Jim, perhaps you are unaware of it, but Bluegrass consists not of a specific list of songs or instrumental pieces, but a style in which those pieces are performed. You can list "Bluegrass songs" until you're purple in the face, and it means nothing. If "Little Maggie" or "Oh, Death" is sung by, say, a solo singer with no fiddle, no mandolin, no 5-string banjo, and no Martin Dreadnaught in sight, but accompanied, say, by a parlor guitar, or a dulcimer, or simply sung without accompaniment, it is not a "Bluegrass song." I have heard Scottish ballads done by Bluegrass groups, and considered—at the time, for the duration of the performance—as being a Bluegrass song. But I don't think Sir Walter Scott or Francis James Child would agree that the ballad is henceforth and forever stamped as a "Bluegrass song."

Like probably the vast majority here on Mudcat, I am urban born and raised and not brought up in any particular folk tradition. I am interested in, and sing, a whole variety of songs:   English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh, American mountain songs, cowboy songs, railroad songs, prison songs, sea chanteys, love songs, many, many ballads, and—name a category and I probably know at least a few songs in that category. And that includes a number of songs that some folks might classify as "Bluegrass," but just because some bluegrass groups may do them does not mean that they are exclusively, or even mainly bluegrass songs. I will wager to say that, although there are some here on Mudcat who specialize in certain types of songs (a lot of Mudcatters are especially big on sea songs), Mudcat mostly consists of singers and musicians whose musical interests are as wide as mine, and quite probably wider.

Just to see what I would come up with, I tried a few searches on other categories and came up with huge lists. Try it. You'll see what I mean. Most songs on these lists can also be found on two, or three, or a half-dozen other lists as well. So I'm afraid your list of "Bluegrass songs" establishes nothing.

As I said, Bluegrass is a particular style of singing and playing, not a specific list of songs.

Jim, as far as the position you are trying to defend here is concerned, I'm afraid you're like Wile E. Coyote, standing in mid-air about twenty feet out from the canyon rim. The only reason you're not hurtling toward the canyon floor is that you just haven't yet looked down and discovered that you are standing on nothing.

Don Firth