Nobody would claim that Milwaukee doesn't have a fondness for American music. Spend a week or two going to shows in Bay View, Riverwest or on the East Side...

Oakfield native Nicole Kottke earned her country-music credentials by being raised on a farm, and she has plenty of the exuberance that comes with a happy youth. That combination works to her favor on her debut CD, I'll Meet You There...

Releasing a cover tunes album can be a way for a performer to tread water or an opportunity to reflect on the influences that shaped him. Willie Nelson's Remember Me is the later. A collection of familiar country songs from the 1940s through the 1970...

Country music legend Patsy Cline developed new range and depth for female vocals in one of the nation's most popular music genres. Her interesting life story, about a woman who achieved great critical and commercial success in the mid-20th century...

When Hank Williams died at the age of 29 he had released 61 songs. In spite of this relatively small amount of material, Williams found himself at the apex of country music. Since 1953, Williams' estate has milked revenue from the deceased star's recordings in ways that make the Jimi Hendrix vultures look like amateurs, and endless...

A contemporary of Steve Earle, Rodney Crowell cut his teeth playing in Emmylou Harris’ Hot Band before literally marrying into country royalty, wedding Rosanne Cash and producing her albums until their 1992 divorce. He’s had an on-again/off-again solo career, too, most memorably recording the great 1988 album Diamonds and Dirt, a mean...

Arriving after the commercial disappointments of Ruben Studdard and Fantasia—and just before the pop-chart poison that was Taylor Hicks—Carrie Underwood proved that “American Idol” could create a bona fide mega-star, with create being the operative word. In Underwood’s malleable voice and vague, girl-next-door charm, the show’s producers found a blank slate, one they molded into the most old-fashioned...

  A true elder stateswoman of country music, Emmylou Harris returns with her first album since 2006's Mark Knopfler collaboration, All the Roadrunning. On the nostalgic All IIntended to Be, Harris once again borrows buddy/superstar power for an updated bout of rustic shoe-gazing, Nashville-style.  Dolly Parton and Vince Gill contribute backing...

At 71, the singer, guitarist and fiddler Charlie Daniels still has what it takes to get the crowd moving, especially when he plays the well-known crowd pleaser “The Devil Went Down to Georgia.” He’s since squandered some of his cache, though, by recording the offensive, post-9/11 Arab-bashing anthem “This . . .