About This Book
This book has little direct connection with modern bluegrass music as it is known today but is included here for research purposes as it documents songs and ballads popular in Kentucky from about 1850 to the early 1900's. Musicians may also find some of this material suitable for performance or inspiration. It is almost certain that many of the pieces in this collection had at least some influence on the bluegrass music emerging from performers like Bill Monroe and Earl Scruggs.
Warning: This book dates from 1900, a time when the social milieu was very much different from today, and some of the content falls far short of current political correctness. The fact of it's inclusion here should not be taken to mean that the publisher of this web site condones or agrees with this content but neither do I believe uncomfortable parts of our history should be edited out.
I also have to apologise for the odd errors and weirdnesses you will find in this text, which are due to the inherent problems of scanning and OCRing old books. I hope you will not find them too distracting.
Bluegrass Ballads, Content Index - Songs & Page Numbers. Note: deduct 100 from the numbers shown to get the original page number from the book.