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. The genre is considered a precursor to modern country music.
Alan Jabbour was an American musician and folklorist, and the founding director of the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress.
Randall Franks is an American film and television actor, author, and bluegrass singer and musician who plays fiddle, mandolin, guitar, and mountain dulcimer. He was inducted into the Tri-State Gospel Music Hall of Fame in 2022; and America's Old Time Country Music Hall of Fame in 2019; Independent Country Music Hall of Fame in 2013; recognized by the International Bluegrass Music Museum & Hall of Fame in 2010 as a Bluegrass Legend; inducted into the Atlanta Country Music Hall of Fame in 2004; and was designated the "Appalachian Ambassador of the Fiddle". and was inducted into the Chamber Business Person Hall of Fame and honored as Patriotic Citizen of the Year in 2020. He was chosen as the first 2020 AirPlay Direct Evolution Grant Artist (www.AirPlayDirect.com).
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.
Wade Ward was an American old-time music banjo player and fiddler from Independence, Virginia. He was widely known playing the clawhammer banjo and frequently won the Galax, Virginia Old Time Fiddler's Convention. His instrument, a Gibson RB-11 5-string banjo, is now in the collection of the Smithsonian Institution. Along with Kyle Creed, Wade Ward is known for his 'Galax' style of playing the clawhammer banjo.
James Edward "Ed" Haley was a blind professional American musician and composer best known for his fiddle playing.
Jean Bell Thomas was an American photographer and folk festival promoter, who specialized in the music, crafts, and language patterns of the Appalachian region of the United States.
Appalachian studies is the area studies field concerned with the Appalachian region of the United States.
The Council of the Southern Mountains (CSM) was a non-profit organization, active from 1912 to 1989, concerned with education and community development in southern Appalachia.
Addie Prater Graham was born in 1890 at Gilmore in Wolfe County in the mountains of eastern Kentucky. She was a masterful traditional singer whose life and repertoire reflect both deep tradition and an era of social change in the Appalachian Mountains. She sang ballads which trace back to the British Isles, others composed in America, frolic songs and ditties, and religious songs in the Primitive Baptist tradition. While the Old Baptist belief of her parents forbade the use of musical instruments, she became an accomplished unaccompanied singer in the complex, highly ornamented style of Kentucky's oral tradition.
Fiddlin' Arthur Smith was an American old time fiddler and a major influence on the old time and bluegrass music genres.
James Henry Neel Reed was an American fiddler and banjoist in the Appalachian music tradition. Reed became known for his fiddle tunes only after Alan Jabbour and the Hollow Rock String Band spread his music. Reed never had a professional career as a fiddler but was able to influence many other musicians through a relationship with his apprentice Alan Jabbour.
Erynn Marshall is a Canadian old-time fiddler, ethnomusicologist, teacher, and author.
"Cumberland Gap" is an Appalachian folk song that likely dates to the latter half of the 19th century and was first recorded in 1924. The song is typically played on banjo or fiddle, and well-known versions of the song include instrumental versions as well as versions with lyrics. A version of the song appeared in the 1934 book, American Ballads and Folk Songs, by folk song collector John Lomax. Woody Guthrie recorded a version of the song at his Folkways sessions in the mid-1940s, and the song saw a resurgence in popularity with the rise of bluegrass and the American folk music revival in the 1950s. In 1957, the British musician Lonnie Donegan had a No. 1 UK hit with a skiffle version of "Cumberland Gap".
Breakin' Up Winter is an old-time music 'retreat', a gathering of old-time string band musicians that began the first weekend of March, 1994. It eschews the contest approach common to the larger festivals. It brings together hundreds of old-time musicians in a state park setting where the first focus is on educational programs and presentations by scholars and icons of the old-time music worlds. And, of course, jamming. It is presented by the Nashville Old-Time String Band Association, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that began as an offshoot of a community education class in Nashville, Tennessee.
"Cripple Creek" is an Appalachian-style old time tune and folk song, often played on the fiddle or banjo, listed as number 3434 in the Roud Folk Song Index.
Old time fiddle is a genre of American folk music. "Old time fiddle tunes" derived from European folk dance tunes such as Jig, Reel, Breakdown, Schottische, Waltz, Two Step and Polka. The fiddle may be accompanied by banjo or other instruments but are nevertheless called "fiddle tunes". The genre traces from the colonization of North America by immigrants from England, France, Germany, Ireland, and Scotland. It is separate and distinct from traditions which it has influenced or which may in part have evolved from it, such as bluegrass, country blues, variants of western swing and country rock.
Bluegrass fiddling is a distinctive style of American fiddle playing which is characterized by bold, bluesy improvisation, off-beat "chopping", and sophisticated use of both double-stops and old-time bowing patterns.
"Blackberry Blossom" is a fiddle tune in the key of G major. It is classified as a "breakdown" and is popular in old time, bluegrass and Celtic traditional circles.
"Soldier's Joy" is a fiddle tune, classified as a reel or country dance. It is popular in the American fiddle canon, in which it is touted as "an American classic" but traces its origin to Scottish fiddling traditions. It has been played in Scotland for over 200 years, and Robert Burns used it for the first song of his cantata 'The Jolly Beggars'. According to documentation at the United States Library of Congress, it is "one of the oldest and most widely distributed tunes" and is rated in the top ten most-played old time fiddle tunes. The tune dates as early as the 1760s. In spite of its upbeat tempo and catchy melody, the term "soldier's joy" has a much darker meaning than is portrayed by the tune. This term eventually came to refer to the combination of whiskey, beer, and morphine used by American Civil War soldiers to alleviate pain.
