..king of all post-war blues harpists,…. The fiery harmonica wizard took the humble mouth organ in dazzling amplified directions that were unimaginable prior to his ascendancy.
~Bill Dahl (allmusic.com)
Induction of Little Walter into R&R Hall of Fame in 2008:
Continue reading “May 1: The late blues legend Little Walter was born in 1930”
If it sounds good and feels good, then it IS good!
~Duke EllingtonArt is dangerous. It is one of the attractions: when it ceases to be dangerous you don’t want it.
~Duke EllingtonBy the time of his passing, he was considered amongst the world’s greatest composers and musicians. The French government honored him with their highest award, the Legion of Honor, while the government of the United States bestowed upon him the highest civil honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
~allaboutjazz.com
Take The “A” Train (Reveille with Beverly from 1943):
Continue reading “April 29: Jazz Legend Duke Ellington Birthday”
My doctor tells me I should start slowing it down – but there are more old drunks than there are old doctors so let’s all have another round.
~Willie NelsonWe create our own unhappiness. The purpose of suffering is to help us understand we are the ones who cause it.
~Willie NelsonHe [Willie Nelson] takes whatever thing he’s singing and makes it his. There’s not many people who can do that. Even something like an Elvis tune. You know, once Elvis done a tune, it’s pretty much done. But Willie is the only one in my recollection that has even taken something associated with Elvis and made it his. He just puts his sorta trip on it…
~Bob Dylan (28 April 1993)
Willie Nelson Induction into the Country Music Hall of Fame (1993):
“I’m a bluesman moving through a blues-soaked America, a blues-soaked world, a planet where catastrophe and celebration- joy and pain sit side by side. The blues started off in some field, some plantation, in some mind, in some imagination, in some heart. The blues blew over to the next plantation, and then the next state. The blues went south to north, got electrified and even sanctified. The blues got mixed up with jazz and gospel and rock and roll.”
― Cornel West, Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud, A MemoirIf you don’t know the blues… there’s no point in picking up the guitar and playing rock and roll or any other form of popular music.
-Keith RichardsThe blues are the roots and the other musics are the fruits. It’s better keeping the roots alive, because it means better fruits from now on. The blues are the roots of all American music. As long as American music survives, so will the blues.
-Willie Dixon
Here´s a list with 10 GREAT old acoustic blues songs. I´ve added youtube “videos” & a spotify playlist.
Check out:
Johnny Cash considered his UK appearance at Glastonbury Festival 1994 as one of the great highlights of his musical career. He wrote about the performance in his autobiography and was so moved by his experience at the time, there were tears rolling down his face when he came off stage afterwards, according to the other performers who were there.
– Paul Goodman (hubpages.com)
Continue reading “Classic Concert: Johnny Cash @ Glastonbury Festival 1994 (video)”
The site was Hiltons, Virginia, a short distance from Bristol, the “Birthplace of Country Music,” where acts including the Carter Family made some of the very first country recordings. Just three miles down a narrow country road from Hiltons, in a large wooden structure known as the Carter Family Fold, Cash was introduced by one of the Fold founders, Janette Carter, the daughter of Sara and A.P., two-thirds of the original Carter Family with Maybelle Carter. Cash, who toured and recorded with the Carter Family throughout the Sixties, would later become inexorably linked to the family when he married June Carter, the second of Mother Maybelle’s three daughters.
-Stephen L. Betts (rollingstone.com)