Darius Rucker crossed a stylistic and color barrier when his latest solo album, “Learn to Live,” lit up the country charts.

Like any good country artist, Darius Rucker knows how to spin tales of growing up in the South and weaning himself on the crackling sounds of AM radio. “You could hear R&B, rock ’n’ roll and country on the same station,” the Charleston, S.C., native said. “That was where it all started for me, being able to flip through the channels and never really hearing about what label something was.”

That helps explain why Rucker, the former singer-guitarist for multiplatinum soft-rockers Hootie & the Blowfish, made the transition into country with his 2008 solo album, “Learn to Live.” It was a smart move for Rucker and his label, Capitol Records Nashville. “Learn to Live” and its singles debuted atop the national charts and nabbed unusually positive reviews.

Whether or not the crossover was a natural progression or a calculated audience grab, it worked. But it also highlighted the fact that Rucker is an extreme rarity in the country-music world: a successful black artist. “A lot of the people who are in country music are people who were fans of Hootie & the Blowfish at some point, so to them I’m not the new guy,” Rucker said. “I feel like I’m the new guy, but they don’t.”

Indeed, when Rucker headlines KYGO’s third annual Summer Chill Out on Friday, Sept. 4 at Red Rocks, it will be to a friendly audience — one Rucker has warmed himself to with help from album guest stars such as Brad Paisley, Alison Krauss and Vince Gill.

“I’ve watched the story with Darius very closely, and I think it was a brilliant move on his part,” said John Kellogg, assistant chair of music business and management at Boston’s Berklee College of Music. “Country is one of the most stable genres in music. Once you develop a fan base there and you tour regularly, you can maintain it for at least 20 or 30 years.”

Rucker is one of a small number of black artists who have found success in country, including groundbreaking singer-songwriter Charley Pride, who rose to stardom in the late 1960s, and contemporary names like Cowboy Troy. There are also countless black country artists — male and female — touring smaller circuits and working to change country’s reputation as a repository of white, rural conservatism.

The genre’s branding and marketing of some of its biggest artists doesn’t help dispel that, nor does a glance at the all-white country-music videos and sales charts. But black artists mingled freely with white artists in the early days of country music as session musicians and peers, even though the official history doesn’t always reflect their contributions. Country pioneer Jimmie “The Singing Brakeman” Rodgers credited much of his sound to the black bluesmen he heard growing up in rural Mississippi and Alabama.

Knoxville, Tenn.-based country singer-songwriter Carl Ray.

But the contemporary country-music industry developed during the heyday of the Jim Crow South. While there was cross-pollination among white and black musicians — consider the marked country licks in early Chuck Berry — it didn’t happen so much with audiences. Pride’s performance at the Grand Ole Opry in 1967 was the first appearance of a black man on that stage since harmonica player DeFord Bailey in 1925.

“The only person I knew of any prominence was of course Charley Pride,” said country singer Carl Ray. “And as a kid I was able to travel with Charley and Johnny Nash (of “I Can See Clearly Now” fame) to see Charley perform. It was then that I started really saying, ‘Man, I like country music.’ And as I started performing I began wondering, ‘Are there any more blacks out there outside of Charley?’”

Ray, a Knoxville, Tenn.-based artist, quickly found out there were in fact other black country artists. But because they weren’t an established part of the Nashville machine they rarely made it to the negotiation table with industry executives. “I can’t even tell you the number of times I’ve gotten the door closed in my face,” said Ray, who was heartened by some unsolicited advice from idol Garth Brooks. “‘This music business is tough, especially for artists of color,’” Ray remembered Brooks saying. “‘But keep on writing.’ I felt like God was saying to me, ‘I have your best interests at heart.’”

Charley Pride sings to the honored guests during the gala celebration at the Capital Center on Inauguration Day in 1981.

The same spiritual culture that produced gospel and R&B also produced country music. It’s no surprise the influences mingled, even if it’s taken far longer for country to begin diversifying ethnically. “So many blacks come from the South, and they grew up on country music, which was certainly the case with Ray Charles,” said Berklee’s Kellogg, a former University of Colorado Denver professor and entertainment lawyer. “I’m black, and I’ve always loved country music because of the songs, the same reason Ray Charles did.”

But what of country music’s overwhelmingly white face? Songwriter Ray attributes it more to Nashville’s economic realities than racial attitudes.

“They’re like any other businessmen: They want to market and assign people where they’re going to get the biggest bang for their buck,” he said. “What better way to use an artist like Darius, who already has a brand established? He was a perfect choice, and of course that takes nothing away from his talents.”

In other words, country music has the ability to change, however slowly. Collaborations between country acts like Sugarland and white soul singer Adele (on the Grammy Awards in February) aren’t just novelties but business-savvy crossovers. In a splintered record industry, a well-written song is as important as its increasingly amorphous genre tag.

“I really like to think it’s all about the music,” said Rucker. “When you write a great song, it doesn’t matter what label you put on it. I look at Charley Pride, who was one of the reasons that I was able to do this. But I think, ‘God, what must that guy have gone through to do what he did?’”

“I live down in Texas, so I’m pretty far removed from what goes on in Nashville as a whole,” said artist Pat Green, who will help open tonight’s Red Rocks show for Rucker. “What I do know is this: Country-music fans appreciate talent and integrity. I think Darius has both.”

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John Wenzel is the co-editor of Reverb, editor of the Get Real Denver blog and an arts and entertainment reporter for The Denver Post. His book “Mock Stars: Indie Comedy and the Dangerously Funny” was recently published by Speck Press.