I am here to spread the vast joy of Appalachian folk music. For many years I was a genre-jumping tourist with no musical home. When I found Appalachian folk music it saved my soul. Do you think this is exaggeration? COVID hit, a relationship of several years fell apart on me, and then my poor papa drowned in the ocean, all in a year's time. True stories. I was destroyed and wrecked and ruined and all I could do was play this music and sing it at the top of my lungs while driving around at dusk with windows down, and it saved me, it got me to the other side of that awful brown and roaring river. It is the most beautiful music I know, it does not need to be your own home genre, only love it for the gemstones it is made of. A few Favorites to start:>The Fiddle Tune. The saving grace of ten dozen generations of Celts and savages scraping life off of hard land. The instrument that sings:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMAyOcKHx_I&list=RDMMAyOcKHx_I&start_radio=1>The Dirge. The modal song, the Ancient Tones, the hymns of the Primitive Baptists, the flat tone given hard souled unto the valley:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qfFJeUdWXI&list=RD4qfFJeUdWXI&start_radio=1>The Old Time Bandshow. Bring your friends to the corn shucking. Gather round in winter 1919 for a four piece band. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YBh5us2J1I&list=RD0YBh5us2J1I&start_radio=1>Bluegrass, Mountain Music on Steroids, FAST and smacking of genuine BLUES in CHURCHhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvkxwTTxe6M&list=RDjvkxwTTxe6M&start_radio=1>And the Old Meadow Man who fiddles and singshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jv6RN3KpVk0&list=RDjv6RN3KpVk0&start_radio=1Do you know more beautiful music in this tradition? Share! Do you have any stories of falling in love with it or dropping into a jam? Do you play instruments?
>>130363491i would give it a shot but im sick of violins. electric guitar + piano harmony 5me
>>130364037you ever played one? My god it is a powerful instrument. It's unbelievable. You have more possibility for and control of the sound than any other instrument I think. Tricky as a devil to learn on but it really might be one of the most incredible instruments from the past. It can play melodic lines as well as anything, but then has an amazing possibility of double-bowing for harmonies with two strings. A singer can play the remaining notes of a chord triad for whatever note they are singing. An interesting thing in Appalachian folk is that the fiddle is played in the same way that vocals are sung: minimal vibrato, dead-on tone, and a carefully held-out note (long bow).
>>130363491im only into the really authentic recordings from the 20s and such
>>130367001That's awesome anon, got any gems you'd like to share? Sometimes I wonder about how the first generation of fiddlers to be recorded ended up having enormous influence on the genre because the oldest recordings are understood as the most authentic. wouldn't it be awesome to hear just one song from 1800?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LstLpd_iVWA
>>130363491>OLD TIME BLUEGRASS>All new standard recordingsCome on now https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ag2cJG_pNqQ&pp=ygUgc3RyaW5nYmVhbiBydW4gbGl0dGxlIHJhYmJpdCBydW4%3D
>>130363491ive played fiddle for 20 something years, did the whole OT festival jamming circuit yadda yadda.. the scene is kinda weird it presents itself as being progressive and a sort of evolution of the hippy culture but when you dig into it, its just re-creating the same power structures ego trips and cults of celebrity found in normie capitalist society. also its mega creepy how theres a definite undercurrent of racism and intolerance in celebrating music of the antebellum period. not all old things are worth holding on to. we can let this music die..
>>130363491i notice you did not post a single reference to black old time players which played a much larger role in shaping this style of music than the "celts" (which are not even a real group of people, see /his/ for more details)
big Gillian Welch fan
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Ol_DKBRlyk
>>130371878now THIS on the other hand is some actual good fiddle music
>>130371997well met, my brother in christ
https://youtu.be/5lHZ1acjNDU?si=xf_PHyITpkAlRENCI’ve been obsessed with this song lately. It’s an Appalachian version of the medieval “Wife of Usher’s Well” with ultra sad and spooky lyrics. Buell Kazee (coolest name ever) recorded a lot of old ballads in the late 1920s and his banjo playing was one of the influences that made me want to learn the instrument.
>>130367001>>130367485>im only into the really authentic recordings from the 20s and suchThe Folkways Anthology of American Folk Music compiled by Harry Smith is a good place to start. It’s 84 old 78s of hillbilly, black and Cajun music. The commercial record companies in the 20s got to some good stuff before the Lomaxes and others made field recordings. Clarence Ashley, Buell Kazee, Uncle Dave Macon, Kelly Harrell, Charlie Poole, Dock Boggs, Carter Family, Skillet Lickers, Mainer’s Mountaineers, Crockett Family, Bascom Lamar Lunsford are some great artists from the pre WWII era.
>>130367485>wouldn't it be awesome to hear just one song from 1800?https://youtu.be/HDllqYFQLFE?si=NFj8pC76h98brVjSThis Texas fiddler was born in 1847 and is one of the oldest trad musicians to be recorded.
>>130372337cool it shows the roots and power of boogie woogie
Been into bluegrass scene for three years. Its the most fun a decent amateur musician can have.I go to festivals and get to play with amazing players. All the band bullshit is absent for festival jamming. If you can hang with it you will get friends and opportunities to play. There are multiple subgenres. You don't have to play strict Monroe style. Monroe was a talented man though. He does grow on you as you understand more. The Monroe style bluegrass quintet is quite powerful.
>>130372514I’m mostly a clawhammer banjo player but I’m welcome at bluegrass jams because I can play rhythm but not too loud, I know a million lyrics and can sing harmony and I let the Scruggs pickers take the fancy breaks. I started in the old time scene but got tired of no singing and “here’s another obscure fiddle tune in a weird tuning”. Every jam has a different vibe but I feel comfortable when I’m not the best or the worst musician in the circle. I just wish I had more time to go to festivals as I mostly go to local jams.
>>130370543>mega creepy how theres a definite undercurrent of racism and intolerance in celebrating music of the antebellum periodA lot of “authentic trad Appalachian music that came from the British Isles” started off composed by some Yankee and first performed by blackface minstrels in New York. Over time it came south and got hillbilly-ized, putting whiteface over black comic tropes. It’s meta weird, one more example of the fakelore in American popular music, but a lot of it is still good music. Here’s Uncle Dave Macon’s awesome version of a song composed by black minstrel (yes they existed) Sam Lucas. What could be more hillbilly than “Carve That Possum”?https://youtu.be/CCGnBcj57UI?si=y_bCAy_cGjqqewfC
>>130370543So you were never into it for the love of the music.
This is my genre of choice :)Here is a recording from a session I did with a fiddler friend of mine the other day. https://voca.ro/192EX1s6dCqTStill working on the mix and everything, but we have about an album's worth of these instrumental duets right now.
