A decade on, the Coen brothers' woefully underrated
O Brother, Where Art Thou? [alt] is remembered for
a lot of things: its sun-drenched, sepia-rich
cinematography (a pioneer of
digital color grading), its
whimsical humor,
fluid vernacular, and
many subtle references to Homer's
Odyssey. But one part of its legacy truly stands out:
the music.
Assembled by
T-Bone Burnett, the soundtrack is a cornucopia of American folk music, exhibiting everything from
cheery ballads and
angelic hymns to
wistful blues and
chain-gang anthems. Woven into the plot of the film through radio and live performances, the songs lent the story a
heartfelt, homespun feel that echoed its cultural heritage,
a paean and uchronia of the Old South.
Though the multiplatinum album was recently
reissued, the movie's medley is best heard via famed documentarian
D. A. Pennebaker's
Down from the Mountain, an
extraordinary yet
intimate concert film focused on a night of live music by the soundtrack's stars (among them
Gillian Welch,
Emmylou Harris,
Chris Thomas King, bluegrass legend
Dr. Ralph Stanley) and wryly hosted by
John Hartford, an accomplished
fiddler,
riverboat captain, and
raconteur whose struggle with terminal cancer made this his last major performance. The film is free in its entirety on
Hulu and
YouTube -- click inside for individual clips, song links, and breakdowns of
the set list's fascinating history.
[more inside]
posted by Rhaomi
on Dec 22, 2011 -
107 comments
Nothing to do this coming week? Head over to
Galax, Virginia to catch the
Old Fiddler's Convention, a mountain music festival & competition that has been ongoing since 1935.
Galax, located on Virigina's
Crooked Road is in the heart of Virginia's musical heritage trail, a
well mapped excursion that takes you way off the interstate's beaten path to experience old time Appalachian music in some of the most beautiful settings in the Blue Ridge Mountains.
If you take the trail outside Galax, make sure you stop at the
Floyd Country Store for daily (and nightly) jams inside the store, much like the Fiddler's convention's campgrounds' awesome
impromptu jams
posted by priested
on Aug 6, 2011 -
14 comments
Ola Belle Reed came down from the mountains and carried that old-timey sound with her. Her voice and her banjo took her from family sing-alongs to rubbing elbows with some of America's best-known country and bluegrass musicians. Radio stations played her work, and with a little help from friends like Marty Stuart and Del McCoury, her musical legacy lives. Or, as Reed herself sang, "I've worked for the rich, I've lived with the poor; Lord, I've seen many a heartache, there'll be many more; I've lived, loved and sorrowed, been to success's door;
I've endured, I've endured."
[more inside]
posted by MonkeyToes
on Feb 20, 2011 -
7 comments
Progressive bluegrass takes the original “melting pot of American music” and infuses it with strains of punk and rock, often giving rise to
performances of intense musicianship. Some of the tunes might be familiar to you, such as
Crooked Still’s cover of Johnny Cash’s Ain’t No Grave, featured on the
True Blood soundtrack, or their
aching, gender-twisting rendition of Robert Johnson’s Come On In My Kitchen. Some might be entirely new, such as
Seven Story Mountain, by Railroad Earth, or
Codeine, from Trampled By Turtles.
[more inside]
posted by Bora Horza Gobuchul
on Feb 16, 2011 -
29 comments
In 1969 banjo virtuoso and bluegrass innovator Earl Scruggs parted ways with his
longtime musical partner
Lester Flatt and the band they led to
great popularity and acclaim,
The Foggy Mountain Boys. Scruggs wanted to push his musical gifts as far as they could go. In 1970 he was the subject of a PBS documentary where he played with artists such as Bob Dylan, Doc Watson, The Morris Brothers, The Byrds, Charlie Daniels, Bill Monroe, Joan Baez, various friends and family members, and even records a track accompanying a Moog. You can watch the whole thing online:
Earl Scruggs, His Family and Friends.
posted by Kattullus
on Jan 28, 2011 -
17 comments
Bluegrass, it's said was invented by
Bill Monroe,
(yt) but where
would bluegrass have been without the banjo style of
Earl
Scruggs?
(yt) Together they
created a sound that has become known
as Bluegrass. In 1945 George Elam Scruggs joined up with
Monroe's Blue Grass Boys, two years later Scruggs left to form
a group with
Lester Flatt(yt), but not before gifting Monroe with
the amalgam that was and is Bluegrass. Other players like
Chubby Wise born 1915, Lake City, Florida(yt), and bassist Howard
Watts became known as the "Original Bluegrass Band".
[more inside]
posted by nola
on Feb 28, 2010 -
19 comments
Pilgrim Productions Presents: Voices Across America, an archive of gospel music in a variety of genres, submitted for free play and download by church groups and folk and traditional groups across the country and beyond. Style, age, and quality vary greatly, but fans of noncommercial music will enjoy hunting for the gems of blues, Cajun, bluegrass, choral, shapenote, country, vintage, and mountain gospel and more.
posted by Miko
on May 24, 2009 -
15 comments
"With
this blog, I want to use the Folkways Anthology as a roadmap to explore American folk music and maybe other countries traditions along the way. I’ll use texts, images, music and videos gathered from my personal collection and from the net to make this work-in-progress enjoyable and educational the best I can."
(via)
posted by 1f2frfbf
on Mar 12, 2009 -
17 comments
Music in the Digital Library of Appalachia provides an unprecedented resource for study of repertoire, technique, lore, and the musical interchanges among the region's traditional musicians. Once you know what you like, it's easy to find the music live with
Blue Ridge Music Trails. Meet musicians who have grown up with that music, visit settings in which Blue Ridge folk music thrives, see traditional dancing, and in many cases, take part in the festivities.
The Crooked Road, Virginia’s Heritage Music Trail, winds through the mountains of Southwest Virginia. Along the trail, the Bluegrass, Old Time, and Traditional Country music is as beautiful and rugged as the landscape itself.
[previous 1, 2]
posted by netbros
on Mar 8, 2009 -
12 comments
MusicMoose wants "to provide the world with free, useful music lessons, and a community based site to help back it all up." The
site contains hundreds of free video music
lessons (often containing notation and/or tablature) with a distinct focus on acoustic and bluegrass music, all taught by some pretty
badass pickers (including the astonishingly good mandolin shredder Anthony Hannigan). There are also obligatory but very useful
forums.
Takeaway: the whole thing is free and you don't have to register to watch the lessons.
posted by kosem
on Jun 29, 2007 -
15 comments
Dim Lights, Thick Smoke, and Loud, Loud Music Photgrapher
Henry Horenstein's
Honky-Tonk: Portraits of Country Music, 1972-1981 captures a sound in transition. This evocative collection of informal, black-and-white portraits of country musicians and fans in bars, backstage, and on the road illustrate a decade when smoky roadhouses and
venerated venues began to give way to the more mainstream
Countrypolitan or "Nashville" sound. Seminal artists like
Mother Maybelle Carter and
Bill Monroe mingled backstage with shinier newcomers like
Dolly Parton and
Anne Murray. But even as the commercial sound was dominating, youngsters mixing with old-timers sparked
the first wave of old-time/bluegrass revival, and some of the artists who got started then still
carry the
torch for a non-Nashville sound today. In this online exhibit you can watch it all unfold.
posted by Miko
on Feb 2, 2007 -
30 comments
Folkstreams.net has two goals. One is to build a national preserve of hard-to-find documentary films about American folk or roots cultures. The other is to give them renewed life by streaming them on the internet. The films were produced by independent filmmakers in a golden age that began in the 1960s and was made possible by the development first of portable cameras and then capacity for synch sound. Their films focus on the culture, struggles, and arts of unnoticed Americans from many different regions and communities. The filmmakers were driven more by sheer engagement with the people and their traditions than by commercial hopes. Their films have unusual subjects, odd lengths, and talkers who do not speak "broadcast English." Although they won prizes at film festivals, were used in college classes, and occasionally were shown on PBS, they found few outlets in venues like theaters, video shops or commercial television. But they have permanent value...
folkstreams.net Currently streaming are the films
The Land Where the Blues Began ,
Cajun Country ,
Jazz Parades: Feet Don't Fail Me Now ,
Talking Feet: Solo Southern Dance: Buck, Flatfoot and Tap ,
Ray Lum: Mule Trader and
Pizza Pizza Daddy-O , among
many others.
posted by y2karl
on Oct 6, 2006 -
14 comments
Made most popular to many Americans as the closing song for the Grand Ole Opry programs, Will The Circle Be Unbroken was written in 1907 by Ada Habershon, an intensely religious young woman and acquaintance of
Dwight Moody and
Ira David Sankey. The music was "composed" by
Charles Gabriel, a popular songwriter and composer of the era who is often solely credited with the song, but while he may have put the notes down on paper, the tune itself already existed as the African-American spiritual Glory Glory / Since I Laid My Burden Down. [lots more inside]
posted by luriete
on May 26, 2006 -
18 comments
701 78s. A huge set of "old-time" music recordings from 1924-1946, made available in RealAudio format by honkingduck.com. Not high sound quality, but an invaluable collection for anyone with any interest in early recorded bluegrass, folk, country, blues, etc.
posted by staggernation
on Nov 10, 2003 -
23 comments
