Bluegrass and old-time music has always had a dark streak, and these twenty murder ballads sit a little further from the spotlight than “Banks of the Ohio” or “Pretty Polly.” Some are old British ballads that came across the ocean and got reshaped in the Appalachians, like “Knoxville Girl,” “Little Mathie Grove,” and “Dreadful Wind and Rain.” Others are newer compositions that deserve a wider hearing: Carter Stanley’s “Little Glass of Wine,” Jake Landers’ “Secret of the Waterfall,” and Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings’ “Caleb Meyer.” A few are true-crime accounts set to music, like “The Story of the Lawson Family” and “Omie Wise.” They all share a plainspoken way of telling something terrible.

Use this list to build a set, learn a new one for your next jam, or just listen through. Each song’s page on Picker’s Guide has chord charts, lyrics, recordings, and the song’s history.