They have been the same wide-eyed children caught by the magic of the songs they learned from their elders. Today fiddler Ben Hunter and guitar/banjo man Joe Seamons aren’t so much a throw-back to the music of the pre-war era songster tradition as they are alchemist-shamans, seemingly sent from those times to the 21 st century to wake us up to the music that is embedded deep within us. They would grow up to become Robert Johnson, Hank Williams, Woody Guthrie, Lead Belly, and others. When the phonograph and radio were invented, their repertoire became limitless.Īnd, always, there were the children who followed them in all of their wide-eyed presence, absorbing and learning at their feet. They roamed the country throwing down songs that were popular in the churches, show places, and homes of America. Although they have been traditionally referred to as ‘blues,’ ‘folk,’ or ‘country’ artists, they couldn’t be bound to one stream of musical expression. It was the first pure musical spirit of people rising out of oppression, slavery, poverty, and hard times into a celebration unique in American history. It was primitive in the truest sense of the word. They provided the undercurrent for much of the popular music that would grow through the 20 th century. They gave us the music born between the Civil War and the outbreak of World War I. They were the field laborers, the rural gypsies, the medicine show hucksters, and back alley vaudevillians. Then, street singers were born.” – Anonymousīefore the radio, the phonograph, before cassette tapes and compact discs - long before downloads and streaming music on-demand - there were the street singers, the buskers, the troubadour tramps we’ve come to call songsters today. The primary challenge here is in moving between chord shapes quickly.“In the beginning the earth was without form and void. The chords are easy – G, C, D, Em, A7 – and the pattern is fairly short. When you listen to the song, remember, don’t get intimidated by the melody!! You’re going to tackle the boom-chick guitar in the background. Blackberry Blossomīlackberry Blossom is a very common bluegrass tune with a fast melody and cut time feel. The Top 10 Easy Bluegrass Guitar Songs for Beginners 1.
We plugged all of these into an Excel spreadsheet (yes, a bit nerdy…) and ranked songs by frequency, ease of use, and popularity. In order to make the list, we looked at several things: And, of course, if you trim it down to ten songs…which ones can you afford to omit? The difficult part is that there are different opinions of exactly what that repertoire is. Because bluegrass has been around for a while and has a healthy ‘jam session’ culture, there’s an established repertoire of songs-you-need-to-know. How Did We Choose The Songs?Ĭhoosing the top bluegrass tunes is both very simple and very difficult. But in order to get started, focus on learning the chords and basic rhythm.
Songster fiddle full#
Those things are amazing, and make the song sound full and complex.
If you listen to recordings (suggestions are included below), you can usually hear the acoustic guitar player doing a simple strumming pattern in the background – that’s what you want.ĭisregard the melody line, the fiddle riffs, and the banjo arpeggiated rolls. When you’re learning these songs at first, just learn the basic chords and a simple strumming pattern. Here are ten easy bluegrass songs for beginners that will get a guitarist up and strumming quickly. But much of the acoustic guitar’s role in bluegrass is strumming accompaniment, and often in guitar-friendly keys. When you listen to legends like Doc Watson and Tony Rice, it’s easy to be intimidated by the lightening fast, single note lead lines or the intricate fingerpicking. Bluegrass doesn’t have to be intimidating.
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