Maggie's Farm

I think y'all give Scruggs too little credit. He did much to "popularize" bluegrass and whether you think The Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde or the Theme from the Beverly Hillbillies are good music, they did much to move bluegrass to a mainstream listening genre. I grew up in the 60's and early 70's, knew bluegrass and it was a very, very regional type of music. You heard it very little outside very specific parts of the south (and certainly never in places like Charleston or Savannah) and very little north of Washington, DC (which had a thriving bluegrass "scene" in the late 60's and on into the 70's) - all those poor folk from the hills come to DC to work in the guvmint.

Monroe was a crotchety old guy whose personality was dramatically different from Scruggs. Look at the clip of Scruggs and a hall of fame cast of musicians playing on Letterman. You would not see Monroe doing that while he was alive and while Stanley has a much greater name recognition now (largely due to Brother where Art thou), his voice does not lend itself well to more "popular" tunes.

I saw Del McCoury at a County Fair in VA around 2002. He and his band were walking around the fair before they performed, eating corn dogs and playing carny games, just like everyone else. He had on a satin jacket that said Del McCoury Band on the back. You would not have seen Bill Monroe doing that (unless someone paid him to . . . )