Appalachian music

Appalachian music is the music of the region of Appalachia in the Eastern United States. It is derived from various European and African influences, including English ballads, Irish and Scottish traditional music (especially fiddle music), hymns, and African-American blues. First recorded in the 1920s, Appalachian musicians were a key influence on the early development of Old-time music, country music, and bluegrass, and were an important part of the American folk music revival of the 1960s. Instruments typically used to perform Appalachian music include the banjo, American fiddle, fretted dulcimer, and guitar. Appalachian music is the music of the region of Appalachia in the Eastern United States. It is derived from various European and African influences, including English ballads, Irish and Scottish traditional music (especially fiddle music), hymns, and African-American blues. First recorded in the 1920s, Appalachian musicians were a key influence on the early development of Old-time music, country music, and bluegrass, and were an important part of the American folk music revival of the 1960s. Instruments typically used to perform Appalachian music include the banjo, American fiddle, fretted dulcimer, and guitar. Early recorded Appalachian musicians include Fiddlin' John Carson, G. B. Grayson & Henry Whitter, Bascom Lamar Lunsford, the Carter Family, Clarence Ashley, and Dock Boggs, all of whom were initially recorded in the 1920s and 1930s. Several Appalachian musicians obtained renown during the folk revival of the 1950s and 1960s, including Jean Ritchie, Roscoe Holcomb, Ola Belle Reed, Lily May Ledford, Hedy West and Doc Watson. Country and bluegrass artists such as Loretta Lynn, Roy Acuff, Dolly Parton, Earl Scruggs, Chet Atkins, The Stanley Brothers and Don Reno were heavily influenced by traditional Appalachian music. Immigrants from England, the Scottish lowlands, and Ulster arrived in Appalachia in the 17th and 18th centuries, and brought with them the musical traditions of these regions, consisting primarily of English and Scottish ballads— which were essentially unaccompanied narratives— and dance music, such as reels, which were accompanied by a fiddle. Many Appalachian ballads, such as 'Pretty Saro', 'The Cuckoo', 'Pretty Polly', and 'Matty Groves', are rooted in the English ballad tradition. Other songs popular in Appalachia, such as 'Young Hunting,' 'Lord Randal,' and 'Barbara Allen', have lowland Scottish roots. The dance tune 'Cumberland Gap' may be derived from the tune that accompanies the Scottish ballad 'Bonnie George Campbell'. Some fiddle tunes popular in Appalachia have origins in Gaelic-speaking regions such as western Ireland and the Scottish Highlands--for example 'Leather Britches,' based on 'Lord MacDonald's Reel.' Printed versions of these were very popular and common throughout the British Empire in the eighteenth century, including North America, and would likely have spread into Appalachia as well. This explains the presence of these tunes in a region which had relatively little Gaelic-speaking settlement. The early British isles immigrants also brought a form of church singing called lining out, in which one person sings a line of a psalm or hymn and the rest of the congregation responds. This type of congregational singing, once very common all over colonial America, is now largely restricted to Old Regular Baptist churches in the hills of southwest Virginia and eastern Kentucky.