Music of Virginia

"Carry Me Back to Old Virginny" by James A. Bland was Virginia's state song from 1940 until 1997; it now has emeritus status. "Oh Shenandoah" was the interim state song from January 2006, and its melody was used for "Our Great Virginia," with lyrics by Mike Greenly, which became the official state song in 2015. The same year, "Sweet Virginia Breeze," written in 1978 by Steve Bassett and Robbin Thompson became the official popular state song; the runner-up was "Virginia, the Home of My Heart".

Singing Davisson's "Retirement" at his graveside in Cross Keys, following an all-day singing from the Shenandoah Harmony (June 7, 2015).

In 1816 Ananias Davisson of Rockingham County published a shape note tunebook containing folk melodies collected during his travels, entitled Kentucky Harmony. At a time when the musicians in the North were turning to Europe and ridiculing the composers of the First New England School, Davisson's focus on grassroots regional music was widely imitated in the South.

One of Virginia's most famous musical contributions is the country singer Patsy Cline. Several towns claim her as their own, including Gore and Winchester. Winchester is home to several Patsy Cline attractions, including a driving tour published by the local Chamber of Commerce, and the Kurtz Cultural Center/Old Town Visitor's Center, which shows various Cline memorabilia.[1] The Golden Gate Quartet founded in 1931 are widely regarded as the founders of jubilee and the sound of many male vocal groups that came after them. Their musical influence crosses multiple genres including gospel, jazz, blues, hip hop, soul and R&B. The legacy continues on through a new version of the Golden Gate in France and former lead singer Charles West from Chesapeake, Virginia.[2]

Jim & Jesse McReynolds and the Virginia Boys, Ralph Stanley, Hobart Smith, The Statler Brothers, and The Carter Family are award-winning bluegrass and country musicians from Virginia. Ella Fitzgerald and Pearl Bailey were both from Newport News. Hip hop and rhythm and blues acts like Missy Elliott, Timbaland, The Neptunes, Clipse, Chad Hugo, Nottz, Young Dez and Bink hail from the commonwealth. The Neptunes produced 43% of all songs on American radio in 2003.[3] Singer-songwriters from Virginia include Jason Mraz and jam bands like the Pat McGee Band and Dave Matthews Band (violinist Boyd Tinsley attended the University of Virginia), who continue their strong charitable connection to Charlottesville, Virginia.[4] Influential stage-rock group GWAR as well as heavy metal group Lamb of God began at Virginia Commonwealth University. Alternative Rock group Seven Mary Three formed at The College of William and Mary in Williamsburg.

Multi-Platinum certified artists are in bold.[5]

Country and bluegrass

The Steel Wheels play at the Jefferson Theater in Charlottesville

• Kenny Alphin – of the country group Big & Rich, b. Culpeper
• Oliver Anthony - had a No.1 Billboard Hot 100 hit with the protest song "Rich Men North of Richmond" in 2023
• Tim Barry – frontman of Avail, and country/folk singer-songwriter, Richmond
• Dock Boggs – singer, banjo player, Norton
• The Carter Family – highly influential 1920s and 1930s country trio, known as the "First Family of Country Music", Maces Spring
• Neko Case – country singer, b. Alexandria
• Roy Clark – country music artist, Meherrin
• Patsy Cline – country music singer, b. Winchester (d.1963, buried in Winchester)
• Steve Earle – country-rock musician and songwriter, b. Hampton
• Grit City Grass – A bluegrass band that pulls influences from modern and classic bluegrass sources, Charlottesville
• Jim & Jesse – bluegrass duo, Coeburn
• Scott Miller – alternative country singer-songwriter, also of The V-Roys and Scott Miller & The Commonwealth, Augusta County
• Old Crow Medicine Show – Americana/folk band formed by Ketch Secor and Critter Fuqua in Harrisonburg
• Old Dominion – country band, Roanoke
• River City Gang – country-rock band, Richmond
• Gary Ruley and Mule Train – Rockbridge County
• Mary Simpson – violinist, Charlottesville
• Canaan Smith – country singer, Williamsburg
• Hobart Smith – banjo virtuoso, Saltville
• Kilby Snow – autoharpist, Grayson County
• The Stanley Brothers – influential bluegrass duo made up of brothers Carter Stanley and Ralph Stanley, Dickenson County
• The Statler Brothers – country-rock-gospel band, Staunton
• The Steel Wheels - folk and Americana, Harrisonburg
• Ricky Van Shelton – country singer, Pittsylvania County
• Phil Vassar – country singer and songwriter, Lynchburg
• Walker's Run, Lexington
• Wade Ward – banjo player, fiddler, Independence
• Mac Wiseman, born in Crimora

The Meadow Pavilion is one of the theaters at Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts.

For larger concerts and events, Virginia has the Ferguson Center for the Arts (Christopher Newport University) in Newport News, Va, Jiffy Lube Live in Bristow (marketed as D.C. for most tours), the Veterans United Home Loans Amphitheater at Virginia Beach in Virginia Beach, the Richmond Coliseum, the Hampton Coliseum and the Norfolk Scope. Vienna is home to the Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts, the only national park for the arts in the United States. Wolf Trap features a large outdoor amphitheatre, the 7,000 seat Filene Center, as well as a smaller indoor venue called The Barns. The Old Dominion Opry is another major venue, located near Colonial Williamsburg, a popular tourist attraction.[1]

Virginia's other prominent music venues include The Birchmere in Alexandria, a local country and bluegrass club where Mary Chapin Carpenter performed early in her career. The Landmark Theater in Richmond and the Harrison Opera House in Norfolk both host the Virginia Opera. Phase 2 (the former Cattle Annie's, but significantly remodeling in 2010) is a popular, large club venue in Lynchburg with a reputation for attracting prominent performers. Garth Newel Music Center in Hot Springs was once a farm that is now known for classical, jazz, and blues concerts with gourmet meals and views from the side of Warm Springs Mountain. The Shenandoah Valley Music Festival celebrated its 50th anniversary of summer concert in 2013 and continues to draw people to the tiny Shenandoah County village of Orkney Springs.

Richmond's 929 West Grace Street has housed a punk and rock-oriented club nearly uninterrupted for nearly three decades. Most famously known as Twisters throughout the 1990s, more recently the building has been known as Club 929, The Nanci Raygun, and Bagel Czar before re-opening in 2009 as Strange Matter. Like its predecessors, Strange Matter hosts up-and-coming local and national touring acts nearly every night. Alley Katz in Richmond continues to have regular shows. Toad's Place accommodated midsized bands in 2007 and 2008 but closed shortly after that time. Another midsized venue is The National, which holds around 1,500 people.

The Hampton Roads area also has several more intimate venues. The most prominent of them is the Norva Theatre, which is a small club-style venue for smaller to mid-size acts.

The Shenandoah Valley hosts a few smaller venues. The mockingbird in downtown Staunton hosted a 168-seat newly renovated grass roots and acoustic music hall, but closed early in 2013.[6] Clementine café in downtown Harrisonburg has cemented itself as the premier venue in the valley.

In the late 1960s and the 1970s, the Alexandria Roller Rink hosted many festival style concerts, among which, bands like Yes, Jethro Tull, and many others appeared.

The Virginia Musical Museum & Virginia Music Hall of Fame in Williamsburg, VA. opened in 2013. The museum and hall of fame displays instruments, memorabilia, pictures and history of Virginia music artists. New Virginia artists are inducted into the Virginia Music Hall of Fame each year.

FloydFest is a popular music festival which is not actually within Floyd County but in the county just next to Floyd called Patrick County. This is a bit of FloydFest trivia that mostly the locals know about. The festival began in 2002 and features camping and a wide range of music from bluegrass, rock, reggae, folk, zydeco, African, and Appalachian.

In 2005, 2006, and 2007, Richmond hosted the National Folk Festival that features Virginia-area regional folk music as well as folk musicians from around the world. Many previous NFF sites have continued to conduct a regional folk festival when the NFF moves to the next site and Richmond has done the same in the form of the Richmond Folk Festival.

The Virginia Blues & Jazz Festival was started in 2006 at Garth Newel Music Center in Hot Springs. It is held each June and has featured national acts like Taj Mahal, The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Buckwheat Zydeco, and Eric Lindell.

The MACRoCk festival happens the beginning of April every year in Harrisonburg VA. It has featured national acts like MewithoutYou, Q and Not U, Fugazi, The Faint, Archers of Loaf, Dismemberment Plan, Sufjan Stevens, Prefuse 73, Mates of State, The Wrens, Converge, Antibalas Afrobeat Orchestra, Of Montreal, Norma Jean, The Dillinger Escape Plan, Superchunk, Elliott Smith, An Albatross, Coheed and Cambria, Avail, and Engine Down.

The Blue Ridge Rock Festival, a Hard Rock/Heavy Metal music festival has been held in Virginia since 2017. It has been held each year except for 2020 due to COVID-19. The festival was held at DeVault Vineyards in Concord, VA in 2017 and 2018, at Oak Ridge in Arrington, VA in 2019, at White Oak Mountain Amphitheater in Blairs, VA in 2021, at Virginia International Raceway (VIR) in Alton, VA in 2022. It is scheduled to be held at VIR again in 2023. GWAR from Richmond played at Blue Ridge Rock Festival in 2022.

Virginia's contributions to country music include the legendary singer Patsy Cline, pioneering performers The Carter Family and Staunton's Statler Brothers, who were one of the most popular country acts in the country in the 1970s and 1980s.

Bristol, TN/VA has been designated by Congress as the 'Birthplace of Country Music'. In 1927 record producer Ralph Peer of Victor Records began recording local musicians in Bristol, to attempt to capture the local sound of traditional "folk" music of the region. One of these local sounds was created by the Carter Family, which got its start on July 31, 1927, when A.P. Carter and his family journeyed from Maces Spring, Virginia, to Bristol to audition for Ralph Peer, who was seeking new talent for the relatively embryonic recording industry. They received $50 for each song they recorded. That same visit by Peer to Bristol also resulted in the first recordings by Jimmie Rodgers. These 1927 sessions became known as the Big Bang of Country Music. Since 1994, the Birthplace of Country Music Alliance has promoted the city as a destination to learn about country music and the city's role in the creation of an entire music genre. Currently, the Alliance is organizing the building of a new Cultural Heritage Center to help educate the public about the history of country music in the region.

The Bristol Rhythm & Roots Reunion is held every September on State Street in Downtown Bristol and celebrates the city's contribution to country music. It has grown to become one of the more popular music festivals in Virginia and the Appalachia region, as close to 50,000 people attended the festival in 2012.

The city of Richmond has long had one of the more active punk rock scenes on the East Coast. The city is perhaps best known for shock-punk-metal band GWAR, known for wild on-stage antics. GWAR grew out of Death Piggy, a hardcore punk band that followed in the footsteps of local scene leaders White Cross, Beex, and The Prevaricators. However Richmond punk became big with Avail. The Richmond punk scene grew, including: Inquisition, Fun Size, Knucklehed, Uphill Down, Four Walls Falling, The Social Dropouts, Ann Beretta, Sixer, River City High, BraceWar, Smoke or Fire (originally from Boston), Strike Anywhere,and many underground bands. Among music venues existing during the Richmond '80s, Benny's, a bar near the campus of Virginia Commonwealth University, served as an anchor for the punk scene despite its small size.[9][10]

Richmond punk is often mistakenly considered to be an offshoot of the D.C. scene, however Richmond punk bands have developed a unique sound, often influenced by country, folk, and southern rock (particularly prevalent in Avail, Sixer, and Ann Beretta, and to a lesser degree in Strike Anywhere). This is most likely due to the fact that Richmond, the capital of the Confederacy during most of the Civil War, is arguably the oldest and most lively punk scene in the South. Richmond punk has a close relationship with punk from Gainesville, Florida, particularly between Avail and the now-disbanded Hot Water Music. Other hardcore bands from Richmond included Unseen Force, God's Will, Graven Image, and Honor Role.[11]

Richmond also has an active metal scene that includes, in addition to GWAR, Lamb of God, Alabama Thunderpussy, Municipal Waste. The metal scene is closely related the city's punk rockers, and, like the punks, there is a Southern influence in the music of Lamb of God and particularly in Alabama Thunderpussy. Richmond still harbors an extremely strong hardcore scene, emerging from the shadows of the mid-1980s Four Walls Falling, Fed Up, Set Straight, Step Above, Count Me Out and Dead Serious. More recently a resurgence of old school hardcore punk has risen from Richmond with such bands as Direct Control, Government Warning, Wasted Time, etc. Richmond also has a small post-hardcore scene with bands such as Remaniscense, Wow, Owls! and Ultra Dolphins.

Norfolk was known, during hardcore's heyday, for violent clashes between punks and local military personnel from the Navy base. Ray Barbieri (Agnostic Front, Warzone) and John Joseph McGeown (Cro-Mags) became punks while serving in Norfolk after a judge's order.

Prompted by a 1983 article printed in Maximum Rocknroll which criticized the Virginia Beach-Norfolk metro area, formerly referred to as "Tidewater," as devoid of punk bands relative to Richmond, Jeff Clites, creator of the Tidewater-based 'zine, The Tidewater A.R.S.E., responded:[12]

What's this shit about us only having half a band? In case you didn't know, there are many: (in alphabetical order)

1. Aggressive Behavior

2. ANSCHLUSS

3. Bottom Line

4. Dead Meat

5. Death Row

6. God's Will

7. HOIT

8. Jerry's Kids

9. Judicial Fear

10. KJB

11. Scat Ritual

12. Skater's Faith

13. Urban Discord

• Indigenous music of North America#Eastern Woodlands

The Virginia Musical Museum & Virginia Music Hall of Fame opened in 2013. Patsy Cline, Wayne Newton, Ella Fitzgerald, The Carter Family, Roy Clark, Bruce Hornsby, Pearl Baily and Ralph Stanley were the founding inductees.

• Blush, Steven (October 1, 2001). Petros, George (ed.). American Hardcore: A Tribal History. Feral House. ISBN 9780922915712.
• Byron, Janet (1996). Country Music Lover's Guide to the U.S.A. (1st ed.). New York: St. Martin's Press. ISBN 0-312-14300-1.
• Fussell, Fred C. (2003). Blue Ridge Music Trails: Finding a Place in the Circle. North Carolina Folklife Institute. ISBN 0-8078-5459-X.