Word comes from the Library of Congress that twenty-five selections have been added to the National Recording Registry. While the likes of Merle Haggard and the unstoppable Gloria Gaynor will no doubt […]
Category: music
Alan Harper’s blues odyssey
Alan Harper left his home in England in 1979 on a pilgrimage to find the blues. His journey led him to Chicago where he worked at a sandwich restaurant and […]
Funk the Erotic up for Lambda Award
Funk the Erotic: Transaesthetics and Black Sexual Cultures by L. H. Stallings is a finalist in the 28th Annual Lambda Literary Awards in the LGBT Studies category. The Lambda Literary […]
Throwbacklist Thursday: Furry’s People
“Virtuosity in playing blues licks is like virtuosity in celebrating the Mass, it is empty, it means nothing. Skill—competence—is a necessity, but a true blues player’s virtue lies in his […]
Throwbacklist Thursday: Life Is Old There
Appalachia is one of those words that encompasses a universe and leaves each of us to form our own ideas of what it means. For me, to use one example, […]
Flatfooting on YouTube
In Hoedowns, Reels, and Frolics, musician, dancer, and scholar Phil Jamison tells the story behind the square dances, step dances, reels, and other forms of dance practiced in southern Appalachia. […]
Gordon Mumma and adventures of the ear
“Pretty much every modern electronic artist you consider ‘out-there’ will appear a lot more ‘in-here’ when you’ve heard this.”–Rob Fitzpatrick, writing for The Guardian, on Gordon Mumma’s Electronic Music of Theater […]
Throwbacklist Thursday
From Beyoncé to Shonda Rhimes to Laverne Cox, African American women have a higher profile up and down our pop culture than at any time in the past. Of course, […]
The composer and the Scarecrow
Harold Arlen composed some of the great classics of the Great American Song Book including “Come Rain or Come Shine,” “Blues in the Night,” “Stormy Weather,” and, of the Wizard […]
Funk the Erotic wins Emily Toth Award
Funk the Erotic: Transaesthetics and Black Sexual Cultures by L. H. Stallings has won the Emily Toth Award for Best Single Work by One or More Authors in Women’s Studies. […]
When the clock strikes rock
One of the most important singles in American music history, “Rock Around the Clock” by Bill Haley and His Comets was the B-side of his first Decca single, a post-apocalyptic novelty […]
Ain’t Valentine’s Day
Love can be hard in real life. It’s always hard in film noir. As the essays in the starry-eyed UIP release Kiss the Blood Off My Hands show, getting involved with guys and/or […]