What are the roots of your repertory?

The Simple Songs for Jazz thread has got me thinking about where we get our aural source for songs. Contemporary (rather than classical) players usually learn originally from hearing rather than from sheet music and the original heard version of a song--and your internalised notion of what it should sound like--must strongly affect how you play it.

I'll start (I was born in 1955 in southern Ontario Canada):

For pop/jazz standards I remember them from my father's records--Bing Crosby, Rudy Vallee, swing and pre-swing renditions, and soundtracks (and lots of schlock). Thus, my playing and singing sounds much more like Bing or Whispering Jack Smith than it does Mel Torme or Monk.

For Rock: my sister's records, my teen purchases and radio, some delving into the roots of rock during my teens and since (our local library had a great collection of all sorts of stuff). The local Ottawa station had a rather British rock orientation, so I'd have heard more Hollies than Detroit Wheels. What flows out of my fingers and throat tends to sound like 60s/70s standard rock and pop.

For Country: what I heard on the radio as a very young child in Brockville--Johnny Cash, Jim Reeves actually a wide variety of pop that included a lot of country; some active research and listening back during the late 70s and 80s when contemporary rock left me behind, so Hank Snow, Jimmie Rodgers, George Jones. I'm kind of all over the place on that one.

http://acapella.harmony-central.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=1389334

Shouldn't this be one thread ?

That thread appeared as I was composing my own introduction--these overlaps can happen. But no, I don't think so.

There's already a huge Introduce Yourself thread where the general introductions should be going.

This thread is about something rather more specific.