Black Bluegrass - found it!

Subject: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 16 Nov 00 - 09:59 AM

I've asked a couple of times about black bluegrass records, and people have been helpful but unable to direct me to the record I sought. Finally found it today: "Black Appalachia". Just in case anyone else is interested.

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Nov 00 - 11:44 AM

Sounds fascinating... will have to check it out!

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: katlaughing
Date: 16 Nov 00 - 12:19 PM

JTT, any links to more info on it or where you found it?

Thanks,

kat

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 16 Nov 00 - 12:53 PM

Might have been here originally:

http://www.elderly.com/recordings/09A.htm

though it's also on Amazon and CD Now.

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: GUEST,Bruce O.
Date: 16 Nov 00 - 03:03 PM

That 'Black Appalachia' CD was noted in the first reply to your original request on Sept. 18. (With label and number cited.)

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 16 Nov 00 - 03:12 PM

Was it? Sorry. Not the brightest these days.

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: Lepus Rex
Date: 16 Nov 00 - 03:48 PM

Heh-heh.

---Lepus Rex

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 16 Nov 00 - 03:49 PM

For others interested: It's a Rounder record in the Lomax "Deep River of Song" series, and you can get it from Camsco, which will give Mudcat a percentage. It's great!

Sandy

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: Mike Regenstreif
Date: 16 Nov 00 - 05:07 PM

Yes, this is a terrific collection of field recordings of old-time music and blues. However, it is not bluegrass. In fact, the recordings were all made some years before Bill Monroe developed bluegrass.

Mike Regenstreif

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: Stewie
Date: 16 Nov 00 - 07:10 PM

'Black Appalacia' was mentioned by at least 3 people in the original thread and, as Mike said, it is not bluegrass. 'Black Texicans: Balladeers and Songsters of the Texas Frontier' in the same series (Rounder 1821) is also excellent.

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 17 Nov 00 - 03:47 AM

Well, perhaps my poor confused mind is even more confuzzled than I thought - maybe this was not, in fact, the record I originally sought. I did also find one called, I think, Black & White Hillbilly in my more recent search, though I'm a bit hazy about whether it's only harmonica music or both harmonica and other stuff like vocals.

Holy God, everyone's very narky about this! I'm sorry if I've put people to unnecessary trouble, but is it necessary to get so exercised about it?

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: Stewie
Date: 17 Nov 00 - 04:21 AM

The 'black and white hillbilly music' to which you refer is probably Various Artists 'Black & White Hillbilly Music: Early Harmonica Recordings from the 1920s and 30s' Trikont US-0226. This is a marvellous compilation with an excellent booklet in German and English but, despite its title, has only one black artist on it - Deford Bailey.

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 17 Nov 00 - 06:31 AM

Yes, that's the one.

The reason I'm looking for black bluegrass/Appalachian/hillbilly/mountain music (sorry about my ignorance, but I'm new to this music and don't yet know the difference) is partly for my own pleasure, and partly to give a record as a present to a black American friend, a Virginia gentleman who has been very helpful to me in my ignorance here in Ireland, and expressed an interest in this record when I told him about it. So it would be really nice if I could find the record.

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: WyoWoman
Date: 17 Nov 00 - 10:27 PM

Unfortunately, JTT, some folks do get snippy about this stuff. Sorry if you felt a bit rebuffed. I only learned about the difference between "bluegrass" and other kinds of mountain/Appalachian music since wandering into the Mudcat a couple of years ago. And sometimes I still forget that it's a kind of music that was actually"created" by someone, that it's not just a generic term for a particular style of mountain music.

I'm sorry I can't be helpful on finding the recording you're talking about, but as I had not seen the original posting, I'm happy to be lurking on this one to see what other suggestions get made.

Best of luck in your quest,

WyoWoman

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 18 Nov 00 - 04:46 AM

Thanks, WyoWoman. In the original posts, people were helping me find the original record I'd seen on CD Now or Amazon, but no one had given the name of the one I'd bookmarked - which by this stage I couldn't remember.

I was coming back to see the new posts, then suddenly got swamped by a huge rush of work (I'm self-employed, and it goes like that, feast or a famine) and forgot all about the thread, so I never said thanks. This annoyed some of the people who gave me help, apparently, because an anonymous poster posted crossly about it.

Sorry, again, to anyone whose help seemed to go unappreciated. It didn't, but sorry if it seemed so.

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 18 Nov 00 - 11:37 AM

Hi Guest, JTT. Hope you've got a sense of humour. Please try to excuse the "rabid" Bluegrassers amongst us. (I'm one of 'em) We tend to see this very specific musical form almost in religious terms. We can go on for hours (or years) at a time discussing the minutiae of Bluegrass. ie: at what actual moment in time "IT" happened! Most of us seem to agree that it was when Earl Scruggs played his first banjo roll with Monroe, Flatt, Wise and Rainwater.

I have no idea why we care SO MUCH about this music....but we do. And boy, can we sound "stuffy" to others who see all string music as being similar. Other than that, we're mostly pretty normal humans.

No offence meant. Good luck in your musical journey.

Rick

Subject: RE: Black Bluegrass - found it!
From: Thyme2dream
Date: 18 Nov 00 - 09:09 PM

Gee, now I'm getting homesick...guess I better plan that trip to Beanblossom this summer after all.....