The low buzz of conversations surrounds theater patrons who are settling into cushioned seats. Softened musical scores float above the whispers into the audience. Lights dim, curtain up, it’s show time at the Mansion America Theater in Branson, Mo. The cast for The Promise bounds onto the stage.
Broadway— and a little bit of every other musical style— has come to the Ozarks. Fans of country, rock, blues, folk, Broadway and classical music have something to enjoy here, almost year-round. Makes sense, as southwest Missouri and northeast Arkansas is a region that has sung its own tune for generations.
Immigrants from the British Isles started that song hundreds of years ago. When the neon and glitzy production numbers are stripped away, the musical roots of this region can be heard. This is the Ozarks-unplugged. The Scots-Irish who emigrated to the Ozarks in the 18th century came primarily from Kentucky and Tennessee. A century before, these Scots were transplanted to northern Ireland but left Europe after the English hiked taxes, causing a huge migration to America in the late 1700s. Musically, some of those Scots-Irish roots can be heard in the acoustic bluegrass, country and old-time gospel melodies of the region. Call it mountain music, old-time country or string band music, the sound resonates with the past. But travelers to the Ozarks can hear this musical style in many places.
The Horsecreek Band, a group of five acoustic musicians, came together in 1975 to play at Silver Dollar City in Branson. Together, they have more than 100 years of musical experience.
George “Butch” Gregory plays guitar and is one of the original band members. The band’s music mixes bluegrass, old-time country, folk and gospel. This musical style has grown in popularity over the last two years, Gregory said. The movie, O Brother, Where Art Thou, has exposed a lot of younger people to string music, he added.
Melodies and rhythms in bluegrass are rooted in Ireland, Gregory said. D.A. Callaway, festival producer at Silver Dollar City, said those ancient European harmonies give us a sense of heritage. “Maybe that’s why it’s magic to us,” he said. “It’s familiar, to the marrow in our bones.”
The fiddle, a favorite for European jigs and reels, mixed with the American banjo and created upbeat instrumentals. Later, lyrics told stories of war, sadness or tragic events, creating bittersweet ballads. “The Ozarks of Missouri have always been a hot spot for country, bluegrass and gospel music,” Gregory said.
This type of music could be heard in the Ozarks as late as the 1920s to ’40s, prior to electricity coming to the area. Folks often gathered for “house parties” that featured square dancing and live music for their evening entertainment. In the 1930s–50s, the Ozarks grew as a vacation destination, and more people were being exposed to its music. In the early 1950s, a radio show brought this music to a wider audience.
“The Ozark Jubilee was the first thing to draw tourists to the Ozarks to hear music,” Gary Ellison, a Springfield producer who was a part of the Jubille cast said, adding he doesn’t believe the Ozark music scene could have evolved into the industry it is today without the Jubilee’s influences.
“Branson has a lot of the Jubilee’s fingerprints on it. One of the writers for the Ozark Jubilee— Don Richardson— was the first PR (public relations) guy for Silver Dollar City and he named the park. Andy Miller, a Jubilee set designer was hired by the Herschends and designed Silver Dollar City.”
The Herschend family opened Silver Dollar City in 1960. During the Jubilee’s era, Springfield was the third-largest city in America to produce live television shows, right behind New York and Hollywood, said Ellison, who conducted interviews for the PBS documentary, Ozark Jubilee: A Living Legacy.
“I believe that in order to be a success, you have to have an audience. And the Jubilee definitely had that,” Ellison said, adding more than 20 million viewers watched each week.
With the completion of Table Rock Dam in 1959 and the Ozark Jubilee rolling along in Springfield, more tourists were coming to the area to hear music and fish in the lakes. That same year, the Mabe family— brothers Bob, Bill, Lyle and Jim— opened their music show in downtown Branson at the old city hall. With 50 folding chairs and homemade instruments, they entertained fishermen who visited Lake Taneycomo. Calling themselves the Baldknobbers after vigilante groups known to the hills in the 1880s, the brothers combined country tunes with Ozark mountain music and comedy skits.
When the show became popular and city hall too crowded, they moved to an old skating rink in Branson and converted it into the town’s first theater. In 1968, the Baldknobbers built a theater on Highway 76, making their act the longest continuously running show in Branson.
In 1960, the Trimble family opened The Shepherd of the Hills Outdoor Drama, based on Harold Bell Wright’s novel. The Presley family in 1963 started their music show near Talking Rocks Cavern in Kimberling City, and built the first music theater on Missouri Highway 76 in 1967. Branson— and the Ozarks— were on the way to fame.
From 1970 to 1990, more music theaters opened in the Ozarks.
In Branson, more country music stars, such as Porter Wagoner, Buck Trent and Dolly Parton, came into town during the 1970s. But Roy Clark was the first national country star to set roots and open a theater in Branson (in 1983) and hosted people like Mel Tillis, Boxcar Willie, Ray Stevens and Jim Stafford, all of whom later opened their own theaters.
When a 1991 segment focused on Branson, there were 22 theaters in town. Today, Branson has more than doubled that number. But Branson isn’t the only venue for Ozark music.
In the Victorian town of Eureka Springs, Ark., the Ozark Mountain Hoe-Down mixes old-time and contemporary country music with bluegrass and gospel in its show. Pine Mountain Jamboree combines a variety of music with comedy for a family show that’s been a tradition in the Ozarks since 1975.
Deborah Reinhardt Palmer is managing editor of AAA Midwest Traveler and AAA Southern Traveler magazines.
Information provided by AAA Magazine