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Beatle Country: A Bluegrass ‘Concept Album’ from 1966

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New Critical Perspectives on the Beatles

Part of the book series: Pop Music, Culture and Identity ((PMCI))

Abstract

In 1966, Cambridge, Massachusetts-based bluegrass revivalist band, Charles River Valley Boys, released the album Beatle Country. Quite unlike the material on their debut Bluegrass and Old Timey Music (recorded 1962–1964) featuring traditional Appalachian mountain songs and those popularized by musicians including the Stanley Brothers, Charlie Poole, Bill Monroe, and A.P Carter, Beatle Country consists of twelve Beatles covers refashioned thoroughly in a bluegrass mold. As a key participant in the 1960s urban folk revival in the northern United States where debates about musical authenticity and novelty were pervasive, Beatle Country raises some fascinating questions. The album also provokes discussion on how songs garner new meanings in shifting contexts, and through the process of sonic transformation: Ivy League-educated, Massachusetts folk-revival musicians reworking Beatles songs with a sound originating in southern Appalachia. While not the only American bluegrass/country makeover of Beatles music, the Charles River Valley Boys’ project is by far the most comprehensive and cohesive. Recorded by Elektra in Nashville, Beatle Country was released around two years after the Beatles’ rapid rise to fame in the USA. Furthermore, September 1966 comes just months after John Lennon’s controversial statements on religion that ignited waves of anti-Beatles sentiment across the country, with particular potency in the South. This essay examines Beatle Country within its various intersecting cultural and musical contexts.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    I use the terms “cover” and “version” with caution. For thorough investigation of these terms in their full complexity, see Solis and Weinstein.

  2. 2.

    See Cantwell prologue for explanation of the “old southern sound”—a phrase coined by Bill Monroe to describe bluegrass’s sound and its relation to traditional musics from the Appalachians.

  3. 3.

    In his essay “Bluegrass, Rock and Roll, and ‘Blue Moon of Kentucky’,” Rosenberg highlights a fascinating relationship between early bluegrass and rock and roll, the former also playing an important role in developing a branch of the latter— “rockabilly.” Here, Rosenberg examines Bill Monroe’s waltz “Blue Moon of Kentucky” (1946) and its subsequent “covers”/“versions” to demonstrate cross-genre interchange in bluegrass’s early years. In 1954, Sun. Records released Elvis Presley’s performance of the song—Monroe’s waltz meter turned into driving 4/4 “boogie beat” (73). The same year, bluegrass duo the Stanley Brothers “covered” Elvis’s 4/4 version, bringing it back to bluegrass. Interestingly, Monroe and his band made a recording the same year beginning in waltz meter before breaking into 4/4, Elvis style. On a related note, the Beatles’ relationship to bluegrass might also be viewed through the lens of rockabilly—a genre that heavily influenced the band’s early repertoire. See Morrison and Price for further investigation of the Beatles/rockabilly connection.

  4. 4.

    In email correspondence with Ethan Signer of the CRVB on February 6, 2015, I received a scanned copy of the hard-to-find liner notes for Bringin’ in the Georgia Mail (1962) along with the royalties statement.

  5. 5.

    Interestingly, Beatle Country was produced shortly after John Lennon’s controversial “bigger than Jesus” statements and subsequent backlash, particularly in Southern states (See Gould 340, 347; Frontani 95). Out of interest, I asked Siggins and Field whether their project was impacted in any way by this scandalous branch of Beatle activity. The unanimous answer was “no.”

  6. 6.

    See Wolfe for history, mythology, and context surrounding Appalachian ballad “Roane County Prison.”

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA

    Laura Turner

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  1. Laura Turner
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Wayne D. McMurray School of Humanities &, Monmouth University, West Long Branch, New Jersey, USA

    Kenneth Womack

  2. Department of English, Texas State University, San Marcos, Texas, USA

    Katie Kapurch

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© 2016 The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s)

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Turner, L. (2016). Beatle Country: A Bluegrass ‘Concept Album’ from 1966. In: Womack, K., Kapurch, K. (eds) New Critical Perspectives on the Beatles. Pop Music, Culture and Identity. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-57013-0_5

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