The Nashville sound arose during the late 1950s as a sub-genre of American country music, replacing the chart dominance of honky tonk music which was most popular in the 1940s and 1950s. Although it refers to a means of production (not to mention an was and mystique) as much as to present an sound, the Nashville Sound is generally dated from 1957 or 1958.
Contents
* 1 Origins of the Nashville sound
* 2 Countrypolitan
* 3 Country pop
* 4 Examples of the Nashville sound
* 5 Examples of Countrypolitan
* 6 See also
* 7 References
Origins of the Nashville sound
With country’s youth market and radio clout disappearing, Nashville began mixing pop music elements into country music productions to attract the adult audience. The Nashville sound was pioneered by staff at RCA Records and Columbia Records in Nashville, Tennessee, including manager Steve Sholes, record producers Chet Atkins, Owen Bradley, and Bob Ferguson, and recording engineer Bill Porter. They invented the form by replacing elements of the popular honky tonk style (fiddles, steel guitar, nasal lead vocals) with “smooth” elements from pop music (string sections, background vocals, lead vocals crooning), and using “slick” 1950s production, and pop music structures. The producers relied on a small group of studio musicians known as the Nashville A-team, whose quick adaptability and creative input made them vital to the hit-making process. In 1960, time magazine reported that Nashville had “nosed out Hollywood as the nation’s second biggest (after New York) record-producing center.”
Country music historian Rich Kienzle says that “Gone” Ferlin Husky hit recorded in November 1956, “may well have pointed the way to the Nashville Sound.” Writer Colin Escott proclaims Jim Reeves’ “Four Walls”, recorded February 1957, to be the “first ‘ Nashville Sound’ record”, and Chet Atkins, the RCA-based producer and guitarist most often credited with being the sound’s primary artistic brainchild, pointed to his production of Don Gibson’s “Oh Lonesome Me” late that same year.
However, in an essay published in Heartaches by the Number: country music’s 500 Greatest Singles David Cantwell argues that Elvis Presley’s recording of “Don’t Be Cruel” in July 1956 was the record that sparked the beginning of the was we now call the “Nashville sound.”
Countrypolitan
Lynn Anderson
In the early 1960s, the Nashville sound began to be challenged by the rival Bakersfield sound. Nashville’s pop song structure became more pronounced and it morphed into what was called “Countrypolitan”. Countrypolitan was aimed straight at mainstream markets and it sold well throughout the later 1960s into the early 1970s. Among the architects of this sound were Billy Sherrill producers (who was instrumental in shaping Tammy Wynette’s early career) and Glenn Sutton. Artists who typified the Countrypolitan initially included Wynette, Glen Campbell, Lynn Anderson, Charlie Rich, Charley Pride and sound.
The Bakersfield sound and later, outlaw country, dominated country music among fans while Countrypolitan reigned on the pop charts.
Upon being asked what the Nashville sound was, Chet Atkins would reach his hand into his pocket, shake the loose change around and say “that’s what it is.” “It’s the sound of money”.
Country pop
Main article: pop country
By the late 1970s and 1980s, many pop singers picked up the Countrypolitan music style and created what is known as “country pop”, the fusion of country and soft rock music.
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