I Got To Cross That River Jordan
Blind Willie McTell
Piedmont Blues
The Piedmont region is closely associated with the Piedmont blues, a style of blues music
that originated there in the late 19th century. Most Piedmont blues musicians came from
Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia. During the Great Migration, Black Americans
migrated to the Piedmont. With the Appalachian Mountains to the west, those who might
otherwise have spread into rural areas stayed in cities and were thus exposed to a broader
mixture of music than those in, for example, the rural Mississippi delta. Thus, Piedmont
blues was influenced by many types of music such as ragtime, country, and popular
songs—styles that had comparatively less influence on blues music in other regions.
The Piedmont is a plateau region located in the eastern United States between the
Atlantic Coastal Plain and the main Appalachian Mountains, stretching from New Jersey
in the north to central Alabama in the south. The Piedmont province is a physiographic
province of the larger Appalachian division. The province consists of the Piedmont
Upland and Piedmont Lowlands sections.
The fall line marks its eastern boundary with the Coastal Plain. To the west, the Piedmont
is mostly bounded by the Blue Ridge Mountains, the easternmost range of the main
Appalachians. Physiographically, the Piedmont is considered a province of the larger
Appalachian Highlands physiographic division. The width of the Piedmont varies, being
quite narrow above the Delaware River but nearly 300 miles (475 km) wide in North
Carolina. The Piedmont's area is approximately 80,000 square miles (210,000 km2).
The name "Piedmont" comes from the French term for the same physical region, literally
meaning "foothill", ultimately from Latin "pedem montium", meaning "the foot of the
mountains". The region is named after the Italian region of Piedmont, the lowlands which
abut the Alps.