Hillbilly Music

For those students who spent numerous and enjoyable hours last year listening to Barn Howl and Junkyard Jamboree, WHRB's ban on hillbilly music is indeed unpardonable.

Grandpa Jones and Hank Snow are admittedly inferior to Thomas L. Thomas, and "The Drunkard's Song" may not equal the musical and aesthetic excellence of "Auf dem Wasser du singer." Either in spite of this, or because of this, however, hillbilly music remains popular at Harvard.

WHRB rarely plays pop music or rock 'n' roll, despite their popularity, but this is at least justified. Almost every other AM station in the Boston area broadcasts popular music. Harvard students' source of entertainment, in this instance, is not dependent on WHRB.

Harvard hicks, however, cannot turn to other stations to hear their favorite ditties, for, as Elton Britt said, "thare jist aint eny." Hillbilly music is not sufficiently popular in the Boston community to warrent commercial radio stations playing it. Yet at Harvard it has a large and devoted audience, whose interests should be recognized by the only station which operates exclusively for Harvard students--WHRB.

Since it started broadcasting as an FM station, WHRB has been unduly sensitive to the interests of its sophisticted FM audience. Most of these listeners are not Harvard students, and no doubt they would not particularly enjoy hearing Yodellin' Slim Clark sing "The Cat Came Back."

WHRB, despite its professional broadcasting and programming standards, does nevertheless have a responsibility to the Harvard community, and as long as hillbilly music remains popular here, it should be played. The titilating voices of Earl Scruggs and Wee Willy Tyler must not forever be kept silent.