Virginia S Blues Country And Gospel Records 1902 1943

During the years before World War II, hundreds of traditional musicians were sought out by commercial record companies, brought to New York or into local—often makeshift—studios, to cut recordings that would be marketed as "race" and "hillbilly" music. Virginia was home to scores of these performers, several of whom were to become internationally known. Among them were the Carter Family, the Golden Gate Quartet, Charlie Poole, and the Stoneman Family, whose music has touched millions of listeners far beyond the confines of the Old Dominion. It is this historically important body of recordings from this unique period that forms the focus of Kip Lornell's study. In it he combines biographical sketches and bibliographies of the artists and groups with comprehensive discographies of each, covering not only the original 78-rpm issues but also American and foreign long-play releases. The entries incorporate new primary research and contemporary interviews with veterans of early recording sessions. Numerous vintage photographs are also included, some reproduced here for the first time.

Examining the blues genre by region, and describing the differences unique to each, make this a must-have for music scholars and lay readers alike. A melding of many types of music such as ragtime, spiritual, jug band, and other influences came together in what we now call the blues. Blues: A Regional Experience is the most comprehensive and up-to-date reference book of blues performers yet published, correcting many errors in the existing literature. Arranged mainly by ecoregions of the United States, this volume traces the history of blues from one region to another, identifying the unique sounds and performers of that area. Each section begins with a brief introduction, including a discussion of the region's culture and its influence on blues music. Chapters take an in-depth look at blues styles from the following regions: Virginia and the tidewater area, Carolinas and the Piedmont area, the Appalachians and Alabama, the Mississippi Delta, Greater Texas, the Lower Midwest, the Midwest, the Northeast, and California and the West. Biographical sketches of musicians such as B.B. King and T-Bone Walker include parental data and up-to-date biographical information, including full names, pseudonyms, and burial place, when available. The work includes a chapter devoted to the Vaudeville era, presenting much information never before published. A chronology, selected artists' CD discography, and bibliography round out this title for students and music fans.

Since its first edition in 1964, this book has been dubbed "the bible" for collectors of pre-war African American music. It provides an exhaustive listing of all recordings made up to the end of 1943 in a distinctively African American style, excluding those customarily classed as jazz (which are the subject of separate discographies). The book covers recordings made for the commercial market (whether issued at the time or not) and also recordings made for the Library of Congress Archive of Folk Song and similar bodies--about 20,000 titles in all, by more than 3,000 artists. For each recording session, full details are given of: artist credit, accompaniment, place and date of recording, titles, issuing company and catalogue numbers, matrix numbers, alternative takes. There are also short accounts of the major "race labels" that recorded blues and gospel material, and a complete list of field trips to the south by travelling recording units. Howard Rye has joined the original compilers for this thoroughly revised, enlarged, and reset fourth edition. The scope has been widened by the addition of about 150 new artists in addition to newly discovered recordings by other artists. The compilation now includes recordings by groups such as the Fisk Jubilee Singers, the Pace Jubilee Singers, and the Tuskegee Institute Singers, who, although they employed African American materials and musical devices, were designed to appeal to a predominantly white audience. Early cylinder recordings of gospel music from the 1890s are included for the first time. Previous editions of this work are applauded for their completeness, accuracy, and reliability. This has now been enhanced by the addition of new information from record labels and from record company files, and by listening to a wide selection of titles, and detailed cross checking.

The Blues Encyclopedia is the first full-length authoritative Encyclopedia on the Blues as a musical form. While other books have collected biographies of blues performers, none have taken a scholarly approach. A to Z in format, this Encyclopedia covers not only the performers, but also musical styles, regions, record labels and cultural aspects of the blues, including race and gender issues. Special attention is paid to discographies and bibliographies.

Contrary to popular belief, the roots of American country music do not lie solely on southern farms or in mountain hollows. Rather, much of this music recorded before World War II emerged from the bustling cities and towns of the Piedmont South. No group contributed more to the commercialization of early country music than southern factory workers. In Linthead Stomp, Patrick Huber explores the origins and development of this music in the Piedmont's mill villages. Huber offers vivid portraits of a colorful cast of Piedmont millhand musicians, including Fiddlin' John Carson, Charlie Poole, Dave McCarn, and the Dixon Brothers, and considers the impact that urban living, industrial work, and mass culture had on their lives and music. Drawing on a broad range of sources, including rare 78-rpm recordings and unpublished interviews, Huber reveals how the country music recorded between 1922 and 1942 was just as modern as the jazz music of the same era. Linthead Stomp celebrates the Piedmont millhand fiddlers, guitarists, and banjo pickers who combined the collective memories of the rural countryside with the upheavals of urban-industrial life to create a distinctive American music that spoke to the changing realities of the twentieth-century South.

A study of nearly four hundred years in the history of Richmond, Virginia, ranges from the first encounters between English colonists and Powhatan to the inauguration of Douglas Wilder, America's first elected African-American governor

Arts in Earnest explores the unique folklife of North Carolina from ruddy ducks to pranks in the mill. Traversing from Murphy to Manteo, these fifteen essays demonstrate the importance of North Carolina’s continually changing folklife. From decoy carving along the coast, to the music of tobacco chants and the blues of the Piedmont, to the Jack tales of the mountains, Arts in Earnest reflects the story of a people negotiating their rapidly changing social and economic environment. Personal interviews are an important element in the book. Laura Lee, an elderly black woman from Chatham County, describes the quilts she made from funeral flower ribbons; witnesses and friends each remember varying details of the Duke University football player who single-handedly vanquished a gang of would-be muggers; Clyde Jones leads a safari through his backyard, which is filled with animals made of wood and cement that represent nontraditional folk art; the songs and sermon of a Primitive Baptist service flow together as one—“it tills you up all over”; Durham bluesman Willie Trice, one of a handful of Durham musicians who recorded in the 1930s and early 1940s, remembers when the active tobacco warehouses offered ready audiences—“They’d tip us a heap of change to play some music”; and Goldsboro tobacco auctioneer H. L. “Speed” Riggs chants 460 words per minute, five to six times faster than a normal conversational rate.