Blue Grass - Why Blue Grass?

Like a lot of the early ‘country’ music sounds, Blue Grass has its origins in a blend of folk music from Great Britain and tribal music from the slaves in West Africa, and was a form of old-time mountain hillbilly.

One of the earliest pioneers of the Blue Grass sound was Bill Monroe and the name ‘Blue Grass’ comes from his band ‘The Blue Grass Boys’.

In later years this band would include two future country legends Lester Flatt (guitar) and Earl Scruggs (banjo). In early 1948, after about six years of playing with the Blue Grass Boys, Flatt and Scruggs left to strike out on their own and formed ‘Foggy Mountain Boys’ and the rest, as they say, is history.

As a mark of respect for his influence on this style of music, Bill Monroe was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1970 and significantly also in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1997 as ‘an early influence’. He died in 1996 following a stroke just four days before his 85^th birthday.

To see which artists were in which category, and to find recordings of these same legends just go to www.countrysongscountrysingers.com and browse the different styles.