Early country music was brought down from the Appalachian mountains, heavily influenced by the Celtic and Gaelic roots of the people in those "hollers." With simple arrangements and beautiful harmonies, it has also been called Mountain Music. It is performed primarily acoustic, with typical instruments including banjos and fiddles, with guitars and even the autoharp adding to this Celtic-Appalachian rooted music.

Traditional Country

As mountain music spread out of the mountains and the Grand Old Opry flourished, the music of the people settled into traditions, drawing its tone mostly from that old-time mountain music, updating it for newer audiences, and blending and merging styles. There were obviously hints of other styles and the later country music movements, but boil it all down to basics, and this is where you'll find the old fiddles, pedal steel, and guitar rhythms of solid, down-home, old-time Traditional Country music.

Cowboy & Western

Many artists didn't like the term "hillbilly," thinking that it portrayed negative cultural stereotypes. But "cowboy" implied romance, heroism, and bravery. By the mid 1930s, artists started wearing fancy outfits with fringe, boots, and cowboy hats. Some of the most well-known country stars, such as Roy Rogers and Gene Autry, were also seen on movie screens and television. Western/cowboy music is distinguished by rich harmonies, storytelling, swing and waltz rhythms, and very distinctive themes.

Nashville Sound

During the 40's and into the 50's, some country artists made the crossover to the big band halls, blending their hill country sound with the ballroom orchestra tunes made popular by Glen Miller and other band leaders during the war years. The Nashville sound took typically honky-tonk and hillbilly singers and backed them with the lush sound of strings and horns to appeal to a wider audience, beginning the crossover phenomenon.

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