If there's been one lesson that's made it through my thick skull Brian, it's simply this - the Tree of Music is twisted and gnarly, and the few of us that live on the branches of that tree aren't really all that different. I think it's how we ended up there anyway.
Picked that postulate up from a good friend of mine over coffee one morning... traveling musician Steve Keith, who spends half his year playing in New Orleans, and the other half in Nova Scotia, writing playing the *exact same* cultural music. I'd never thought about it before, but the Louisiana Cajuns were exiled Acadians from up there. (Acadian = Cajun, like Indian = Injun) Phonetic faux-pas aside, people carry their music with them, just like family heirlooms. No small wonder Slovic, (and really most of Eastern European) folk music and American folk music mesh so well. David Grisman spent a good portion of his career studying, and incorporating elements of Gypsy Jazz into what became his "Dawg" music. Tony Rice seized upon that, and carried it to the ears of a Bluegrass audience. Two generations later, Bluegrass musicians from both sides of the Atlantic crossover to play festival circuits and/or smaller venues. It's just kinda' making laps around the world now.
In related news, here's my entry to the Listening Thread today: The Band's "Acadian Driftwood", live at Winterland, with a couple guests:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSZv3cOI4kI
