A Hot-Bed of Musicians: Traditional Music in the Upper New River Valley-Whitetop Region

In the Blue Ridge Mountains along the Virginia–North Carolina border, an extraordinarily rich musical heritage survives and flourishes. Even before the legendary Bill Monroe coined the term “bluegrass” in the mid-1950s, the traditional music of this area was coming into its own as a distinctive style. Early performers from the 1920s through the 1950s, many of whom migrated northward during the Great Depression, popularized the music they had grown up hearing, thereby preserving and celebrat...