When Beyoncé released “Texas Hold ‘Em,” the first single from her new country album, “Cowboy Carter,” it elicited a mix of admiration and indignation.
This is not her first foray into the genre, but it is her most successful and controversial entry. With “Texas Hold ‘Em,” Beyoncé became the first Black woman to have a No. 1 song on the country charts. At the same time, country music stations like KYKC in Oklahoma initially refused to play the record because it was “not country.”
Many non-listeners stereotype country music as being white, politically conservative, militantly patriotic and rural. And you can certainly find artists and songs that fit that bill.
But the story of country has always been more complicated, and debates about race and authenticity in country are nothing new; they’ve plagued country artists, record companies and listeners for over a century.
As someone who researches and teaches Black culture and country music, I hope that Beyoncé’s huge profile will change the terms of this debate.
To me, Beyoncé’s Blackness is not the major bone of contention here.
Instead, the controversy is about her “countryness,” and whether a pop star can authentically cross from one genre to the next. Lucky for Beyoncé, it’s been done plenty of times before. And her songs are arriving at a time when more and more Black musicians are charting country hits.
Cross-racial collaboration
Americans have long viewed country music – or, as it was known before World War II, hillbilly music – as largely the purview of white musicians. This is partly by design. The “hillbilly” category was initially created as a counterpart to the “race records” aimed at Black audiences from the 1920s to the 1940s.
But from the start, the genre has been influenced by Black musical styles and performances.
White country music superstars like The Carter Family and Hank Williams learned tunes and techniques from Black musicians Lesley Riddle and Rufus “Tee-Tot” Payne, respectively. Unfortunately, few recordings of Black country artists from the early 20th century exist, and most of those who did record had their racial identity masked.
Johnny Cash’s mentor, Gus Cannon, proves a rare exception. Cannon recorded in the 1920s with his jug band, Cannon’s Jug Stompers, and he had a second wave of success during the folk revival of the 1960s.
Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
Similarly, the genre has always included a mix of Anglo-American and Black American musical instruments. The banjo, for instance, has African roots and was brought to America by enslaved people.
In the case of “Texas Hold ‘Em,” which begins with a lively banjo riff, Beyoncé has partnered with Grammy- and Pulitzer Prize-winning MacArthur Fellow Rhiannon Giddens, America’s foremost contemporary Black banjoist and banjo scholar. (I would argue that this choice alone undercuts objections about the track’s country bona fides.)
Different tacks to navigate race
By releasing these tracks, Beyoncé joins performers like Charley Pride and Mickey Guyton – country stars whose success has forced them to confront questions about the links between their racial and musical identities.
Pride, whose hits include “Kiss an Angel Good Mornin’,” “Just Between You and Me” and “Is Anybody Going to San Antone?,” became, in 1971, the first Black American to win the Country Music Association’s Entertainer of the Year award. In 2000, he was the first Black American inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame.
But throughout his career, Pride resisted attempts to emphasize his Blackness. From his 1971 hit “I’m Just Me” to his 2014 refusal to discuss his racial “firsts” with a Canadian talk show host, Pride consistently strove to be seen as a country artist who happened to be Black, rather than as a country musician whose Blackness was central to his public persona and work.
At the other end of the spectrum is Guyton, who gained recognition and acclaim for songs like her 2020 hit “Black Like Me” – a frank, heartfelt commentary on the challenges she’s faced as a Black woman pursuing a career in Nashville, Tennessee.
Both Pride and Guyton reflect the zeitgeists of their respective decades. In the wake of the civil rights struggles of the 1960s, Pride’s “colorblind” approach enabled him to circumvent existing racial tensions. He chose his material with an eye toward averting controversy – for example, he eschewed love ballads, lest they be understood as promoting interracial relationships. At the start of his career, when his music was released without artist photos, Pride made jokes about his “permanent tan” to put surprised white concertgoers at ease.
Guyton’s work, on the other hand, resonated with the national outrage over the murder of George Floyd and tapped into the celebration of Black empowerment that was part of the ethos of Black Lives Matter.
And yet I cannot think of another Black musical artist with Beyoncé’s cultural cache who has taken up country music.
Some might argue that Ray Charles, whose groundbreaking 1962 album, “Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music,” brought legions of new listeners to country artists, is a forerunner of Beyoncé’s in this regard.
Without diminishing Charles’ significance, I believe Beyoncé’s new album outshines Charles’ landmark recording.
Black country in the 21st century
Over the past five years, in addition to the buzz over Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road,” a significant number of Black musicians – including Darius Rucker, Kane Brown and Jimmie Allen, to name a few – have charted country hits.
Luke Combs’ cover of Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car” topped the country charts and made Chapman the first Black woman to win the Country Music Association’s Song of the Year award. Their performance of the song at the 2024 Grammys went viral, demonstrating both the fluidity of genres and the power of collaboration.
Beyoncé’s loyal fan base, known colloquially as “the Beyhive,” has already propelled “Texas Hold ‘Em” to the top of the pop and country charts. While there may continue to be pushback from traditionalist country music gatekeepers, country radio executives holding sway over national broadcast networks are calling Beyoncé’s new songs “a gift to country music.”
As more and more listeners hear her directive to “just take it to the dance floor,” perhaps the sonic harmony of the country genre will translate to a new way of thinking about whether socially constructed categories, like race, ought to segregate art.
And what a revolution that would be.
This is an updated version of an article originally published on February 22, 2024.
90,000 experts have written for The Conversation. Because our only agenda is to rebuild trust and serve the public by making knowledge available to everyone rather than a select few. Now, you can receive a curated list of articles in your inbox twice a week. Give it a go?
News
Beyoncé’s “Cowboy Carter” took the music world by storm, debuting at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 and claiming the biggest week of 2024 with 407,000 equivalent album units. Despite dominating the charts, breaking records and marking Beyoncé as the first Black woman to top Billboard’s Top Country Albums list, she was notably absent from the Country Music Association (CMA) Awards nominations.
Beyoncé’s latest album, “Cowboy Carter”, has taken the music world by storm, debuting at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 and claiming the biggest week of 2024 with 407,000 equivalent album units. Despite “Cowboy Carter” dominating the charts, breaking records,…
Jason Aldean, America’s most famous country music star, recently caused considerable controversy with a bold statement to the media: Look at their code for five minutes and you’ve learned every single one of them lies for the day.
Watch their ticker for five minutes and you’ve learned every one of their lies for the day. Jason Aldean, one of America’s most popular country music stars, recently stirred up significant controversy with a bold statement about the media. In…
Hank Williams Jr. Criticizes Beyoncé’s Country Album “Cowboy Carter” for Lacking Authenticity
Beyoncé has made an ambitioυs entry into the coυntry world with “COWBOY CARTER,” a sprawling 27-track project with a fairly υniqυe strυctυre. The albυm provided me with an opportυnity to not only talk hip-hop, bυt also coυntry mυsic, a genre…
The Clash of Titans: Kid Rock vs. Taylor Swift and the Battle for Country Music’s Soul
People are pitting Taylor Swift against Kid Rock in an ongoing culture war between liberals and conservatives. A post on X, formerly Twitter, pointed to an interview Kid Rock did with former Fox News anchor Tucker Carlson as a sign of the election year being “MAGA vs…
Photo of Kid Rock with Drag Queen resurfaces after singer’s transphobic outrage
An old photo of Kid Rock “chilling” with legendary drag queen Wanda has resurfaced, following the country singer’s transphobic response to Bud Light’s new partnership with influencer Dylan Mulvaney. The beer company’s recent campaign has sparked a backlash from conservative consumers, who have…
Kid Rock caused controversy with a message aimed at Garth Brooks that made him so angry.
Kid Rock’s pointed message to Garth Brooks—”True country stars love the flag! You can’t sing country if you don’t stand by it. Country music is about heart, soul, and patriotism”—has ignited a fierce debate within the country music community and…
End of content
No more pages to load