This year artists working within the orbit of the unstable category "roots music" got personal even as they explored complex cultural lineages and challenged the rules of established scenes and forms.

This year artists working within the orbit of the unstable category "roots music" got personal even as they explored complex cultural lineages and challenged the rules of established scenes and forms.

In Goodman's songs, music is a route to both survival and transcendence. Watch her perform three powerful tracks that confront grief and stump for understanding.

The songs we love from the first half of the year span a wide emotional and musical range, from wild percussive romps to raw pleas for empathy to Beyoncé's command to leave it all on the dance floor.

The songs we love from the first half of the year span a wide emotional and musical range, from wild percussive romps to raw pleas for empathy to Beyoncé's command to leave it all on the dance floor.

The songs we love from the first half of the year span a wide emotional and musical range, from wild percussive romps to raw pleas for empathy to Beyoncé's command to leave it all on the dance floor.

A songwriter with a rural Kentucky zip code and a philosophy degree, Goodman has thoughts to spare on small-town life, bottled trauma and the ways that both are misunderstood.

A songwriter with a rural Kentucky zip code and a philosophy degree, Goodman has thoughts to spare on small-town life, bottled trauma and the ways that both are misunderstood.