7 Bill Monroe 7Monroe’s signature sound emerged fully in 1945, when
banjoist Earl Scruggs and guitarist Lester Flatt joined
his band. Scruggs was among the first banjoists in country
music whose principal role was musical rather than comical;
Monroe’s original banjoist David (“Stringbean”) Akeman
had provided a humorous touch to the proceedings. The
Blue Grass Boys established the classic makeup of a blue-
grass group—with mandolin, fiddle, guitar, banjo, and
upright bass—and ultimately bequeathed the band’s name
to the genre itself. Bluegrass is characterized by acoustic
instruments; a driving syncopated rhythm; tight, complex
harmonies; and the use of higher keys—B-flat, B, and E
rather than the customary G, C, and D. The band played
traditional folk songs and Monroe’s own compositions,
the most famous of which were “Blue Moon of Kentucky”
(later famously covered and transformed by a young Elvis
Presley), “Uncle Pen” (a tribute to another early influence
on Monroe, his fiddle-playing uncle Pendleton Vandiver),
and “Raw Hide.” Although Monroe had sung only har-
mony as a member of the Monroe Brothers, his high,
mournful tenor (both as lead and backing voice) estab-
lished the convention of bluegrass music’s “high lonesome”
vocals, and his breakneck-tempo mandolin playing set the
standard for other bluegrass performers.
The Blue Grass Boys enjoyed wide popularity, but
Scruggs and Flatt quit in 1948 in order to form their own
influential bluegrass band, the Foggy Mountain Boys. Soon
other bands playing this style of music began to appear,
many of them led by former members of Monroe’s band,
such as Sonny Osborne (the Osborne Brothers), Carter
Stanley (who with his brother Ralph formed the Stanley
Brothers), Don Reno, Jimmy Martin, and Mac Wiseman.
Bluegrass was promoted at numerous annual festivals, such
as the one founded by Monroe in 1967 at Bean Blossom, Ind.
He continued to perform until shortly before his death.