Cowboy Country
Cowboy Country is the broad mainstream of cowboy-themed country song, mixing the romance of Western Music with the drive of honky-tonk and traditional country. It uses acoustic and electric guitar, fiddle, steel guitar, and an occasional gallop rhythm, with warm baritone leads telling first-person stories of riding, roping, and the cowboy way. The feel ranges from breezy and good-natured to lonesome, and lyrics lean hard on frontier imagery, horses, and the cowboy code of honor.
History
Cowboy Country grew directly out of the singing-cowboy films and radio shows of Gene Autry and Roy Rogers, who blended hummable pop melodies with Western settings and brought the cowboy archetype into millions of American homes. As Nashville's country industry consolidated, the cowboy theme became a permanent lyrical and visual lane, expressed in the rhinestone "Nudie suits" worn by Hank Williams, Porter Wagoner, and others, and in songs that romanticized the rambling cowboy life. Marty Robbins's gunfighter ballads of the late 1950s gave the style a literary, cinematic depth.
Defining artists
Essential listening
Sources
- Bill C. Malone, "Country Music, U.S.A."
- Douglas B. Green, "Singing in the Saddle"
- Country Music Hall of Fame archives
- Chris LeDoux biography "Gold Buckle Dreams"