Re: Why the nasal singing?
I think that the tradition of "high lonesome" singing long predates Bill Monroe and bluegrass. Listening to unaccompanied Appalachian singers one hears both men and women singing at the higher end of their vocal ranges. The need to be heard before the days of amplification, the emotional content of nearly "straining" vocals sung in a piercing tone, and the influence of even earlier British Isles traditions of vocal stylings, probably had a lot to do with this. Singing over a fiddle-led string band, without a microphone, would also push vocalists to sing loud, sing high, and select the most "projecting" tone they could deliver.
Nimrod Workman
Dillard Chandler
Almeda Riddle
I do agree that contemporary bluegrass singers adopting a style that's not natural to them, and sounding "affected" and imitative, makes little sense. Bluegrass has featured its share of lower-range lead singers, from Charlie Waller to John Starling and many more, and it can seem a bit incongruous when some guy from Brooklyn or San Diego suddenly starts trying to sound like he just came out of the Appalachians. I remember a college roommate laughing at Joan Baez's adopted "Southern Ohio accent" when she sang songs like Banks of the Ohio and Little Darling, Pal of Mine on her early albums. No different from the Rolling Stones trying to sound African-American, or a whole slew of folk revivalists trying to sound English or Irish, though.
Allen Hopkins
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