In September, PBS ran the latest documentary series from Ken Burns, focusing on country music. If Ken Burns sounds familiar, he is best known for his documentaries on baseball and the Civil War. He’s also created film series about World War II and the Vietnam War. Regardless of the topic, I’ve yet to encounter anything Ken Burns has produced that is subpar.
The films about country music were no different. I’ve never placed country music at the top of my playlist, but I grew up hearing it when my parents had the radio going and learned to appreciate it as an important form of music.
This miniseries solidified that notion. You don’t have to love country music, but you might want to know that we wouldn’t have the music that is played today without it. Burns zeroed in on the evolution of music in our country in the 20th century and how we got to where we were by the end of that hundred-year span.
What we know as country music today started with a variety of names, most often called hillbilly music in the ‘20s and ‘30s. This was a nod to the type of people who most often created the style of music that came to be known as country. But if you listen to the music that populated the Grand Ole Opry when it began, it sounded very different from what you might hear from Taylor Swift or Blake Shelton today.
Over the eight episodes, the evolution of not just country music, but music as a whole was illuminated quite well. When you see singing stars like Bob Dylan as important to the development of country music, it really highlights how much music interacts as genres. You don’t think of Bob Dylan when you think country, but he did some good work in that area.
The idea of hillbilly music evolving and being called country music or western music or folk music seems like a lot to take in. In fact, Burns talks frequently how the music charts had a hard time deciding what to call certain styles of music and even how to differentiate between songs from the same artist that didn’t seem to fit in just one area. Many stars over the years had No. 1 hits on both the country and pop charts!
When people grumble about country music today, it’s often about how it seems more like country rock than anything. Most country music is a long way from Kenny Rogers singing, “You picked a fine time to leave me, Lucille,” or Dolly Parton crooning about working nine to five. But this is part of the evolution. All music changes, but the great thing is that you can really love the particular style that you grew up with the most and be okay with that; that music will always be there for you.
You can also grow and learn to appreciate new variations on the old theme. But you don’t have to! It’s okay! You can hate modern country and stick with the classics. We all tend to lean eventually to the stereotype of disliking what the younger people listen to, what I commonly refer to as hip-hoppity, jip-joppity nonsense. I don’t like much of what you hear on pop stations today, but maybe if I gave it more of a chance, I’d change. Maybe.
As my daughter was working on the playlist for pregame warmups for basketball, I reminded her that at the table, Larry Crabtree and I control the volume. If we don’t like the song, we tend to turn it down, especially if it’s this incessant screeching that hurts our ears. She has assured me that I will enjoy much of the music, since she will draw from the ‘70s and ‘80s a lot, though not exclusively. Hooray!
Our children will dislike their children’s music some day. We as grandparents will really hate it. But the tradition and evolution of music will carry on. What is considered country music in 20 or 50 years might seem unrecognizable to us unless we listen to a couple hits from each decade and notice the gradual changes. That was the true beauty if you watched Burns’ series in a short amount of time: that evolution was very evident and caused me to appreciate the old hillbilly music just as much as Toby Keith or Garth Brooks.
Speaking of musical evolution, I hope you’ll come out to the NRHEG High School either Nov. 25 or Nov. 26 at 7 p.m. for the NRHEG Marching Band’s annual indoor marching band concert. They played music from Queen this summer, and they are linking that to their indoor theme of royalty. You’ll hear many songs from performers considered musical royalty from different eras. Come and see and hear the evolution of music right before your very eyes and ears!
Word of the Week: This week’s word is aposiopesis, which means an abrupt breaking off in the middle of a sentence, as in, “He had a case of aposiopesis every time he heard ‘Desperado’ being sung by the Eagles, annoying those who were talking to him.” Impress your friends and confuse your enemies!