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drone  A single tone, sounded continuously or repeated many times.
hillbilly music  A term applied to early country music.
Grand Ole Opry  The world’s longest-running radio show, which began as a barn-dance radio program in Nashville, Tennessee, in 1925 and continues to present country music’s top performers.
yodel  A singing technique that involves changing rapidly back and forth between the normal and falsetto voices.
backbeat  A heavy accent on the normally weak second and fourth beats of a measure in quadruple meter.
gospel  A folk-like religious music. White gospel includes camp meeting spirituals; black gospel has had far more influence on popular music.
bluegrass  A commercial instrumental style, for acoustic instruments, derived from mountain music.
acoustic  A natural, as opposed to electric, instrument.
Dobro  A wood-body guitar with a metal resonator and an aluminum cone for amplification.
rockabilly  A close amalgamation of country music and rock and roll.
Nashville sound  Country music’s commercial response to rock and roll, with country themes, pop instrumentation, and a heavy beat.
cover recording (cover)  A rerecording of a popular record, sometimes intended to appeal to a broader audience than the original recording addressed.
country-western  Western music with a country flavor.
western swing  The Texas swing band style, influenced by Mexican and Hawaiian sounds and by jazz.
honky-tonk  A Texas vocal style, featuring harsh, honest lyrics.







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