Summing it up…. May 28, 2008

 

 

For the past few weeks we have been using this blog site in an attempt to bring country music out of the shadows of mainstream music. We have been researching the genre and trying to cover the missing areas that are not shown in the media, including artists, events, interpretations of country music and the history of country music. I’m not sure how well we have educated others on this genre but I’m hoping they now can appreciate the genre for what it is. You don’t have to like it, just appreciated the talent that is involved. I know how much I have learnt from my own research and from reading the blogs from the other group members. I have always liked some country music songs but after researching and discovering other artists I have widened my musical taste.

  Radio and media has a strong power and is very influential. Before this blog page started my country music knowledge was limited to famous names including Slim Dusty, Keith Urban, Lee Kernaghan and the Tamworth Country Music Festival. I now know that there are many more country music festivals in Australia, I know about Aboriginal Country Music, Hick Hop, Rock influenced country music and a range of new artists including Lisa Mitchell. The media doesn’t seem to cover the broader range of the genre and it’s a shame because as Negus (1999) stated when it comes to media ‘the tail has started wagging the dog’. The media and radio is so powerful that it has a direct impact on who is being signed to recording contracts and in many ways influences the ways in which artists are recorded.

    Ever since I wrote the blog about the cyclical changes of country music I have been thinking about the stage it is now. It was at its height in 1994 and has since been lowered on the media radar. Hopefully new technologies such as Myspace can enable new artists to start their career in the Country Music Genre and help to bring Country Music back to its height. Now that music is cheaper and easier to obtain people might be more willing to down load a country music song as it is less commitment than buying a physical album and they can give the genre a go. It is good to hear that mainstream artists are taking on a bit of a country feel in their songs, maybe this will boost Country Music’s image.

   This is my last blog as part of this assignment and I wanted to finish with a final thought: after researching the genre I don’t think it deserves to slip into ‘mainstream’ as it is fantastic on it’s own it deserves much more! Hopefully our blog site here at Country Kids has given Country Music at least some of the recognition it deserves and coverage of the areas that may have been forgotten.

 

Rachelle Fenning

 

Negus, K. (1999), ‘Music Genres and Corporate Cultures’. Routledge, London.