Music

It is likely that most fans of bluegrass music would concede that no state should be more associated with bluegrass music than Kentucky--and rightly so. Bluegrass music draws its name from the band that Kentuckian Bill Monroe formed during the late 1930s and 1940s. Bill named his band Bill Monroe and The Blue Grass Boys to honor his home state. Eventually, the music these bands and others like them were playing came to be known as bluegrass music. Later, another Kentuckian, Ebo Walker, while playing with the Bowling Green-based bluegrass band, New Grass Revival, coined the phrase "newgrass" to describe the band's progressive style of music. Other Kentuckians such as Bobby and Sonny Osborne, J. D. Crowe, Ricky Skaggs, and Dale Ann Bradley have become bluegrass stars. Some of the musicians from Kentucky covered in this book are quite famous--some are not. Famous or not, all of them have a deep-rooted passion for the music they play.

Forged on the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers during the nineteenth century, jug band music was the early soundtrack for a new nation. Louisville was at the heart of it all. German and Irish immigrants, former slaves en route to Chicago and homesteaders moving into the city created a fertile ground for this new sound. Artists like Earl McDonald and his Original Louisville Jug Band made the city legendary. Some stayed in this so-called money town, passing on licks and melodies that still influence bands like the Juggernaut Jug Band. Tune in to Louisville's jug band music history with local writer Michael Jones and discover a tradition that has left a long-lasting impression on America's musical culture.

Kentuckians have been wearing out shoe leather at informal jamborees since the state was settled over two hundred years ago. Tadpole's Dew Drop Inn played host to some fifteen hundred musical shindigs in its time as a mecca of Marshall County music. A Rosine barn dance gave bluegrass founder Bill Monroe his start, and another fosters new musical talent at its weekly get-togethers. Clawhammer banjo players, Appalachian cloggers and square dance callers from Possum Trot to Rabbit Hash celebrate the unique musical culture of Kentucky. Join Grammy-nominated soundtrack artist J.D. Wilkes as he waltzes around the Bluegrass, looking for oprys, socials, porch pickins and barn dances in every holler.

Within these pages are vintage postcards, created between 1900 and 1950, that depict an area known across the country as Kentucky's Bluegrass. From its horse farms to its military forts and river commerce, this seventeen county region exemplifies the spirit and pride of Kentucky, and the images preserved on these postcards bring the history of this unique area to life.