Episode 26: Country Swing Pioneers

Deeper Roots Radio

Join Dave Stroud for two hours of the very best of country swing music on Deeper Roots Radio: A Century of America’s Music. He’ll excavate the archives for a show from over eight years ago, reminding us that the west had been long-settled when a new sound exploded. It blasted its way out of the dance halls and barn-dance venues of the Midwest with an upbeat blend of jazz, hillbilly, and down-home blues. The arrangements blended strings, guitar, fiddle and bass, with the rhythmic sounds of urban jazz to reveal something catchy and danceable…and marketable. Before the beat was modernized into the mass market country blandness that paralleled mainstream pop, there were the pioneers including Milton Brown, Bob Wills, Adolph Hofner, Spade Cooley, Light Crust Doughboys, and a host of others. Drop in and celebrate this classic fusion of America’s best.