Early Country Music and the Mass Media in Roanoke, Virginia

It is only since the early 1960s that scholarly interest in the history and development of American country music has gained acceptability in academic circles.' Researchers have largely focused on the careers of recording such as Bob Wills, Jimmie Rodgers, and Grandpa Jones2 and, to a lesser degree, those artists who performed on the radio.3 But recent books by Charles Wolfe and Ivan Tribe have broadened the geographic scope of research by presenting statewide historical surveys.4 Some scholars have taken an applied approach to the subject: Richard Blaustein of East Tennessee State University in Johnson City has helped organize annual programs that feature local country radio stars from the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s. In October 1985 the Folklife Program of North Carolina conducted a series of well-researched programs that spotlighted some of the country musicians who had performed over Charlotte's WBT.5 The Blue Ridge Institute of Ferrum College chose a similar route when it sponsored a stage show of early country radio artists from Roanoke, Virginia, during the 1985 Blue Ridge Folklife Festival. These instances underscore not only the increasingly diverse nature and dissemination of country music scholarship but also the trend toward projects related to local and regional histories. Because country music-indeed folk music in general-springs from such microcosms, such studies constitute the most basic research. Bill Malone's author

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  Open Access•Bill C Malone•Western Folklore•1971

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