[MUSIC] When we think of roots music in the South, the white tradition of old time country, of the ballad, of bluegrass, all are very important. Old time country evolved from instruments like the fiddle the guitar. Instruments that were very familiar in the British Isles and Scotland and Ireland. And we see old-time country evolving from its earliest sounds in the deep south. And we can see how today it's being embraced and celebrated by the Carolina Chocolate Drops, who are a wonderful new set of voices who bring the old-time country music to contemporary audiences. The bluegrass sound takes the instruments of the banjo, originally an African instrument, the fiddle, and the guitar, and the mandolin and blends those into the fastest and most hard-hitting country music sound ever. And Alan Lomax once called bluegrass country music on steroids. And when we hear the music of artists like Tommy Edwards, we can see the power, the speed, and the beauty of bluegrass music. The ballad is a wonderful link to the British Isles. The British ballads in England, Ireland, and Scotland, our much beloved ballads like Barbara Allen. Those ballads crossed the Atlantic and continued to be sung in the American South. There were other ballads that were created in the South, like John Henry, Casey Jones, The Wreck of the Old 97. The ballad is a wonderful way to capture a story. It's the nature of a ballad to tell a story with a beginning, a middle, and an end. And one of my dearest and most wonderful friends who sang the ballad was Ola Belle Reed. She and her husband would come to my classes and teach my students, much as BB King had taught those students the blues, they would teach my students the ballads. And she created ballads and sang them in a powerful, wonderful way. Start it of on there, mm-hm. [MUSIC] They were roaming in the gloaming while the roses were in bloom. Just a soldier and his sweetheart, fond and true. Their hearts were filled with sorrow while their thoughts were of the morrow, as she pinned a rose upon his coat of blue. That's the only place. Do not ask me love to linger for you know not what you say. For the country calls soldier to the fray. You know I hate to leave you, but I know I have to go. But I'll be with you when the roses bloom again. When the roses bloom again beside the river. And the robin red breast sings her sweet refrain. As in days of auld lang syne, I'll be with you, sweetheart mine. I'll be with you when the roses bloom again. [MUSIC] It's the rattle of the battle, came and whispered soft and low. For the soldier boy had fallen in the fray. I am dying Captain, dying and I know I have to go, but I would have you promise ere I pass away. Now there's a far and distant river where the roses bloom so fast. There's a maiden waiting for me all in vain. It is there I'd have you take me, I've been faithful, don't forsake me, for I must be there when the roses bloom again. When the roses bloom again beside the river, and the robin red breast sings her sweet refrain. As in days of auld lang syne I'll be with you sweetheart mine. I'll be with you when the roses bloom again. So, blue grass, the ballad, and old-time country music, are roots sounds for the modern country music and for the musics that we look at as the great legacy of the American South.
