Bluegrass
Bluegrass is a fast, acoustic style of American string-band music played on banjo, fiddle, mandolin, guitar and upright bass.
There are usually no drums. Players take turns at quick solos, and singers use tight, high harmonies. It took shape in the 1940s with Bill Monroe and his band the Blue Grass Boys, which gave the style its name, and Earl Scruggs's three-finger banjo picking became its signature. It draws on Appalachian old-time music, blues and gospel, and is faster and more solo-driven than old-time.
Artists it is known for: Bill Monroe, Flatt & Scruggs, The Stanley Brothers, Alison Krauss.
- Family
- Country
- On Spotify
- A current genre
- What it is
- A genre
- From
- Appalachian region, United States, 1940s
- Also called
- bluegrass music
- Trackify listeners who play it
- 2%
About 1,600 of 83,000 Trackify listeners with public profiles have bluegrass among their top artists of the last four weeks. Rounded; updated 13 November 2026.
Bluegrass artists
Tyler Childers
Colter Wall
Sturgill Simpson
Sierra Ferrell
Billy Strings
John Prine
The SteeldriversThe bluegrass artists most Trackify listeners have in their top fifty. Each opens on Spotify.
Sources
The definition is written for this site from open sources, and was checked against them on 13 November 2026.