We Wanna Boogie The Rockabilly Roots Of Sonny Burgess And The Pacers

Rock and roll pioneer and Newport native Sonny Burgess is a member of the Rockabilly Hall of Fame. In this book full of personal interviews and remembrances, Burgess and his band tell of their original recordings for Sun Records in the 1950s; their shows with greats such as Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, and Jerry Lee Lewis; and their success in the contemporary rockabilly revival. This also is the history of a once prominent and spir­ited Delta community of extensive agricultural wealth. Newport was home to numerous music clubs that hosted national artists as well as illicit backroom gambling. Burgess is a product of this history, and his vivacious music is shaped by his hometown and the dramatic transfor­mation of southern rural life it witnessed.

Rock and roll pioneer and Newport native Sonny Burgess is a member of the Rockabilly Hall of Fame. In this book full of personal interviews and remembrances, Burgess and his band tell of their original recordings for Sun Records in the 1950s; their shows with greats such as Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, and Jerry Lee Lewis; and their success in the contemporary rockabilly revival. This also is the history of a once prominent and spirited Delta community of extensive agricultural wealth. Newport was home to numerous music clubs that hosted national artists as well as illicit backroom gambling. Burgess is a product of this history, and his vivacious music is shaped by his hometown and the dramatic transformation of southern rural life it witnessed.

"In Country Boy, Colin Woodward combines biography, social and political history, and music criticism to tell the story of Johnny Cash's time in his native Arkansas. Woodward explores how some of Cash's best songs are based on his experiences growing up in northeastern Arkansas, and he recounts that Cash often returned to his home state, where he played some of his most memorable and personal concerts"--

"Arkansas in Modern America since 1930 represents a significant rewriting of and elaboration on the earlier Arkansas in Modern America, published in 2000. This book offers an overview of the factors that moved Arkansas from a primarily rural society to one more in step with the modern economy and perspectives of the nation as a whole. The narrative covers the roles of Bill Clinton, Daisy Bates, Sam Walton, Don Tyson, and other influential figures in the state's history, placing them in the context of women's movements, music and literature, religious influences, environmental trends, and other important cultural phenomena"--

Country music maintains a special, decades-long relationship to American military life, but these ties didn't just happen. This readable history reveals how country music's Nashville-based business leaders on Music Row created partnerships with the Pentagon to sell their audiences on military service while selling the music to servicemembers. Beginning in the 1950s, the military flooded armed forces airwaves with the music, hosted tour dates at bases around the world, and drew on artists from Johnny Cash to Lee Greenwood to support recruitment programs. Over the last half of the twentieth century, the close connections between the Defense Department and Music Row gave an economic boost to the white-dominated sounds of country while marginalizing Black artists and fueling divisions over the meaning of patriotism. This story is filled with familiar stars like Roy Acuff, Elvis Presley, and George Strait, as well as lesser-known figures: industry executives who worked the halls of Congress, country artists who dissented from the stereotypically patriotic trappings of the genre, and more. Joseph M. Thompson argues convincingly that the relationship between Music Row and the Pentagon helped shape not only the evolution of popular music but also race relations, partisanship, and images of the United States abroad.

For almost 200 years, Jackson County has been a typical farming community in the Mississippi Delta. Based on timber, cotton, and freshwater pearls, its early economy produced great wealth for a small group of landowners. In the 1920s, Jackson County was the 10th-largest cotton producer in the country. However, with the arrival of the tractor in the 1950s and the departure of the laboring classes, the county's economy spiraled downward. The tensions in this social mix led to a creative fermentation that allowed Jackson County to become one of the birthplaces of rock and roll. Images of America: Newport and Jackson County tells many of the colorful stories of the history of the county, from land barons and sharecroppers to Elvis, illuminating the rich heritage of its apparently simple towns and communities.

Includes bibliographical references and indexes.