Country and Western

Country and Western Country music grew from the folk music that was brought to North America by Anglo-Celtic settlers in the 1700s and 1800s.

While it is challenging to pinpoint the exact first country music song, many consider "The Little Old Log Cabin in the Lane" to be one of the earliest recorded country songs. "The Little Old Log Cabin in the Lane" was written and recorded by Will S. Hays in 1871. The song features elements commonly associated with country music, such as a simple melody, lyrics about rural life, and a focus on storytelling. It became popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and is often recognized as an influential early country music recording.

In 1922 radio stations WBAP in Fort Worth, Texas and WSB in Atlanta, Georgia, broadcast shows called barn dances, modeled after the informal social dancing of the frontier.

Fiddler Eck (A.C.) Robertson traveled to New York City and in 1922 made the first recording of rural Appalachian folk music, “Arkansas Traveller” and “Sallie Goodin,” sett the stage for the development of country music .

Automaker Henry Ford had an intense hatred of what he saw as the urban decadence of couples jazz dancing. In response he pumped huge amounts of money in the 1920s into fiddling contests and promoted square dances across the US to encourage more wholesome forms of entertainment.
His funding helped establish country music culture as we know it today.

In 1924 Vernon Dalhart's "The Prisoner's Song" became the first commercially-successful country single.

The Grand Ole Opry began broadcasting in Nashville, Tennessee, as the WSM Barn Dance. On the evening of November 28, 1925, on Nashville’s WSM-AM radio station, announcer George D. “Judge” Hay introduced famed fiddle player Uncle Jimmy Thompson as the first performer for the new show. The show was first called the Grand Ole Opry on December 10, 1927.

The very first broadcast of the Grand Ole Opry came out of a fifth-floor radio studio in Nashville, though listeners were encouraged to think that the whole country music jamboree came out of a barn, with the audience sitting on hay bales. 

Jimmie Rodgers is widely considered to be the "Father of Country Music." He was a singer-songwriter and guitarist who was known for his distinctive yodeling style. Rodgers recorded over 100 songs, many of which became classics, such as "T for Texas," "Blue Yodel No. 1," and "In the Jailhouse Now."

Rodgers' music was groundbreaking for its time. He was one of the first country artists to use electrical instruments and to record in a studio setting. He also helped to popularize the genre of country music beyond its rural roots. Rodgers died in 1933 at the age of 35, but his legacy continues to live on.

In 1927, Victor Records, under the direction of producer Ralph Peer, headed to Bristol, Tennessee to record local musicians. The sessions, referred to by genre historians as the country music "big bang", yielded debut recordings from The Carter Family and Jimmie Rodgers.

Billboard started tracking country music songs on January 8, 1944 with the "Most Played Juke Box Folk Records" chart.

Written by Jenny Lou Carson and performed by Tex Ritter, "You Two-Timed Me One Time Too Often" becomes the first #1 country hit penned by a woman in 1945.

World War II accelerated country music's growth away from an exclusively Southern and rural phenomenon. Southern servicemen took the music with them to far-flung parts of the nation and the world, while civilian defense workers from the South brought their love of the music into the various centers of war production.

Country music used to be known as "hillbilly" music. Dissatisfied with the pejorative connotations of the term "hillbilly music" in the mid forties, Ernest Tubb coined the term "country" music to include string bands, fiddling bands, and old time singing and dance bands. Decca executives decided cowboy music didn't quite fall in that category, so Tubb came up with "country & western". By 1948, the record industry had stopped using "hillbilly music" altogether.

Billboard magazine published its first country and western album chart on January 11, 1964. At #1: Johnny Cash's Ring of Fire album. The chart changed its name to Top Country LP's in the issue of Billboard dated January 13, 1968, Top Country LPs (with no apostrophe) in the issue dated May 31, 1980, and Top Country Albums in the issue dated October 20, 1984. 

Album cover art for Ring of Fire: The Best of Johnny Cash Wikipedia

The first ever CMA Awards were held on October 20, 1967 hosted by singers Sonny James and Bobbie Gentry. The big winning song was Jack Greene’s "There Goes My Everything."

Wanted: The Outlaws by Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, Tompall Glaser and Jessi Colter became in 1976 the first country album to go platinum.

Country music took over Hollywood in 1980, with the movies Coal Miner's Daughter, Urban Cowboy, Honeysuckle Rose and 9 to 5 all debuting on the silver screen.

Garth Brooks' mainstream success with his 1991 third album, Ropin' the Wind, set the stage for the pop-country of the rest of the decade. It was the first country album to debut at #1 on the pop charts.

Garth Brooks By Steve Jurvetson -Wikipedia

Garth Brooks' “More Than a Memory” debuted at #1 on the Billboard Hot Country Song charts in September 2007, the first song to do so in its history.

In 2013 Country was the #1 commercial radio format in the U.S., with 2,042 stations.

One in five country music songs refer to "alcohol," one in three to "tears," and one in seven  to "mama."

Source Compton's Interactive Encyclopedia © 1998 The Learning Company, Inc.