Scots Irish roots of country music

David Doggett · Posted 23 Oct 2004 5:08 pm

Here is a link to a very interesting article about the ethnic group that gave birth to country music.
http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110005798

(go to OpinionJournal Wall Street Journal editorial page)

The article addresses the influence of this group on electoral politics, and I don't mean for this thread to go off on that, so please let's not go there here. But the rest of the article discusses this huge ethnic group (which I am a part of), but which is rarely considered as an ethnic group. The author has also written a book on this subject which looks interesting. He says country music is the soundtrack for this ethnic group. I know Emmy Lou Harris was featured in a PBS documentary on the Scots Irish and their music, but unfortunately I have never seen it.

I was always told I came from the "Scotch Irish" who populated the Southeast. I just figured that meant the Scotch and Irish came here and got so mixed up together they were just lumped together as a group. Not so, The Scots Irish were Scots protestants who resided in Northern Ireland for several generations, and combined Scotch and Irish culture, especially music. They eventually were caught in a political squeeze between Anglican loyalists and Irish Catholics.

From the 1700s through the potato famine of the 1800s, hundreds of thousands of Scots Irish immigrated to New Hampshire and Vermont, and the Middle-Atlantic and Southeastern states. Many came with nothing as indentured servants. Over the generations they spread across the Southern portions of the Midwest and across the Southwest, all the way to Bakersfield. In the last half of the twentieth century many migrated to the industrial cities in the Northern midwest. Their nostalgia for the South fueled a big market for country music, and country music stars toured those areas as much as the South and Southwest.

I'm interested in other Forum members' thoughts on this cultural phenomenon.

[This message was edited by David Doggett on 24 October 2004 at 07:25 AM.]

Ken Lang · From: Simi Valley, Ca

The Irish Washer woman comes to mind. A great fiddle tune and an icon in country music as well as others.

Dolly Parton is said to be a desendant of the Scots-Irish.

Country music HAD to be imported. It surely didn't come from the Native American Indians. They were busy inventing drum music and disco dancing.

Kevin Hatton · From: Buffalo, N.Y.

If you listen to some politically correct B.S., country music came from the blues. Its Scot/Irish/ English in reality. The country music museum in Nashville documents this. Whats being purpotrated on country music today by the radio stations is cultural genocide. We can't have them white people having there own music you know. There all a bunch of racists.

[This message was edited by Kevin Hatton on 24 October 2004 at 02:13 AM.]

[This message was edited by Kevin Hatton on 24 October 2004 at 02:15 AM.]

Del Rangel · From: Clayton, NC

Try http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110005798

David Doggett · Posted 24 Oct 2004 6:20 am

Yes that's the correct link, Del (I've edited the link I gave). KL, if you start trying to name all the Scots Irish country musicians, it will be probably 3/4s of them, and we'll run out of space. Some of the names have Mc or Mac in them, but most do not. They are just the very common Southern names that are so common across America that we don't associate them with any particular group, and many people wrongly assume they are English names, because there is a lot of overlap. Also, a lot of lower class English migrated to the same areas over the same time period, so the Scots Irish typically get lumped with them. In my lineage, Doggett is an English name, but in my grandparents generation there are Scots Irish names like Mills and Hills. It's hard to tell by the names.

KH, while it's true that country music came from Scots Irish folk music, there is a strong influence from the African Americans in the South. Likewise, the Scots Irish music influenced the black sound, it is not pure African. Mississippi Fred McDowell is quoted as saying, "The blues ain't nothin' but a reel." The banjo came from Africa. Bill Monroe had his Uncle Pen, and there is the ragtime influence. Pentatonic scale tones are sprinkled liberally throughout bluegrass and country - this is one of the main differences between these latter genres and the original Scots Irish folk music, fiddle tunes, and old-time music. And Western swing is of course heavily influenced by the jazz of the '20s and '30s. Most steel guitar tunings reflect the blues and jazz influence.

But of course the dominant core of country music came from the Scots Irish folk tradition, and has mostly been developed and performed by whites. Of course now it has spread around the entire country and into Canada, so North Americans of any ethnic group can be found in country music, and the Forum certainly reflects this (even Europeans).

Modern commercial country music is strongly influenced by rock and blues-rock. And of course rock came about as a combination of country music and rythmn&blues. But the fact is this trend comes as much from the tastes of young listeners as from any top-down plot by the people who run the music industry. White young people have always been drawn to black sounds. Many white kids these days listen almost exclusively to hip-hop (and Tim McGraw just cut a song with Usher, so watch out).

[This message was edited by David Doggett on 24 October 2004 at 07:36 AM.]

Rick McDuffie · From: Benson, North Carolina, USA

There's no doubt that country music is an amalgamation of Celtic music and southern blues. It's from both. Where do you think Earl Scruggs got that little minor-to-major G-string slide? That didn't come from no Irish jig or reel, and it's not found on the Great Highland Bagpipe chanter. It's a "blue" note, and he probably heard it in the cotton patch and on the railroad 'round here.

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