Hillbilly is a term for people who dwell in rural, mountainous areas in the United States, primarily in the Appalachian region. As people migrated out of the region during the Great Depression, the term spread northward and westward with them.
Appalachia is a geographic region located in the central and southern sections of the Appalachian Mountains of the eastern United States. It stretches from the western Catskill Mountains of New York state into Pennsylvania, continuing on through the Blue Ridge Mountains and Great Smoky Mountains into northern Georgia and Alabama. In 2020, the region was home to an estimated 26.1 million people, of whom roughly 80% were white.
Ralph Edmund Stanley was an American bluegrass artist, known for his distinctive singing and banjo playing. Stanley began playing music in 1946, originally with his older brother Carter Stanley as part of The Stanley Brothers, and most often as the leader of his band, The Clinch Mountain Boys. He was also known as Dr. Ralph Stanley.
The Music of Kentucky is heavily centered on Appalachian folk music and its descendants, especially in eastern Kentucky. Bluegrass music is of particular regional importance; Bill Monroe, "the father of bluegrass music", was born in the Ohio County community of Rosine, and he named his band, the Blue Grass Boys, after the bluegrass state, i.e., Kentucky. Travis picking, the influential guitar style, is named after Merle Travis, born and raised in Muhlenberg County. Kentucky is home to the Country Music Highway, which extends from Portsmouth, Ohio, to the Virginia border in Pike County.
Old-time music is a genre of North American folk music. It developed along with various North American folk dances, such as square dancing, clogging, and buck dancing. It is played on acoustic instruments, generally centering on a combination of fiddle and plucked string instruments, most often the banjo, guitar, and mandolin. Together, they form an ensemble called the string band, which has historically been the most common configuration to play old-time music. The genre is considered a precursor to modern country music.
Hazel Jane Dickens was an American bluegrass singer, songwriter, double bassist and guitarist. Her music was characterized not only by her high, lonesome singing style, but also by her provocative pro-union, feminist songs. Cultural blogger John Pietaro noted that "Dickens didn’t just sing the anthems of labor, she lived them and her place on many a picket line, staring down gunfire and goon squads, embedded her into the cause." The New York Times extolled her as "a clarion-voiced advocate for coal miners and working people and a pioneer among women in bluegrass music." With Alice Gerrard, Dickens was one of the first women to record a bluegrass album.
John Cohen was an American musician, photographer and film maker who performed and documented the traditional music of the rural South and played a major role in the American folk music revival. In the 1950s and 60s, Cohen was a founding member of the New Lost City Ramblers, a New York–based string band. Cohen made several expeditions to Peru to film and record the traditional culture of the Q'ero, an indigenous people. Cohen was also a professor of visual arts at SUNY Purchase College for 25 years.
Songcatcher is a 2000 drama film directed by Maggie Greenwald. It is about a musicologist researching and collecting Appalachian folk music in the mountains of western North Carolina. Although Songcatcher is a fictional film, it is loosely based on the work of Olive Dame Campbell, founder of the John C. Campbell Folk School in Brasstown, North Carolina, and that of the English folk song collector Cecil Sharp, portrayed at the end of the film as professor Cyrus Whittle. The film grossed $3 million in limited theatrical release in the United States, which was generally considered as a respectable result for an arthouse film release in 2001.
Appalachian music is the music of the region of Appalachia in the Eastern United States. Traditional Appalachian music is derived from various influences, including the ballads, hymns and fiddle music of the British Isles, the African music and blues of early African Americans, and to a lesser extent the music of Continental Europe.
Larry Eugene Sparks, is an American Bluegrass singer and guitarist. He was the winner of the 2004 and 2005 International Bluegrass Music Association Male Vocalist of the Year Award. 2005, won IBMA for Album of the Year and Recorded Event of the Year for his album "40," celebrating his 40th year(2003) in bluegrass music.
The Eastern Kentucky Coalfield is part of the Central Appalachian bituminous coalfield, including all or parts of 30 Kentucky counties and adjoining areas in Ohio, West Virginia, Virginia, and Tennessee. It covers an area from the Allegheny Mountains in the east across the Cumberland Plateau to the Pottsville Escarpment in the west. The region is known for its coal mining; most family farms in the region have disappeared since the introduction of surface mining in the 1940s and 1950s.
The Upland South and Upper South are two overlapping cultural and geographic subregions in the inland part of the Southern United States. They differ from the Deep South and Atlantic coastal plain by terrain, history, economics, demographics, and settlement patterns.
Michael Johnathon is an American folk singer-songwriter, producer, author, and playwright. He has released 20 albums, published 5 books, a play, composed an opera, performs with symphony orchestras and in coffee houses, completed a motion picture script, created three volunteer organizations and tours nationwide.
Sonny Osborne was an American bluegrass musician and founding member of the Osborne Brothers.
Appalachian Ohio is a bioregion and political unit in the southeastern part of the U.S. state of Ohio, characterized by the western foothills of the Appalachian Mountains and the Appalachian Plateau. The Appalachian Regional Commission defines the region as consisting of thirty-two counties. This region roughly overlaps with the Appalachian mixed-mesophytic forests, which begin in southeast Ohio and southwest Pennsylvania and continue south to Georgia and Alabama. The mixed-mesophytic forest is found only in Central and Southern Appalachia and eastern/central China. It is one of the most biodiverse temperate forests in the world.
Rickie Lee Skaggs, known professionally as Ricky Skaggs, is an American neotraditional country and bluegrass singer, musician, producer, and composer. He primarily plays mandolin; however, he also plays fiddle, guitar, mandocaster, and banjo.
John Sturgill Simpson is an American country music singer-songwriter and actor. As of February 2022, he has released seven albums as a solo artist. Simpson's style has been met with critical favor and frequent comparisons to outlaw country.
Tom & Jerry is a 2021 American live-action/animated slapstick comedy film based on the cartoon characters of the same name created by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, produced by Warner Animation Group and distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures. It is the second theatrical film based on the characters, following Tom and Jerry: The Movie (1992), and the third to combine live-action and animation, following Anchors Aweigh (1945) and Dangerous When Wet (1953). The film is directed by Tim Story and written by Kevin Costello. It stars Chloë Grace Moretz, Michael Peña, Colin Jost, Rob Delaney, Pallavi Sharda, Jordan Bolger, Patsy Ferran, and Ken Jeong in live-action roles, with Nicky Jam, Bobby Cannavale, and Lil Rel Howery in voice roles. The titular duo are voiced by William Hanna via archival recordings, with additional vocals from Kaiji Tang and André Sogliuzzo. Set in a world co-populated by humans and cartoon animals, the film follows Tom enlisted to catch Jerry, whose presence threatens New York City's fanciest hotel and its planned high-profile Indian-themed wedding.
Anna & Elizabeth are an Americana/folk music duo formed by Anna Roberts-Gevalt and Elizabeth Laprelle, integrating experimental music with authentic performances of folk songs from both the north and south of the US.
Mike Oberst is an American multinstrumentalist, musician, artist and songwriter based in Cincinnati, Ohio, who performs solo and as a member of the band, The Tillers, which he co-founded. As a solo artist he has released two albums and appeared as a guest on Jean Dowell's album, A Place Way Back in Time, which he produced. Additionally, The Tillers have released five studio albums and one concert album. They have performed internationally, including shows with Pokey LaFarge, Justin Townes Earle, Jerry Douglas, Iris Dement, Rev. Horton Heat, Doc Watson, Taj Mahal, Guy Clark, The Hackensaw Boys, Country Joe Mcdonald, Th' Legendary Shack Shakers, Dex Romweber, Rev. Peyton's Big Damn Band, The Dirt Daubers and more. Band member Joe Macheret has described their style as a mix of various American Folk styles with pieces of Bluegrass and bits of Jazz and Blues.
