Bluegrass and Fiddling are really cousins.

Fiddling has its roots in European tunes that came westward with the immigrants up to 200 or more years ago.  Often these tunes were called “Mountain Music.”

Bluegrass, in comparison, as stated elsewhere on the site, though it sounds just as ancient to modern ears, is a much more modern invention!  The man who started it all was Bill Monroe, who was of Irish decent, and learned the “mountain music” of his parents, but was also secretly listening to african american blues on a then new-fangled thing called a radio!  It is said that Bill just mixed the two style together to come up with a much more hard driving sound that became very popular, with him having hit records in the 1930’s and 40’s.

*side note: I find it very interesting that this same time period produced other strong styles too… just in different parts of the world.  Check out Gypsy or Hot Club Jazz (started in Paris, France) and Western Swing (created just a bit west of Bill Monroe’s Kentucky, in Oklahoma).  I wonder if this could or still does happen today with global communication’s influences?

Here’s an auto-generated list of everything I’ve remembered to click the Bluegrass category checkbox on!  (Please let me know if I missed something!).

• Don’t beat up your improvising!
• Dill Pickle Rag – Bluegrass
• Bucket List Fiddle Jam tune for members
• A-Toodz Book G Major Practice Along Session
• Fisher’s Hornpipe – Bluegrass
• Ragtime Annie
• Three D Major Jams
• Experience Path – Three EZ Fiddle Tunes
• MM101-Cotton Eyed Joe
• Bluegrass – Section
• Fiddle Tunes Lesson List
• Country Music Lessons
• Lesson Lists By Style
• St. Annes Reel
• Improv Any Style – Using 3 Unique Approaches! (overview)
• Country Music Lesson Section
• Red Haired Boy
• Tatering Level 4 – chopping technique
• Tatering Level 2 – – adding double “drone” strings
• Tatering level 3 – chord tone double stops
• Tater Section
• Styles Page
• Fiddler’s Tab
• Shave Endings
• Acadian Two-Step
• Sugarfoot Rag
• Angeline the Baker
• The Perils of the Classical-only Music Education
• I Hated Fiddling!
• Ode to Joy – Beethoven
• Blackberry Blossom
• Fiddle Tune Section
• Cotton Eyed Joe
• Ms. McLeod’s Reel
• Bile Them Cabbage Down
• Old Joe Clark
• Clinch Mountain Back-Step
• Cripple Creek
• That Fiddle Sound

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