Background
Bill Monroe was born William Smith Monroe near Rosine, Kentucky, United States on September 13, 1911.
Bill Monroe was born William Smith Monroe near Rosine, Kentucky, United States on September 13, 1911.
Monroe's older brothers were already playing music when he was born. He learned mandolin because no other member of his family played it. His mother died when he was ten, and he lived with his uncle, Pendleton Vandiver, a semiprofessional fiddler. Monroe later celebrated his uncle in what became a bluegrass standard, "Uncle Pen. "
In 1929 Monroe joined his brothers Charlie and Birch in Chicago, playing semiprofessionally. Birch dropped out, and in 1934 Bill and Charlie became full-time musicians, working on radio stations in the South and Midwest. They made their first recordings in 1936. The Monroe Brothers, as they were known, split in 1938. Bill Monroe formed a group that he called the Blue Grass Boys, and in 1939 he joined the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn.
The "bluegrass" sound was formulated after World War II when Monroe added banjo player Earl Scruggs and guitarist/vocalist Lester Flatt. As country music became more cosmopolitan, Monroe held fast to tradition-based music, but transformed it by playing in high keys and often at breakneck tempos. Improvisation was a key component, as was the sound of the mournful mountain plaint dubbed "the high lonesome sound. " Monroe's seminal recordings include "Blue Moon of Kentucky, " "I'm Going Back to Old Kentucky, " "Footprints in the Snow, " "I'm Blue, I'm Lonesome, " and "Walk Softly on This Heart of Mine. "Flatt and Scruggs left in 1948, and there were many changes in the Blue Grass Boys from that point. The sound, though, remained largely unaltered. Monroe inspired many others to play in a comparable style. At first he viewed younger performers as competition; later, he came to understand that he had inspired a musical genre.
Bluegrass was increasingly marginalized to festivals and campuses, but Monroe's status was assured. He influenced every bluegrass performer, as well as rock musicians such as Elvis Presley and Bob Dylan. Newer country artists such as Dwight Yoakam and Ricky Skaggs also cited his influence. Monroe performed until his final year.
Monroe's core beliefs were in songs rooted in Anglo-Celtic forms and in acoustic instrumentation. His own passionate, uncompromising nature gave bluegrass music much of its character.
