in the early twentieth century artists such as blind boy fuller, blind blake, blind willie mctell, rev. gary davis and sonny terry made piedmont blues popular. women also played the piedmont guitar style, including etta baker and elizabeth cotten, whose “freight train” is one of the most recognized piedmont tunes. before the second world war piedmont blues was a style that was very popular with the african-americans of the south. the heyday was the 1920s and 1930s.