Is Bluegrass Passé ? - A Prescription Bluegrass Editorial

I think the earliest I can remember this strange, and as far as I'm concerned unwarranted, need to change everything beginning to happen was somewhere in the late 1970s or early 1980s.

It was then that I saw a road sign on a back road heading out into the Arizona Desert.

Now, I'd been on that road countless times and remembered well the sign that, for decades, had read “4-Wheel Drive Only”.

Only on this particular trip a brand new sign had been erected and it now read:

“During Periods of Inclement Weather

All-Terrain Vehicles

May Be

Required”

Over the years, I watched numerous other examples of “change for the sake of   change” occur. Now it seems as if our bluegrass industry has fallen prey to the whims and fancies of those who champion this need to fix what isn't broken.

It seems that it is no longer cool to say you play “bluegrass.” Whether you are a DJ on the radio or Internet, an artist on stage or a label producing product for sale, everywhere it seems that something is replacing the word “bluegrass.”

The two most common terms seem to be “Roots Music” and “Americana”. And then there are those who wish to be cool and hip and in the “In Crowd,” but still wish to remain on the fence about this and so they've decided that the term “American Roots Music” is the handle they'll grab on to.

Just how many times Mr. Monroe may have turned over in his grave regarding this is another wonderment. Really! ... “Bill Monroe and his Americana Boys”... now that was a band to remember ... or wait, I forget, maybe I have them confused with “Bill Monroe and his Roots Music Boys.”

Now, of course, you're free to call it anything you like. Ralph Stanley still doesn't call it bluegrass. He calls it “Mountain Music.” But the danger here is when we use these terms that seem to be popular without having a clear definition of what they really mean.

The official definition of the term from the Americana Music Association is: “Americana is music that honors and is derived from the traditions of American roots music. It is music inspired by American culture traditions which is not only represented in classic man made / roots based sounds but also through new and contemporary artists whose music is clearly inspired by these great traditions. It is a great genre, vast, like jazz which encompasses a wide range of music. Like jazz, which spans from Miles Davis to Harry Connick to the Preservation Hall, Americana's range includes artists like Gram Parsons, Solomon Burke, The Band, Lucinda Williams, Lyle Lovett, Mavis Staples...”

According to Wikipedia, the definition for “Roots Music” is even more ambiguous. And so it is that a DJ on a Folk program and a DJ on a Blues program and another DJ on progressive station playing the latest Jam Band can all claim to be playing Americana or Roots Music.

It appears as if the terms are nothing more than a dumping ground for anything and everything that someone doesn't want to be considered as Old School, or somehow wants it to be considered as new and exciting rather than old and boring. Or, perhaps, is it that the act of renaming somehow makes the music better?

Does this mean that our society today thinks Bluegrass is passé ? They haven't been to the festivals I've been to. Really … Boring Bluegrass? Could there ever be a more contradictory term?

I think the comedy here is that anyone who prefers to call their music Americana or Roots should be banned from ever using any other descriptive terms like “Blues” or “Reggae” or “Folk”. It would make for a very interesting stage presentation ... imagine, the front man saying something like, “Well, that was one of our favorite Americana tunes written by Chris Thile ... now we're gonna do an old B.B. King song so here's an Americana tune called ‘The Thrill is Gone’ ... oh wait, we had a request to do this Americana tune done by Bob Dylan back in 1964 which was actually an old English Ballad from the 18th century …”

Grandad always said you can paint a mule to look like a zebra but that don't make it so.