However, the culture-changing story proves Beyoncé's new album Cowboy Carter to be, it is not unprecedented. For generations, artists have blurred the supposed lines between country music, R&B, soul, funk, gospel, rock n roll and other genres that sprang from the same American well. It harkens back to the days of 78rpm shellac records, when certain records were separated into “hillbilly music” and “race music”. And some of the best recordings of the 20su and 21St century have been created by artists—with diverse backgrounds—that reflect both the country and their soul.
American music has always been a cross-racial, cross-cultural mix, which is why it's so great. Country legend Hank Williams learned guitar from a black man, Rufus “Tee Tot” Payne. AP and Maybelle Carter shaped the Carter family legacy with much input from their African-American friend, guitarist and song collector Lesley Riddle. Rock 'n' roll evolved from a blend of country, blues and gospel in the hands of Sister Rosetta Tharp, Chuck Berry, Elvis Presley and the Beatles.
In a way, Bey's great-grandfather among recording artists is Sam Jones, aka: No. 1 Stove Pipean African-American singer from Cincinnati who recorded half a dozen songs—including “John Henry” and “Turkey In The Straw”—for the “hillbilly” music market in New York in the summer of 1924. (“hillbilly” was renamed “country & western” after World War II, to expand its target market, and later shortened to “country.”) This Cowboy Carter coming exactly 100 years since the first documented African-American “country” recording session may be a coincidence — or more proof of the conceptual brilliance of the hot button.
Jones was not alone, and racially integrated groups were not uncommon at hill sessions during the 1920s and 1930s. Most famously, for Jimmie Rodgers “Blue Yodel #9” aka “Standing On The Corner,” was a superstar summit with rising jazz genius Louis Armstrong and his pianist wife Lil Armstrong in Los Angeles in 1930. The modern era of country-soul began, more or less, with Ray Charles, an The r&b legend whose tag-team Modern Sounds In Country & Western The LPs were milestones that arguably shaped soul music itself. A golden era of country-soul fusion followed in the late '60s and well into the '70s.
After a few slow years, we're in for another golden age, with Yola, Brittney Spencer, Allison Russell, Mickey Guyton, Kane Brown, Jimmie Allen, Maren Morris, Sam Hunt, Sturgill Simpson, and many other baffling gatekeepers. Of course, add Darius Rucker and Taylor Swift (who covered “Irreplaceable” as a rising teenager). And of course, Beyoncé herself, who has been a touchstone of country music for over a decade.
It's helpful to see country soul less as a genre in its own right than as an attitude of musical fluidity, where chord progressions, grooves, and vocal phrases alternate deftly with the coda — sometimes subtly, sometimes explicitly. We see it among artists who don't pivot with full albums, but who actually claim the full richness of American music as they go, from Lil Nas X's “Old Town Road” to Tierra Whack's “Dolly” and Dasha “Austin.” And looking ahead to the multi-artist celebration of pioneering songwriter Alice Randall, My black countryCharley Crockett's $10 cowboyand the rise of new stars such as Tanner Adell, musical boundaries are steadily being buried every day. These artist albums and anthologies document where things really started.
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