In one of the more predictably absurd moments of the 2025 Grammy Awards, Beyoncé was crowned the queen of country music. Her victory in the Best Country Album category was met with an obligatory standing ovation from an industry terrified of doing anything but applauding. One imagines that had she been nominated for Best Bluegrass Album, a fiddle would have spontaneously combusted in Ricky Skaggs' hands as the Recording Academy rhapsodized about how the true spirit of Bill Monroe can be found in whatever her record actually is.
The real joke is not just that Beyoncé won, but that her competitors were no more authentic avatars of country tradition. One might scan the list of nominees in vain for anything resembling the music that once emerged from the hard red clay of Georgia, the coal fields of West Virginia, or the dive bars of Texas. Instead, we were presented with a parade of radio-friendly suburban warblers, each more eager than the last to assure listeners that, yes, they still drive a truck and drink light beer. Meanwhile, in the “Americana” category – the designation Nashville created to quarantine actual country music – there were albums more deserving of the title than anything in the official “country” lineup.
The great Ken Burns, in his magisterial documentary “Country Music,” chronicled how the genre was born in the intersection of Celtic folk, African spirituals, and working-class blues, molded by the struggles and joys of a people who sang because they had no other way to express the weight of their world. The Carter Family harmonized across the hollers, Hank Williams bled out his pain on an acoustic guitar, and Johnny Cash took the music behind prison walls, where its stories felt most at home. There was an authenticity to it, an unvarnished expression of American life that transcended regionalism even as it was deeply rooted in place.
But in the relentless march toward commercial ubiquity, the industry has largely erased those roots. When genre lines blur, they do not blur equally – certain traditions swallow others, and the original thing is left barely recognizable. We were told that “bro-country” was just an evolution, that pop influences were a necessary adaptation and that everything must change. And yet, no one argues that jazz would be improved by the addition of 808 beats and Auto-Tune, nor do classical purists suggest that Beethoven’s symphonies should be remixed with club bass. Only country music is expected to “evolve” by ceasing to be itself.
This is not a complaint about Beyoncé personally – she is a singular talent, and if she wants to make a country album, she is welcome to try. But the more interesting question is why the industry so desperately wants her to be a country star while it systematically ignores actual country artists.
Country music, at its best, is a form of cultural memory – a way of preserving stories and struggles, a testament to the places and people often overlooked by the mainstream. But memory is fragile, and once lost, it is difficult to recover.
The question is not whether genres can change; they always do. The question is whether, in that change, we are losing something irreplaceable. And if we are, will anyone notice before the last pedal steel fades into silence?
Talmadge L. East is the sitting Republican Probate Judge of Tallapoosa County.
This culture article was made possible by The Fred & Rheta Skelton Center for Cultural Renewal, a project of 1819 News. To comment on this article, please email culture@1819news.com.
The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the policy or position of 1819 News.
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