse, Carl Story, the Stanley Bros., etc. I'm getting tired of people telling us Bluegrassers that like the old music to "broaden your horizons". I'm also tired of being told that Monroe sounds different than Flatt & Scruggs, so there is no such thing as Classic Bluegrass. I got into Bluegrass because of the fathers of the genre. I don't have to broaden my horizons. I've listened to the other stuff at Bluegrass Festivals and on Bluegrass Radio and don't like it. I don't tell people who like the new styles that they have to broaden their horizons. This is a free country, listen to whatever turns you on!!!

    Love & Peace ...

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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    Mick, I was thinking this afternoon that some of the people on here say they want to see bluegrass keep "progressing" and I wonder if they realize the change that has come about in the last fifty years and if it keeps "progressing" farther out pretty soon it will have wah-wah pedals and fuzz boxes and lots of reverberation and then there will be smoke and bright lights flashing and then the musicians will bust their instruments up while on the stage....If that is what they want to see and still call it bluegrass I am glad that I won`t be around when all of that happens....My definition of bluegras is a simple kind of music that tells a story and is played with the instruments backing up the singers, not the other way around, what one would expect to hear if he came upon a cabin in the mountains after dinner and there were people playing music on the porch just killing time and entertaining them selves until time to go to bed, no TV`s, No computers...In other words play it like it was invented....

    Willie

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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    Exactly!

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    Mando accumulator allenhopkins's Avatar
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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    OK: I guess I'm one of the people who's at least interested in listening to the musicians who have bluegrass roots and backgrounds, but sometimes try new things (successfully or unsuccessfully). From my point of view, you guys can like what you like, dislike what you don't like, and it's no skin off my nose in any case.

    What prompts the responses that you obviously don't like, is when someone will bring up a question like, "Is there a place for drums/harmonica/electric guitar/whatever in bluegrass," and the answer is, "No! That's not bluegrass! There's only one way to play bluegrass, and that's the way Bill Monroe (Flatt & Scruggs, Stanley Brothers, Jimmy Martin, Osborne Brothers, Jim & Jesse, Lonesome Pine Fiddlers, Carl Story, etc. etc.) played it in 1956! Everything else is punk rock, folky-dokey, hippy-dippy nonsense that's 'no part o' nothin'!"

    So I pipe up and point out, "Hey, didn't Flatt & Scruggs record with drums and harmonica at times? Didn't Jimmy Martin use a brushed snare drum with his live band? Didn't Bill Monroe make an LP with Grady Martin on electric guitar? What about Wilene Forrester, the 'Blue Grass Girl' with her accordion?" And then people say I'm trying to tell them they're narrow-minded and should like all these non-standard forms of bluegrass.

    That's not true. You don't have to like 'em, and it's pretty clear that you don't. What I disagree with is the idea that anyone can "excommunicate" someone from the "bluegrass congregation" because they do practice those forms of heresy.

    I enjoy jazz, but I don't particularly like "free jazz" with minimal melody and harmony. I like classical music, but don't like atonal, dissonant "modern" composers. I love rock 'n' roll, but '70's bubblegum, not so much. However, I'd never try to say, "That's not jazz! That's not classical/rock/whatever!" I'd just say, "That's a form of jazz, classical music, or rock that doesn't appeal to me."

    Everyone is free to like/dislike whatever kind of bluegrass, or any other music, he/she chooses. I would be the last (well, at least the second-last) to try to impose my tastes on others. There are plenty of bands that play "classic" bluegrass, if that's all one wants to listen to. There are other bands that try some different things, some of which work and some of which don't. I might find those bands interesting, too. You guys don't have to.

    Remember, when Bill Monroe came out with his brand of music, there were certainly people who thought it was 'way too "far out," as compared to the Skillet Lickers or Charlie Poole. Think of Frank Proffitt's quote: "I'd like to be able to play banjo like Earl Scruggs -- and then not do it." Yesterday's avant garde is today's "classic," and tomorrow's "old hat." I like 'em all.
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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    Allen,

    I'm not a Bluegrass only person, i.e., I played bass & keyboards in a Beatles tribute band,
    am a classical guitarist, etc. I understand this isn't a religion, just music preference. But, I only like the old Bluegrass style, and didn't appreciate it when the fathers tried drums, harmonica, etc. I'm just an all or nothing kind of guy ...

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    Mando accumulator allenhopkins's Avatar
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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    I agree with your first post: it's a free country and we can all like Flatt & Scruggs or Crooked Still or the Austin Lounge Lizards. I will never criticize anyone for preferring the sound of Bill Monroe, to the sound of the Flecktones. I just don't want to be told what is or isn't "bluegrass." There have been so many experiments and side-roads tried, starting with the "classic bluegrass" sound, that we have everything from Ralph Stanley singing with no instruments at all, to Ricky Skaggs and his Giant Band, to the Charles River Valley Boys playing Yellow Submarine, to Berry Pickin' In the Country and Run-C&W, squeezed under the big tent.

    I like some of it, you like some of it. I'd guess our tastes are more similar than different. I just get a bit concerned when people want to use their likes and dislikes, as the definition of the entire bluegrass style.
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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    Quote Originally Posted by allenhopkins View Post
    [/B] I just don't want to be told what is or isn't "bluegrass."
    How about being told what is or isn't "classic bluegrass".

  8. #8

    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    Wish someone would tell me what blue grass actually is. Everybody voices their opinion on what is or isn't bluegrass but no one has ever defined what it is in musical terms.

  9. #9

    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    This is the <politics of music>...not meant pejoratively, necessarily--only observing the manifestation.

    We have some pretty strong attachments to what amounts to a picture of a <moment>.

    But as pointed out, the political manifestation can be a tedious and pernicious side affect of these discussions.

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    Mando accumulator allenhopkins's Avatar
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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    Quote Originally Posted by mandolirius View Post
    How about being told what is or isn't "classic bluegrass".
    So: Blue Grass Boys circa 1946? We all agree on that. Flatt & Scruggs, well, yeah, when they're doing Cora Is Gone...but what if they're doing Maggie's Farm with Charlie McCoy on harmonica and Randy Scruggs on lead guitar? Jim & Jesse singing Air Mail Special or Blue-Eyed Darling, but what about Maybelline? Country Gentlemen doing New Freedom Bell (hey, wait a minute, is that Mike Seeger on Autoharp? What's that doin' in there?), but perhaps not when imitating Clarence "Frogman" Henry singing I'm a Lonely Boy.

    Did Monroe stop being "classic" when he hired Bill Keith (and called him "Brad")? Was Sam Bush "classic" with Poor Richard's Almanac or the Bluegrass Alliance, but not with the New Grass Revival? Were the Dillards "classic" until Doug left for the Dillard & Clark Expedition, and the remaining Dillards recorded Copperfields?

    There are more or less traditional bands, and more or less experimental/innovative bands, and a bunch of bands that seem to work both sides of the street. Went to hear Daley and Vincent a few months ago -- wonderful show, but a potpourri of everything from "straight" full-band bluegrass, to "brother duet" singing, to Statler Brothers gospel quartets, to cornpone comedy. Was it "classic," "prgressive," "eclectic," or just good bluegrass?

    Labels go on pickle jars, IMHO. Like Justice Potter Stewart with obscenity, "I know bluegrass when I hear it."
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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    These arguments are circular and become ridiculous;
    I am only going to make one post about it, as I disagree with some of the things posted.
    All the recorded work of "The Bluegrass Album Band" (which includes Dobro-phonic guitar, sometimes twinned fiddles, and lead acoustic guitar) could be said to be an exact modern pure representation and example of the spirit of what the OP is trying to describe.

    It is not a matter of repertoire, evidenced by the inclusion of Jim Croce's "Age", for instance. It is an approach where all the relevant boxes are ticked, and a variety of sonic "options" are not (ever) included.

    They are not included not because there is anything wrong with them, but because they simply don't belong there. If they are included, then the music style has changed.

    Which boxes are ticked and which options have no box to tick?

    Volume 1 to Volume 6: "The Bluegrass Album Band"

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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    I'm with Mick all the way -but- whatever we say,Bluegrass will keep changing,it's as inevitable as tomorrow will follow today.Whether we like it is our choice. I hear more & more bands drifting away from the 'Trad. style of Bluegrass & playing with a more 'modern' approach ie.The Infamous Stringdusters,Yonder Mt.String Band etc.,personally i like it,but i don't need others to tell me to listen to it to 'broaden my horizons',any more than i needed somebody to tell me to play Bluegrass music in the first place.
    IMHO those persons are well meaning,they enjoy something & they want to pass that enjoyment on - so,'let it be'.
    Mike B - I understand your question & the reasoning behind it.All i can say is that 'for me' if i wish to hear 'definitive' Bluegrass,listen to the original recordings of Bill Monroe & the Boys,when Earl Scruggs was first with him - that's the band sound that 'defined' the music that became generically known as Bluegrass,
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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    Quote Originally Posted by Ivan Kelsall View Post
    ]
    Mike B - I understand your question & the reasoning behind it.All i can say is that 'for me' if i wish to hear 'definitive' Bluegrass,listen to the original recordings of Bill Monroe & the Boys,when Earl Scruggs was first with him - that's the band sound that 'defined' the music that became generically known as Bluegrass,
    I am not asking for the names of bands that exemplify bluegrass, I would like a definition of the style.

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    Mando accumulator allenhopkins's Avatar
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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    OK, then, Buddy Bolden and Louis Armstrong defined "jazz" before 1910, and those who brought different "sonic options" are playing something else that ain't jazz. W C Handy defined the blues, and all this other stuff represents some impostor masquerading as "blues." If we've got Bill Haley, Big Mama Thornton and early Elvis, that's all she wrote about rock 'n' roll.

    Applying the "only the originator, and those who play like him/her, are really playing the music" criterion to other musical genres, is a reductio ad absurdum, but you see where it leads. It also denies the evident fact, that early bluegrass musicians also did a lot of experimentation -- for a variety of reasons, including commercial pressures from recording companies -- and produced music that differed significantly from "classic bluegrass."

    I can't get away from the viewpoint that when people are talking about "classic" or "definitive" or "true" bluegrass, what they're really talking about is what they like. And putting a Good Housekeeping Seal of authenticity on it. I like it too, but I'm not going to say it's "the only real bluegrass."

    And I really haven't heard anyone say that those who don't like "newgrass" or experimental bluegrass-like acoustic music, should start liking it. Like it, don't like it, hate it -- your choice.
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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    None of you will say what bluegrass is, if you don't know what it is, how can you argue about it?

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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    I hope that we're NOT arguing Mike -simply trying to get to the crux of the matter. We all know that Bluegrass music is a form of American Country music that took it's name from the band of musicians that Bill Monroe put together.When Earl Scruggs joined the band,it gained immense popularity because of the Banjo playing of Scruggs,which was a revolutionary style at that time.
    Over the passage of time,& according to Neil Rosenberg's book "Bluegrass - A History",the music became known by the generic name "Bluegrass" because that's what the folk sending their requests in to the radio stations called it "Bluegrass" (style).As Rosenberg states,it was the fans that named the music.
    The sound of Bill Monroe's band with the inclusion of Earl Scruggs,is for most of us the "defining Bluegrass band sound" & that sound / style was imitated by many other bands.
    That's the best i can do re.defining the 'sound' of a Bluegrass band. Re.the 'style' - i'd say that Bluegrass music is very akin to some forms of Jazz,where all the instruments play together,each instrument in it's turn will play an 'improvised' solo,while the other instruments provide the 'accompaniment' - please don't ask me to define Jazz, i need to eat !,
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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    Mike,

    I think that our discussion is going where the Supreme Court was when they tried to define pornography and somebody said something to the effect, "I can't define it, but I know it when I see it".

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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    If there's one thing I can't stand, it's intolerance. That's why I carry a solar powered Taser™ in my case

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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    All music is constantly evolving. When do you take a snapshot in time and say, "That's classic (fill in the blank)"? I mean, what we call American bluegrass is generally thought to have originated in the Appalachians. But of course, that music evolved from European forms, celtic, etc. Then it was popularized, another important moment. Then more musicians start playing it and inevitably put their own interpretations on it, experimenting with new instruments and forms, and so it goes. Which is the real bluegrass?

    If you try to define a musical genre by the instruments used, well, the modern piano didn't exist when most of what we call "classical" music was composed. But if the modern piano had existed, you can bet your boots Mozart would have composed for it--and the electric guitar too. The folks who first started playing something we'd call bluegrass used whatever instruments they could get or make. Probably not too many f-style mandos in the mix. On the other hand, there might well have been a drum (!), since those are easy to make.

    I think folks are right when they say they know it when they hear it. To me, there's a certain feeling evoked by bluegrass, and as long as that's there, I'm happy. I do think there can come a point when you change so much, you lose the soul of the music, so to speak. Then you've got a new genre.

    I'm glad there are purists out there because I think it's important to preserve the original forms; I also salute the experimenters who want to take the music as far as it can go.
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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    Quote Originally Posted by Fretbear
    I am reading a book right now by a feminist who makes an argument that feminism had gotten to the point where a normal hetero-woman was no longer allowed to act or express like one for various reasons.
    Too much PC "Everything is all right everywhere" ends up with "Nothing is right anywhere."
    Thanks for this, I agree.

    Quote Originally Posted by John McGann
    If there's one thing I can't stand, it's intolerance. That's why I carry a solar powered Taser™ in my case
    "Watch out son, I've got a taser gun...."
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    Bill Monroe - "Brakeman's Blues" (definitely bluegrass!)
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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    I wrote this a few years ago when the WIBA thing came up.....still makes sense to me....Loafer...

    What Is Bluegrass?


    RE: I really don't know what this statement means so I won't try to
    understand it. I do know that whatever folklore about the music that
    I " subscribe " to suits me. Some of it I got from the recorded
    efforts of lots of my heroes, some from stories told me by some of
    those same heroes, some of it I was honored to witness first hand. I
    also do not have one single problem figuring out what is or is not
    Blue Grass music, never have. I have even less problems recognizing
    the difference between good Blue Grass and not so good Blue Grass
    music. Don't take a lot of credentials to do this. Don't have to have
    a degree in a thing to hear the difference.
    Blue Grass music has spoken to me in a very distinct language for a
    lot of years. It's related to me, thank goodness, it's very heart and
    soul many, many times. It's told me the way that it wants to be played
    every time I ever tried to play it even when I did not know just how
    to play it as I wanted to, this still happens. It's told me to
    listen, pay attention, remember this phrase, keep this moment alive,
    share it with those who can love it like you do, never forget how
    hard it is to play right but also how easy it is when it is played
    right. This music has sent me on many journeys in search of itself as
    played through others, telling me, see, they know what it is too.
    I've learned to understand the language when it speaks to me, and to
    heed its advice, simple as that. It's sent me to places where I knew
    the playing would be not as good as I would like but there are always
    moments of magic you can find if you try, though sometimes it takes
    all I've got to stay with it. Still it talks to me when I hear the
    good stuff. I find it hard to think I'm the only one who hears it
    like this and I'm sure I'm not but if you play this music, hear it
    like I'm talking about, you don't need a soul to define what it is or
    isn't. Worrying about this assinine question ain't going to help you
    hear it or play it any better. If you're not satisfied that you know
    what it is, find out what it is.
    Blue Grass language is really very easy to understand, just take
    heed when it speaks, it'll tell you when you're doing it good and it
    will really speak loud to you when you're doing it wrong. Let's all
    try to do it as right as we can and see if we can't quit analyzing it
    to death.
    You want something to analyze, I'll send a specimen------------

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    Mando accumulator allenhopkins's Avatar
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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    Very heartfelt; bluegrass has obviously been a big part of your life.

    Can this be adapted into a general descriptive definition that others could understand? There are many kinds of music out there that speak to different individuals. What if it's the blues, or jazz, or Gregorian chanting, that speaks to them the way that bluegrass evidently speaks to you?

    Sometimes I think that we can get so intensely invested in a particular kind of music, that we feel everyone should be able to share our love and understanding of it. That's also when we start resenting others' suggestions that we "broaden our horizons," accept and love other musical styles, even critique the music that seems such an intimate part of us.

    May not be possible to take that step back, to put our beloved music into some kind of perspective, to recognize that what seems so evident to us may be opaque to others. And -- that we may be so close to the trees, that we have a hard time comprehending the forest.

    People who don't share the intensity and immersion of our musical experiences, are not our enemies; they have a different perspective, and may have their own favorite musical places where they go for fulfillment. We can meet on common ground, and accept the personal validity of viewpoints we do not share.

    All of us "hear the good stuff," but it's not the same "good stuff" for each of us. And immersing ourselves, hoping to "hear it or play it better," can sometimes keep us from hearing all the other "good stuff" that's out there, and that others love.
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    Registered User dcoventry's Avatar
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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    I've said it before, but I'll say it again.

    The flash bang moment for me was seeing the Seldom Scene in 1991 at the Great American Music Hall in SF. It blew me clean away. That band with Lou Reid at that time was the best BG band in the land....to me. They played all kinda crazy stuff: Dylan, Motown, and a slew of Grateful Dead songs like, Rider, Sitting on Top of the World, Dark Hollow.......ahem, or so I thought!

    Anyway, that was my benchmark for arrangement, instrumentation, and level of skill. Those were my formative moments. THAT is my bluegrass.
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  24. #24

    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    Allen's account speaks to me. Being devoted myself to forms which elicit from the vast majority of people not mere ambivalence but often extreme aversion, it's rare that I meet people in everyday encounters who share my particular affinities.

    I enjoy music of all types--so it's easy for me to find some commonality. But much of the essence of musical expression that moves me stays hidden--I usually don't even mention my particular musical ambitions in front of people unless I sense they can have some awareness of a "foreign" aesthetic, as it usually is a means of alienation.

    What I find of particular value on forums such as this is the occasional opportunity to have discourse over matters musical that I find are more universal--realms of human experience underlying the creative impulse: it is here--well beneath the surface--where I anticipate that what aesthetic phenomena moves me does so in ways not unlike that for the classic bluegrass afficionado; while there are vast differences in type of medium, there is perhaps little difference in quality of experience.

    It takes some getting used to--when 99% of people have intense disdain for the music we love. But since the gulf of aesthetic preference is vast, I don't bother trying to urge people to understand. I used to be an active proselytizer of riding bicycles, environmentalism, and many alternative lifestyle issues, and became accustomed to resistance and opposition over these matters. An affinity for avant garde jazz is even harder to convey.

  25. #25
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    Default Re: Classic Bluegrass

    Quote Originally Posted by allenhopkins View Post
    OK:

    Didn't Bill Monroe make an LP with Grady Martin on electric guitar? What about Wilene Forrester, the 'Blue Grass Girl' with her accordion?" And then people say I'm trying to tell them they're narrow-minded and should like all these non-standard forms of bluegrass.
    The answer is: he did not. There were three electric sessions over a period of a little more than five weeks. Between the first and second there was a session with the BG Boys.¨

    The electric sessions produced ten songs, four of which were canned. Exactly how these numbers qualify as a "non-standard form of bluegrass" is not at all clear to me.Then you're using the word "bluegrass" so liberally as to render it completely meaningless. There wasn´t the slightest attempt to broaden, develop, or enhance the existing tradition today known as bluegrass, or integrate the electric guitar, organ, or piano
    in that genre.

    Bascially one of the founding fathers of a genre was placed in an entirely different,
    in fact alien, context, much closer to, say, the country music of Red Foley or Little Jimmie Dickens. Do you consider their music to be non-standard bluegrass as well? And what about Ricky Skaggs who had a much longer and much more successful country music period - do you consider that music to be "non-standard Bluegrass" too?

    As for the accordion band (1943-early 1945) people tend to forget that it preceded all of bluegrass chronologically. The use of an accordion was very much in line with contemporary trends in country music. Not until Earl Scruggs joined the group
    in late 1945 can we speak of a genuine, separate tradition/genre - because that's the band others took off from.

    There is good reason to use the term Bluegrass very restrictively today. Many musicians resist the label because of its connotations of purism and parochialism, and we should respect them. Typical in that respect are Punch Brothers and The Infamous Stringdusters. And, of course, when people aplly the term to gorups like the DGQ, The Flecktones, or Strength in Numbers, it gets downright ridiculous. Do we need labels at all?

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