She's Country: Country Music was Originally Called “Hillbilly Music”

Four Things You Didn't Know about the Origins of Country Music

Atlanta, rather than Nashville, should have become "Music City, U.S.A." Not only was there was more local talent in Atlanta, but more importantly, in the mid-1920s the five elements that together made commercial country music possible: radio, record making, live touring, song writing, and song publishing, all came together in Atlanta. At the center of this enterprise was Polk Brockman and his first find, Fiddlin' John Carson. For the whole story see Chapter 2 of Creating Country Music.

Jimmie Rodgers, the "Father of Country Music," didn't think he was the father of anything but three daughters. When "discovered" by Ralph Peer of RCA he was just trying to be a snappy southern vaudeville act. In a letter to his wife, Carrie, he said derisively of the music Peer wanted him to perform: "If I can't get 'em in town, we'll go to the woods." In the same year—1927—Peer also "discovered" the Carter Family. For more details on the creation of these "authentic" country artists.

Why is country music called "country?" Joe McCarthy, the anti-Communist witch-hunting Senator from Wisconsin, had a lot to do with it. From the late 1940s country had been a musical genre in search of a label—something less degrading than "hillbilly." Everything from "old-time" to "oat tunes" was tried out, but "folk" gained currency with the unexpected success of the Weavers, whose hits included "Goodnight Irene" and "On Top of Old Smoky." Even Hank Williams called himself a folk singer. Then came the 1952 Senate hearings, where McCarthy demanded that the Weavers' lead singer, Pete Seeger, testify about his "Communist leanings." The industry dropped "folk" like a hot rock and "country and western" or simply "country" came into wide use. For the further story of the consolidation of the country music industry around Nashville.

The book "Creating Country Music"

How did "western" get linked to "country"? Credit (or blame) Hollywood. Luckily, Hollywood didn't call the tune, just the dress code. Gene Autry and other Western-cowboy-outfitted artists were much more popular in B films of the 1930s and 1940s than were their Southern-hillbilly-styled counterparts like Roy Acuff. So, emerging honky-tonk artists like Patsy Montana, Ernest Tubb, Hank Snow, Rex Griffin, and Webb Pierce donned cowboy-styled outfits to sing their hillbilly songs of life's travails. Increasingly backed by hot, electrified instruments, they shaped the sound, lyric, and look that has been at the core of country music ever since. It takes three chapters—5, 6, and 10—to tell the story of this evolution. Along the way, you'll learn about John Wayne's short career as a singing cowboy.