Distinctly “Western” songs began to emerge in the mid-19th century, reflecting the Texas, Arizona and Oklahoma region’s unique mix of peoples of Anglo, Celtic, Spanish, and Other European; African; Native; and Central American heritage. In addition, the great trail drives of the 1860s to the 1890s drew young men from all over the country and abroad to work as cowboys. They refashioned old folk and popular song forms to their own tastes, and added serious and comic lyrics about their lives and work, as well as specials calls and hollers to herd cattle and communicate with each other over the vast expanses of the trail. Cowboy poetry also flourished. The westernmost terminals of the railroads became points where cowboy songs were sung, shared, and then taken to new parts of the West by the cowboys returning home. For example, the railhead at Abilene, Kansas brought cowboys together from many Southwestern territories. The pioneer song “Home on the Range,” written by Dr. Brewster M. Higley and set to music by Daniel Kelly in about 1874, not far from this railhead, was spread rapidly across the West in the 1870s by cowboys on cattle drives.

https://www.loc.gov/collections/songs-of-america/articles-and-essays/musical-styles/popular-songs-of-the-day/western-and-cowboy-songs/

Burl Ives – Cowboy’s Lament

Johnny Cash and Marty Robbins – Streets Of Laredo 1969

Colter Wall – Night Herding Song – live at Crescent Ballroom, Phoenix AZ, April 27 2018