Torsdagens Shoot-udsendelse er helliget countrymusik

 Ifølge Merriam-Webster online-ordbog er country:

”Music derived from or imitating the folk style of the Southern U.S. or of the Western cowboy

especially : popular vocal music characterized by simple harmonies, accompaniment by stringed instruments (such as guitar, fiddle, banjo, and pedal steel), repeated choruses, and often narrative lyrics

— called also country, country and western

First Known Use of country music: 1942”

På Dictionary.com lyder definitionen:

“a style and genre of largely string-accompanied American popular music having roots in the folk music of the Southeast and cowboy music of the West, usually vocalized, generally simple in form and harmony, and typified by romantic or melancholy ballads accompanied by acoustic or electric guitar, banjo, violin, and harmonica.”

På netop citerede side, kan man dog klikke sig videre til beskrivelser med mere kød på:

What comes to mind when we say country music? Pickup trucks and cowboy hats? Garth Brooks and Patsy Cline? How about West African string instruments and Atlanta-based hip-hop? Past and present, country music—and what gets to be called country music—is far more complex than many realize.

What is country music?

Country music is defined as “a style and genre of largely string-accompanied American popular music having roots in the folk music of the Southeast and cowboy music of the West, usually vocalized, generally simple in form and harmony, and typified by romantic or melancholy ballads accompanied by acoustic or electric guitar, banjo, violin, and harmonica.”

The regional influences of the genre are likely how it came to be known as country music in the first place. The word country itself is old, however, recorded in English in the 1200s. By the early 1500s, country was being used to denote rural areas and things in distinction to urban ones. There’s even evidence of the phrase country music in the late 1500s, though the name for the modern music genre, alongside country and western and country-western, isn’t recorded until the 1940s.

What about the actual music the phrase describes? Most people think country music began with the cowboys who sang campfire songs out on cattle drives, but its true origins are far older and more diverse that.

For instance, the banjo—an instrument prominently featured in country and bluegrass music and, as a result, associated with white people—is based on instruments black slaves brought from West Africa. As Pamela Foster, author of My Country: The African Diaspora’s Country Music Heritage (1998), explained in the Chicago Tribune: “In the antebellum South, banjos, fiddles and harmonicas were the dominant instruments played in black culture. Unfortunately, history has distorted these facts to make people believe jazz, blues and spirituals were the staples of black culture at that time when, in fact, it was country.”

After slavery was abolished, segregation and Jim Crow laws meant that music was often separated into genres by race. White folk music became country music while music by black artists, including blues, gospel, and rhythm and blues, was labelled “race” music. But, black and white artists worked together in music studios more often than is thought. Patrick Huber, a professor of history and political science at Missouri University of Science and Technology, notably identified around 50 black artists who played on white “hillbilly” records, as they have been called, before 1932.

Nevertheless, the erasure of black artists has long been a problem in what we popularly understand as country music. Many people know Johnny Cash, for example, but they don’t know DeFord Bailey, a black musician, best known for his harmonica playing, who was an early superstar of the Grand Ole Opry in the 1920s. Such erasure continues today, as we see with Atlanta rapper Lil Nas X (Montero Lamar Hill), who can’t seem to get his own hit country song recognized by the music industry.”

Læs videre herunder

Ovenstående er efterhånden blevet en lang og forudsigelig smøre, så jeg undlader at citere Den Store Danske Lexs definition af countrymusik. I virkeligheden handler dette opslag også bare om, at man på torsdag, d. 15. oktober, skal stille ind på Mod Strømmen. Her vil Jan Damage Petersen, Thomas Løppenthin, Lars Krogh og undertegnede, divertere med nedslag i countrymusikkens lange historie. Stil ind, kl. 18.00, på enten FM 98.9 eller via et af disse link: den direkte stream / TuneIn. Tak for opmærksomheden.