The Commons #14: Chuck Hicks on Bluegrass Music

In this episode of The Commons, Brian Phillips chats with our very own Chuck Hicks (head of operations and resident music scholar here at CiRCE) about bluegrass music, the southern agrarians, and classical education.

Topics include:

• How bluegrass came to be
• How bluegrass music was a reaction to the modern age (7:30)
• The evolution of the form (13:20) 
• Bluegrass and the southern agrarians (19:00)
• Bluegrass and modern pop culture (23:29)
• Connections to classical education (31:05)

Musical selections discussed in today's episode:

• Bill Monroe "Mule Skinner Blues" (1940): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lIuuI00XY_Y
• Flatt & Scruggs "Foggy Mountain Breakdown": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_Y3mnj-8lA
• David "Stringbean; Akeman "Run Li'l Rabbit" :https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8uOy3WdT3mY