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The Urban History of Rural
Country Music
Transition
of Rural Music from Urban Roots (Paperback
- 23 Nov 2010)
Robert D. Morritt
Availability
The title of this book was
selected to specifically distinguish it as ‘not another book about Nashville
music, which would be an accurate statement.
The author collected early ‘rural
recordings’ for many years. From listening to their lyrics he noticed their
structure betrayed a much earlier provenance. Many had they had evolved into
American ballads, their British origin l ong forgotten. Many of these ballads resurfaced on early
recordings originating from rural Appalachia where they had orally been
preserved in the hills. Other influences noted were that of urban recordings
purchased by rural people from mail order catalogues contained Victorian or
earlier songs.
This book identifies many of these
obscure ballads and in retrospect a more apt book ‘title’ may have been, “The
migration of urban Songs into early Country Records which an accurate
description of the contents. The book represents the author’s journeys (for
many years) into rural Barns, and flea markets during vacation ‘stops’ in
Appalachia to forage for early recordings and is enhanced from his
discography compilations over the years and his sizeable vintage record
collection which assisted him to collate this information into some semblance
of order.
Examples of the transition of
early songs and ballads include the following: An original 18th century ballad sheet from England was found in
a ‘flea market’ it was called, ‘The Valiant Sailor’ the author he compared it
to an ‘Country’ recording made in 1927 of ‘Charles Guiteau’ (Guiteau shot
President James A. Garfield in 1881) he discovered that the song parodied the
song ‘Valiant Sailor’.
The book includes examples of similar ballads “The Boston Burglar’,
which became a Country recording, ‘The Louisville Burglar'. The listings go
on with many other examples including
‘Tin Pan Alley’ songs reincarnated as
‘Country Music’ In depth disco graphical information is included.
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