International Bluegrass Music Museum
Introduction
Text-to-speech Audio
Images
International Bluegrass Music Museum
![International Bluegrass Music Museum](https://storage.googleapis.com/clio-images/medium_3355.2772.jpg)
Backstory and Context
Text-to-speech Audio
The International Bluegrass Music Museum is located in the RiverPark Complex at the foot of “the blue bridge” in downtown Owensboro, Kentucky. As you draw near, you’ll hear the sounds of bluegrass music emanating from the museum’s radio station, RBI, with audio speakers taking the music to the streets. Only a few hundred feet from the museum’s entrance, the sound of music drifts downstream via the mighty Ohio River, the subject of more than a few memorable bluegrass songs.
In the late 1930s, Bill Monroe took the stage with what became known as his signature high lonesome sound.
He and his band, “The Blue Grass Boys,” forged a mighty confluence of sound… including Appalachian mountain music, rural “old time” string playing, folk ballads, blues, African stomp, and Black and white gospel to introduce a new style of music which became known as bluegrass in the 1950s. It took its name from fans referring to Mr. Monroe’s band; Bill,in turn, named his band for his home state of Kentucky, known as “The Bluegrass State.” Once–and still–known as the bluegrass state for the gorgeous horse farms planted in bluegrass that occupy many thousands of acres in the central part of the state, Kentucky is now known as the bluegrass state just as commonly for this, the indigenous music of its people.
While popular since the 1940s, bluegrass enjoyed an immense resurgence with the release of the movie, “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” in the year 2000.1http://bluegrassmuseum.org/about-bluegrass-museum/
Sources
http://bluegrassmuseum.org/about-bluegrass-museum/