In the 1970s, country music reached stratospheric heights by seamlessly weaving itself into the fabric of American culture by blending elements of folk and rock music into its Southern honky-tonk roots. Songs of love and loss, booze and gambling, family and country — the triumphs and struggles of everyday folks trying to make it through life — fueled a new generation of artists who reveled in a compelling mix of nostalgia, heartbreak, and pride.
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The ‘70s brought talents like Loretta Lynn, Tammy Wynette, Reba McEntire, and Emmylou Harris into the ranks, their raw talent and star power shining alongside luminaries like Johnny Cash, Conway Twitty, John Denver, and Charley Pride. Throughout the decade, country music could be heard on popular television shows like Hee Haw as well as on local radio from coast to coast, the stars of the Grand Ole Opry were seen as national icons — with breakout performers like Dolly Parton, Kris Kristofferson, Willie Nelson, and Marie Osmond going Hollywood.
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Photographer Henry Horenstein, a dyed in the wool Yankee, began photographing the country music scene as part of a final assignment for his history professor, the famed British writer and socialist E.P. Thompson, who helped Horenstein understand the importance of recording, studying, and documenting the people who were going to disappear from history unless someone preserved their role in it. He did just that, amassing an extraordinary archive of the images now on view in the new exhibition,Honky Tonk: Portraits of Country Music 1972-1981 – Photographs by Henry Horenstein.
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