Americana’s Annual Conference Addresses Music’s Mission

When Sheryl Crow received the BMI troubadour award on Sept. 14, she broke into tears as she revealed that her mother no longer recognizes her.

But, she added, when Crow sings something from the Great American Songbook, her mom perks up and sings every word. Her reveal unwittingly set up some of what was to come when the annual AMERICANAFEST opened the next day in Nashville. Between the songs and the personal stories of the genre’s artists, it tackled a bundle of difficult issues, including suicide, climate change, Hurricane Helene, wildfires, dementia, deportations, artificial intelligence and the loss of Dolly Parton. No conclusions emerged, but the topics seemed less depressing than they might otherwise be, reflecting music’s power to inspire resilience, a trait that’s required for the artists to move forward.

Nearly every good story has at least one character who grows stronger by beating back challenges, and in an underdog genre, resilience is a valuable tool. Some artists have had to learn resilience on the fly once they went professional; still others adapted it to their work after developing that trait in their personal lives. One example came with artist-writer Amanda Shaw, who survived Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans in 2005.

“That’s something that has stuck with me — not just as an artist, but as a human being,” she said in the “Whose Roots? Expanding the Americana Music Narrative” panel. “I think it has helped me so much in this industry because you can create something, you can do the best thing that you think you’ve ever done, but you cannot control the outcome at all. But when you are authentic to who you are and what you do, there is nothing that can truly knock you down.”

Americana, now more than 25 years into its journey, remains a somewhat nebulous catch-all format. It grew originally as a bit of a country music subgenre, consisting of sounds that were influenced by country’s roots but were not connecting with what was then considered commercial country. As it has evolved, Americana has embraced all sorts of roots music — blues, bluegrass, gospel, soul, rock, zydeco and rockabilly, for example.

It has developed its own core set of stars, with several of them claiming trophies at the Americana Honors & Awards on Sept. 15: Molly Tuttle took artist of the year, Gillian Welch & David Rawlings earned duo/group, Tyler Childers claimed album of the year for Snipe Hunter and Brandi Carlile walked off with song of the year for “Returning to Myself.”

Since the genre is a hard-to-define umbrella for multiple styles, its artists have an enormous amount of freedom to experiment as they fulfill their musical goals. That also gives them leeway to tackle tougher topics than many competing genres.

Case in point: Jesse Welles, who’s emerged as this generation’s Woody Guthrie, commenting at will through music on the state of America’s citizens, its government and the American dream. For example, the pointedly titled “Good vs. Ice” tackled one of the Minneapolis shootings, cleverly rhyming bits of real-life tragedy in a way that informs and inspires in a succinct one minute and 19 seconds. His work and his activism are inextricably linked.

“It can be tricky trying to tie those things together,” Margo Price said in an interview presented at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, “but it’s also completely difficult to separate them because art is supposed to reflect the times and show people how to feel things.”

The tendency, of course, is to shy away from the hard things and embrace the easy feelings. But life doesn’t always allow that. Wynonna — in an AMERICANA Conference interview that advanced her forthcoming album, The Hard Truth, due Oct. 2 — ran through a series of challenges that dogged her personal world: her mother’s suicide in 2022, the night before their family duo The Judds was to be inducted in the Hall of Fame; her daughter’s incarceration in a Memphis prison; adopting her granddaughter; and processing information she learned about her biological father, who she never knew.

“All I knew to do was sing,” she said, “and so that became our motto, sort of ‘shut up and sing.’”

Digging into the emotional mysteries in her story seems to have provided Wynonna some healing, while her artistic rendering of that story is likely to aid some fans in their own efforts at self-repair. If nothing else, it will remind those listeners that their personal pain is a communal condition.

“What music does,” said Crow, “is it finds you and it makes you feel like you’re not alone.”

Amid the cultural divisions that strain America in 2026, connection with others has arguably greater value than at any time in current generations’ memories, and for those who connect on shared experiences over hard issues, artists’ willingness to make themselves vulnerable is gold. It’s one positive reason to address difficult topics, though it creates a conundrum for associates in music and broadcasting who may not be as passionate about the subject.

“You do run the risk of alienating [some] listeners if you’re really focusing on a particular side [of an issue],” said WNCW Asheville, N.C., music director/morning personality Martin Anderson during a Sept. 17 panel, “When the Song Matters: Radio’s Role in Moments of Cultural Change.” “At the same time, I do think we have a responsibility to lead, to champion an artist who has something to say, and to try not to be afraid to make those choices and take chances in that regard.”

Many programmers remember — or, at least, are aware of — the threats that angry listeners lobbed during The Chicks’ public statement on the Iraq War in 2003. Country famously abandoned the act at the time, and broadcasters now operate with some fear of getting “Dixie-Chicked” over controversial content. However, recording artist Jobi Riccio noted on that same “Radio’s Role” panel that many of the naysayers’ attacks are typically confined to phone calls or social media.

“Often, they’re not brave enough to interface with you one-on-one,” she noted. “I’m kind of aggressive with the message, too, and I like to stand in the power of, you know, ‘Fuck big oil, fuck this,’ because I think it’s powerful to see a young, small, feminine person saying that. Generally, those people don’t want to come to the merch table and be like, ‘I don’t like that you said that.’ So it’s worth it to me.”

Americana acts’ use of music for a purpose beyond commerce drew applause more than once, including at the Price Q&A. “What’s happening right now is not right,” she said, eliciting that laudatory ovation by alluding to the government’s current deportation program. “I wish more people would say things about it.”