One of the surprises of last week's announcement of the Pulitzer Prizes was a special posthumous citation of Hank Williams for his "pivotal role in transforming country music into a major musical and cultural force in American life."
In a public career that lasted just six years, from 1946 to 1952, Hank Williams took country music to new heights of popularity. Until his time, country music, then called "hillbilly," was regarded as a quirky genre that appealed only to slightly disreputable rural types - "poor white trash" in the minds of many. Williams changed all that.
Although there had been popular country musicians before him - Jimmie Rodgers, Roy Acuff, Ernest Tubb - none had Williams' impact. Drawing upon traditional country music, white gospel, and Southern black blues, he was heavily influenced as a young boy in Alabama by a black street musician, Rufus Payne, known as Tee Tot. Williams created a type of country and Western music that dominated the format until recent years, when the genre went pop.
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