Known for harmonica work on Rolling Stones' "Miss You," Blue branches out with new album, out January 26, 2010 NEW YORK, NY -- "We have chosen the title Threshold because the tunes open new musical territory for us," says bluesman Sugar Blue of his new album, due out January 26, 2010 on Beeble Music. The album follows the acclaimed 2007 album Code Blue, which hinted at a widening...
Hey, here’s a crazy idea: Why not set the ol’ iPod to Shuffle and list the first ten songs that come up? 1. Hey, Now - Oasis 2. Little By Little - Southside Johnny and the Jukes 3. Sweet Old Chicago - Roosevelt Sykes 4. Love Is Teasin’ - Marianne Faithfull and The Chieftains 5. Susie Rosen’s Nose - Austin [...]
The Pocono Blues Festival is also this weekend, and I know some folks who like to make the trip out there. Here's a story about the festival in the Pocono Record . When you open it, check the schedule in the box in the article. It's a very impressive lineup.
Given the fact that life is just plain hard sometimes, maybe even most of the time, it would seem that any era one picks could make claim to being the worst, the hardest, the most difficult, and yet still, somehow, people get through things, undoubtedly to run into hard times again somewhere soon down the [...]
Memphis Slim, a.k.a. John Len (and Peter) Chatman, born in 1915 in Memphis, and deceased en 1988, started playing piano during the 1920s. He met the great pianist Roosevelt Sykes, and started his recording career in the 1940s. He settled down in Chicago, where he played with bassist Willie Dixon, and moved to Paris in 1961, where he delighted parisian Blues fans ("Live at the Hot Club")....
From wikipedia: Sykes grew up near Helena, Arkansas but at age 15, began playing piano with a barrelhouse style of blues at various places until ending up in the St. Louis, Missouri area where he met St. Louis Jimmy Oden. He started recording in the 1920s, signing with multiple labels and recording under various names including [...]
This is the 40th anniversary of Jazz Fest, which started as a small festival in what is now Congo Sqaure at Armstrong Park. If you look closely at your cubes, you will notice stars next to the artists who were present at the first event. Many will be there, but many more will not. I [...]
This CD consists of material from a session in 1971 produced by the late John Bentley & recorded at Jazz City Studios in New Orleans; Sykes plays solo on piano, guitar & vocals. Roosevelt Sykes , the best known and most prolific of all blues pianists, was born 1906 in Elmar, Arkansas, and was brought up in St. Louis, Missouri . As a child he played the organ in churches but soon switched to...
Surely over half a century is more than long enough for anyone to have the blues? Well in Delmark's case the answer's a resounding negative, especially in view of what's on offer here. The very position of the label has of course ensured that it's documented the Chicago scene closely, but as this compilation shows that's only part of the story...
Folk music and civil/human rights icon Odetta, the woman Dr. Martin Luther King annointed “The Queen of American Folk Music”, has passed. I have a suspicion that so many social media readers are Gen X and Y, people whose memories stretch back not much further than the late 1970s. Do they know who Odetta is [...]
The musician, who'll christen the B.B. King Museum and Delta Interpretive Center, has a new T-Bone Burnett-produced album. B.B. King is full of it. Humility, that is.
To evaluate almost a century of blues recordings and narrow it down to thirty albums takes much thought. First and foremost, you must include recordings that were important for their wide influence. Early Delta musicians like Charlie Patton and Son House influenced Howlin’ Wolf and Muddy Waters, respectively, who themselves started in the Delta and [...]
One of the best things about the blogosphere are the multitudinous obituaries that follow the passing of a major figure: The private memories of how an individual's lives were touched can work in warm counterpoint to the inevitable even-handedness of...
ROOSEVELT SYKES: Complete Recorded Works in Chronological Order Vol. 1, 14 June 1929 to 01 June 1930 Sykes grew up near Helena, Arkansas but at age 15, began playing piano with a barrelhouse style of blues at various places until ending up in the St. Louis, Missouri area where he met St. Louis Jimmy Oden. He started recording in the 1920s, signing with multiple labels and recording under various names...
This was a busy week, lots of new songs - some really great verisons - I’m hoping to start actually posting the songs in another week, pending on if I can twist Ms. Honey into making some a funeral march of bees. Also for all the wordpress users out there that haven’t updated to 2.5 [...]
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