1.
Birmingham, Alabama
–
Birmingham is the most populous city in the U. S. state of Alabama and the county seat of Jefferson County. The citys population was 212,237 in the 2010 United States Census, the Birmingham-Hoover Metropolitan Statistical Area had a population of about 1,128,047 according to the 2010 Census, which is approximately one quarter of Alabamas population. Birmingham was founded in 1871, during the post-Civil War Reconstruction period and it was named for Birmingham, England, one of the UKs major industrial cities. The Alabama city annexed smaller neighbors and developed as an industrial and railroad center, based on mining, the new iron and steel industry. Most of the settlers who founded Birmingham were of English ancestry. From its founding through the end of the 1960s, Birmingham was an industrial center of the southern United States. Its growth from 1881 through 1920 earned its nicknames as The Magic City and its major industries were iron and steel production, plus a major component of the railroading industry. Rails and railroad cars were manufactured in Birmingham. The two primary hubs of railroading in the Deep South have been nearby Atlanta and Birmingham, since the 1860s, the economy has diversified since industrial restructuring in the latter half of the 20th century. Banking, telecommunications, transportation, electrical transmission, medical care, college education. Except for coal mining, the industry has declined in the Birmingham area, Birmingham ranks as one of the most important business centers in the Southeastern United States and as one of the largest banking centers in the nation. In higher education, Birmingham has been the location of the University of Alabama School of Medicine, since that time it has also gained the University of Alabama at Birmingham, one of three main campuses of the University of Alabama System. It is also home to three institutions, Samford University, Birmingham-Southern College, and Miles College. In total, the Birmingham area has major colleges of medicine, dentistry, optometry, physical therapy, pharmacy, law, engineering, the city has three of the states five law schools, Cumberland School of Law, Birmingham School of Law, and Miles Law School. Birmingham is also the headquarters of the Southwestern Athletic Conference, and Southeastern Conference, Birmingham was founded on June 1,1871, by the Elyton Land Company, whose investors included cotton planters, bankers and railroad entrepreneurs. It sold lots near the crossing of the Alabama & Chattanooga and South & North Alabama railroads. The first business at that crossroads was the trading post and country store operated by Marre, the site of the railroad crossing was notable for its proximity to nearby deposits of iron ore, coal, and limestone – the three main raw materials used in making steel. Birmingham is the only place worldwide where significant amounts of all three minerals can be found in close proximity, from the start the new city was planned as a center of industry
Birmingham, Alabama
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From top left: Downtown from
Red Mountain; Torii in the
Birmingham Botanical Gardens;
Alabama Theatre;
Birmingham Museum of Art; City Hall; Downtown Financial Center.
Birmingham, Alabama
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Child labor at Avondale Mills in Birmingham, 1910, photo by
Lewis Hine
Birmingham, Alabama
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Panorama of Birmingham, Alabama in 1916
Birmingham, Alabama
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16th Street Baptist Church, now a National Historic Landmark
2.
Country music
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Country music is a genre of United States popular music that originated in the southern United States in the 1920s. It takes its roots from the genre of United States, such as folk music. Blues modes have been used throughout its recorded history. The term country music is used today to many styles and subgenres. In 2009 country music was the most listened to rush hour radio genre during the evening commute, immigrants to the Southern Appalachian Mountains of North America brought the music and instruments of Europe and Africa along with them for nearly 300 years. Country music was introduced to the world as a Southern phenomenon, Bristol, Tennessee, has been formally recognized by the U. S. Congress as the Birthplace of Country Music, based on the historic Bristol recording sessions of 1927. Since 2014, the city has been home to the Birthplace of Country Music Museum, historians have also noted the influence of the less-known Johnson City sessions of 1928 and 1929, and the Knoxville sessions of 1929 and 1930. Prior to these, pioneer settlers, in the Great Smoky Mountains region, had developed a musical heritage. The first generation emerged in the early 1920s, with Atlantas music scene playing a role in launching countrys earliest recording artists. Okeh Records began issuing hillbilly music records by Fiddlin John Carson as early as 1923, followed by Columbia Records in 1924, many hillbilly musicians, such as Cliff Carlisle, recorded blues songs throughout the 1920s. The most important was the Grand Ole Opry, aired starting in 1925 by WSM in Nashville, during the 1930s and 1940s, cowboy songs, or Western music, which had been recorded since the 1920s, were popularized by films made in Hollywood. Bob Wills was another musician from the Lower Great Plains who had become very popular as the leader of a hot string band. His mix of country and jazz, which started out as dance hall music, Wills was one of the first country musicians known to have added an electric guitar to his band, in 1938. Country musicians began recording boogie in 1939, shortly after it had played at Carnegie Hall. Gospel music remained a component of country music. It became known as honky tonk, and had its roots in Western swing and the music of Mexico. By the early 1950s a blend of Western swing, country boogie, rockabilly was most popular with country fans in the 1950s, and 1956 could be called the year of rockabilly in country music. Beginning in the mid-1950s, and reaching its peak during the early 1960s, the late 1960s in American music produced a unique blend as a result of traditionalist backlash within separate genres
Country music
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Jimmie Rodgers
Country music
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Vernon Dalhart
Country music
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Roy Acuff
Country music
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Publicity photo of Roy Rogers and Gail Davis, 1948
3.
Folk music
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Folk music includes both traditional music and the genre that evolved from it during the 20th century folk revival. The term originated in the 19th century, but is applied to music older than that. Some types of music are also called world music. Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways, as music transmitted orally, music with unknown composers and it has been contrasted with commercial and classical styles. Starting in the century, a new form of popular folk music evolved from traditional folk music. This process and period is called the revival and reached a zenith in the 1960s. This form of music is called contemporary folk music or folk revival music to distinguish it from earlier folk forms. Smaller, similar revivals have occurred elsewhere in the world at other times and this type of folk music also includes fusion genres such as folk rock, folk metal, electric folk, and others. Even individual songs may be a blend of the two, a consistent definition of traditional folk music is elusive. The terms folk music, folk song, and folk dance are comparatively recent expressions and they are extensions of the term folklore, which was coined in 1846 by the English antiquarian William Thoms to describe the traditions, customs, and superstitions of the uncultured classes. Traditional folk music also includes most indigenous music, however, despite the assembly of an enormous body of work over some two centuries, there is still no certain definition of what folk music is. Some do not even agree that the term Folk Music should be used, Folk music may tend to have certain characteristics but it cannot clearly be differentiated in purely musical terms. One meaning often given is that of old songs, with no known composers, the fashioning and re-fashioning of the music by the community that give it its folk character. Such definitions depend upon processes rather than abstract musical types, one widely used definition is simply Folk music is what the people sing. For Scholes, as well as for Cecil Sharp and Béla Bartók, Folk music was already. seen as the authentic expression of a way of life now past or about to disappear, particularly in a community uninfluenced by art music and by commercial and printed song. In these terms folk music may be seen as part of a schema comprising four types, primitive or tribal, elite or art, folk. Music in this genre is often called traditional music. Although the term is only descriptive, in some cases people use it as the name of a genre
Folk music
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Béla Bartók recording Slovak peasant singers in 1908
Folk music
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Indians always distinguished between classical and folk music, though in the past even classical Indian music used to rely on the unwritten transmission of repertoire.
Folk music
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Armenian traditional musicians
Folk music
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Assyrians playing
zurna and
Davul, the typically used instruments for their folk music.
4.
Country Rock
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Country rock is subgenre of popular music, formed from the fusion of rock and country. It was developed by musicians who began to record country-flavored records in the late-1960s and early-1970s. These musicians recorded rock records using country themes, vocal styles, country rock began with Bob Dylan and The Byrds, reaching its greatest popularity in the 1970s with artists such as Emmylou Harris, the Eagles, Michael Nesmith, Poco and Pure Prairie League. Country rock also influenced artists in genres, including The Band, Grateful Dead, Creedence Clearwater Revival, The Rolling Stones. It also played a part in the development of Southern rock, john Einarson states, From a variety of perspectives and motivations, these musicians either played rock & roll attitude, or added a country feel to rock, or folk, or bluegrass, there was no formula. Dylans lead was followed by The Byrds, who were joined by Gram Parsons in 1968. Parsons had mixed country with rock, blues and folk to create what he called Cosmic American Music. Earlier in the year Parsons had released Safe at Home with the International Submarine Band, the result of Parsons brief tenure in the Byrds was Sweetheart of the Rodeo, generally considered one of the finest and most influential recordings in the genre. Country rock was a popular style in the California music scene of the late 1960s. Some folk-rockers followed the Byrds into the genre, among them the Beau Brummels, one of the few acts to successfully move from the country side towards rock were the bluegrass band The Dillards. Former members of Ronstadts backing band went on to form the Eagles, however, the principal country influence in the Eagles came from Bernie Leadon of the Flying Burrito Brothers, and little country influence was left in the band after he left in late 1975. The genre declined in popularity in the late 1970s, but some established artists, List of country rock albums List of country rock musicians
Country Rock
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Gram Parsons in 1972
Country Rock
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Emmylou Harris, the "Queen of country rock", playing in
Rotterdam,
Netherlands (2006)
Country Rock
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Dickey Betts of The
Allman Brothers Band, brought elements of country rock into the band during the 1970s
5.
Bluegrass music
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Bluegrass music is a form of American roots music, and a related genre of country music. Settlers from Britain and Ireland arrived in Appalachia during the 18th century and these traditions consisted primarily of English and Scottish ballads—which were essentially unaccompanied narrative—and dance music, such as Irish reels, which were accompanied by a fiddle. Many older bluegrass songs come directly from the British Isles, several Appalachian bluegrass ballads, such as Pretty Saro, Barbara Allen, Cuckoo Bird and House Carpenter, come from England and preserve the English ballad tradition both melodically and lyrically. Others, such as The Two Sisters, also come from England, however, some bluegrass fiddle songs popular in Appalachia, such as Leather Britches, and Pretty Polly, have Scottish roots. The dance tune Cumberland Gap may be derived from the tune that accompanies the Scottish ballad Bonnie George Campbell and this is in contrast to old-time music, in which all instruments play the melody together or one instrument carries the lead throughout while the others provide accompaniment. Breakdowns are often characterized by rapid tempos and unusual instrumental dexterity, there are three major subgenres of bluegrass and one unofficial subgenre. Traditional bluegrass has musicians playing folk songs, tunes with traditional chord progressions, progressive bluegrass groups may use electric instruments and import songs from other genres, particularly rock & roll. Examples include Cadillac Sky and Bearfoot, another subgenre, Bluegrass gospel uses Christian lyrics, soulful three- or four-part harmony singing, and sometimes the playing of instrumentals. Bluegrass music has attracted a following worldwide. Bluegrass pioneer Bill Monroe characterized the genre as, Scottish bagpipes and its Methodist and Holiness and Baptist. Its blues and jazz, and it has a high lonesome sound, unlike mainstream country music, bluegrass is traditionally played on acoustic stringed instruments. The fiddle, five-string banjo, guitar, mandolin, and upright bass are often joined by the resonator guitar and this instrumentation originated in rural dance bands and is the basis on which the earliest bluegrass bands were formed. The guitar is now most commonly played with a style referred to as flatpicking, unlike the style of bluegrass guitarists such as Lester Flatt. Banjo players often use the three-finger picking style made popular by such as Don Reno. Fiddlers frequently play in thirds and fifths, producing a sound that is characteristic to the bluegrass style, bassists almost always play pizzicato, occasionally adopting the slap-style to accentuate the beat. A bluegrass bass line is generally a rhythmic alternation between the tonic and dominant of each chord, with walking bass excursions. Instrumentation has been a topic of debate. Traditional bluegrass performers believe the correct instrumentation is used by Bill Monroes band
Bluegrass music
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A
5-string banjo
Bluegrass music
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Bluegrass artists use a variety of
stringed instruments.
Bluegrass music
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Ralph Stanley on April 20, 2008 at The Granada Theater in
Dallas
Bluegrass music
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Multiple
Grammy Award -winning bluegrass singer and fiddler
Alison Krauss
6.
Reprise Records
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Reprise Records /rəˈpriz/ is an American major record label, founded in 1960 by Frank Sinatra. It was mostly inactive from 1976 to 1987 and it is owned by Warner Music Group, and operates through Warner Bros. Reprise Records was formed in 1960 by Frank Sinatra in order to more artistic freedom for his own recordings. Hence, he garnered the nickname The Chairman of the Board, having left Capitol/EMI, and after trying to buy Norman Granzs Verve Records, the first album Sinatra released on Reprise was Ring-a-Ding-Ding. As CEO of Reprise, Sinatra recruited several artists for the label, such as fellow Rat Pack members Dean Martin and Sammy Davis. The original roster from 1961 to 1963 included Bing Crosby, Jo Stafford, Rosemary Clooney, Nancy Sinatra, Esquivel, the label still issues any Sinatra work recorded while on the label and, after his death in 1998, it had great success with his greatest hits collections. One of the founding principles under Sinatras leadership was that each artist would have full creative freedom. This is the reason why recordings of early Reprise artists are distributed through other labels. In Martins case, his Reprise recordings were out of print for nearly 20 years before a deal was struck with Capitol Records, in 1963, as part of a film deal, Warner Bros. purchased Reprise from Sinatra, who nonetheless retained a 20% interest in the label. Many of the artists on the label were dropped by Warner Bros. Reprise president Mo Ostin was retained as the head of the label, warner-Reprise executives began targeting younger acts, beginning by securing the American distribution rights to the Pye Records recordings by the Kinks in 1964. Reprise would soon add teen-oriented pop acts like Dino, Desi & Billy to the roster, as well, Franks own daughter Nancy Sinatra would be retained by Ostin, becoming a major pop star starting in late 1965. The label moved almost exclusively to rock-oriented music in the late 1960s, rex, the Meters, John Cale, Gordon Lightfoot, Michael Franks, Richard Pryor, Al Jarreau, Fleetwood Mac, Fanny, and the Beach Boys. In 1976, the Reprise label was deactivated by Warner Bros. an unconfirmed explanation for this move is that Sinatra wanted to be the only artist on Reprise, and Young is said to have been the only Reprise act who refused to agree to a change in labels. In late 1985, some copies of the Dream Academys hit single Life in a Northern Town were pressed with Warner Bros. labels bearing a Reprise logo,1986 saw releases bearing Reprise labels from the Dream Academy as well as Dwight Yoakam. Vice President of Promotion Rich Fitzgerald was appointed as label Vice-President and it was formerly home to the Jimi Hendrix and the Barenaked Ladies catalogs in the U. S. When the Bee Gees back catalog was remastered by Rhino Records in the 2000s, neil Young stated in a documentary about his life that Marilyn Manson was turned down by Reprise. In September 2011, several took place at Reprise Records
Reprise Records
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"Tricolor" label, used by Reprise until 1968. (Label to
The Kinks '
Something Else.)
Reprise Records
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Reprise Records
Reprise Records
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"Two-tone orange" label used by Reprise during the Warner Bros.-Seven Arts merger from 1968 to 1969. (Label to
Jimi Hendrix 's
Smash Hits.) After the Kinney National Company took over Warner Bros. in 1969, the orange tone at the top of the label was changed to the same tone as on the rest of the label, the W7 box logo was removed and the circled:r logo became a boxed logo without the "Reprise" designation.
Reprise Records
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Red label, used by Reprise throughout the late 1970s. (Label to
Neil Young 's
Decade.)
7.
Warner Bros. Records
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Warner Bros. Records was established on March 19,1958, as the recorded-music division of the American film studio Warner Bros. For most of its existence it was one of a group of labels owned and operated by larger parent corporations. The sequence of companies that controlled Warner Bros. and its allied labels evolved through a series of corporate mergers. Over this period, Warner Bros. Records grew from a minor player in the music industry to become one of the top recording labels in the world. In 2003, these assets were divested by their then owner Time Warner. This independent company traded as the Warner Music Group before being bought by Access Industries in 2011, WMG is the smallest of the three major international music conglomerates and the worlds last publicly traded major music company. Cameron Strang serves as CEO of the company, artists currently signed to Warner Bros. At the end of the silent movie period, Warner Bros, pictures decided to expand into publishing and recording so that it could access low-cost music content for its films. This new group controlled valuable copyrights on standards by George and Ira Gershwin and Jerome Kern, the label signed rising radio and recording stars Bing Crosby, Mills Brothers, and Boswell Sisters. In December 1931, Warner Bros. offloaded Brunswick to the American Record Corporation for a fraction of its former value, in a lease arrangement which did not include Brunswicks pressing plants. Warner Bros. sold Brunswick a second time, this time along with the old Brunswick pressing plants Warner owned, to Decca Records in exchange for a financial interest in Decca. The studio stayed out of the business for more than 25 years. Warner Bros. reëntered the record business in 1958 with the establishment of its own recording division, by this time, the established Hollywood studios were reeling from multiple challenges to their former dominance - the most notable being the introduction of television in the late 1940s. Legal changes also had a impact on their business—lawsuits brought by major stars had effectively overthrown the old studio contract system by the late 1940s. Pictures sold off much of its library in 1948 and, beginning in 1949. Semenenko in particular had a professional interest in the entertainment business. With the record business booming - sales had topped US$500 million by 1958 - Semnenko argued that it was foolish for Warner Bros, another impetus for the labels creation was the brief music career of Warner Bros. actor Tab Hunter. In 1958, the studio signed Hunter as its first artist to its newly formed record division, to establish the label, the company hired former Columbia Records president James B
Warner Bros. Records
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The gold, black and red label design used for Warner Bros. stereo albums from 1958 to 1968 and mono albums from 1964 to 1968.
Warner Bros. Records
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The grey, black, white and yellow label design used for Warner Bros. mono albums from 1958 to 1964 when it switched to the same gold label as the stereo version.
Warner Bros. Records
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"Cream Puff War" (1967), the first Warner Bros. single by
The Grateful Dead, showing the orange label with chevron border used on WBR's American 45s for much of the 1960s.
Warner Bros. Records
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Beginning in 1968, Warner LP and single label designs became identical. From 1968 to 1970, the label was called Warner Bros.-Seven Arts Records. The basic design and colour scheme of the W7 label were retained after the company name reverted to Warner Bros. Records and the "WB" shield in 1970 and remained in use until 1973.
8.
Elektra Records
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Elektra Records is an American record label owned by Warner Music Group, founded in 1950 by Jac Holzman and Paul Rickolt. It played an important role in the development of folk music. In 2004, it was consolidated into WMGs Atlantic Records Group, after five years of dormancy, the label was revived as an imprint of Atlantic in 2009. The label has been run by Gregg Nadel since 2015 who officially became its president in 2017, Elektra was formed in 1950 by Jac Holzman and Paul Rickolt in Holzmans St. Johns College dorm room. The usual spelling of the Greek mythological Pleiad Electra was changed, Holzman famously explained, I gave her the ‘K’ that I lacked. He found the C in the name too soft but liked the solid bite of the letter K. The first Elektra LP, New Songs, was a collection of Lieder and similar art songs, Holzman also recorded Josh White, who was without a record deal as a result of McCarthyite blacklisting. In 1964, Elektra launched Nonesuch Records and this classical budget label was the best-selling budget classical label of the era. In 1965, Elektra began a joint venture with Survey Music called Bounty Records which was Elektras first foray into pop music. The most notable signing for Bounty was the Paul Butterfield Band who was moved over to Elektra when Bounty folded, the labels most important signings were the Chicago-based Paul Butterfield Blues Band, the Los Angeles bands Love and The Doors, and the Detroit bands The Stooges and MC5. Included in Elektras LA signings were Tim Buckley and Bread, in 1968, the label also signed pioneering rock guitar soloist Lonnie Mack to a three-album deal. Also in 1967, Elektra launched its influential Nonesuch Explorer Series, excerpts from several Nonesuch Explorer recordings were later included on the two Voyager Golden Discs which were sent into deep space in 1977 aboard the Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 space probes. Elektra, along with its Nonesuch Records subsidiary, was acquired by Kinney National Services in 1970, soon afterwards, Kinney consolidated their label holdings under the Warner-Elektra-Atlantic umbrella. Holzman remained in charge of Elektra until 1972, when it merged with Asylum Records to become Elektra/Asylum Records, Asylums founder, David Geffen, would head the newly combined label. Holzman, in the meantime, was appointed vice president and chief technologist for Warner — ushering the company into home video. Holzman also went on to acquire Discovery Records, in 1975, Geffen stepped down due to health problems. He would be replaced by Joe Smith, who went on to become CEO of Capitol Records. Although the company was listed as Elektra/Asylum Records on the label credits
Elektra Records
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Elektra Records logo
9.
Asylum Records
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Asylum Records is an American record label founded in 1971 by David Geffen and partner Elliot Roberts. It was taken over by Warner Communications in 1972, and later merged with Elektra Records to become Elektra/Asylum Records, after various incarnations, today it is geared primarily towards hip-hop, along with rock and alternative metal. It is owned by Warner Music Group, and is distributed through Atlantic Records. Asylum was founded in 1971 by David Geffen, and partner Elliot Roberts, who had worked as agents at the William Morris Agency. They had previously founded their own management company, Geffen was unable to get a recording contract for their client Jackson Browne. While pitching Browne to Ahmet Ertegun, Geffen said, Youll make a lot of money, Ertegun replied, You know what, David, I have a lot of money. Why dont you start a company and then youll have a lot of money. They agreed immediately that Ertegun would put up the funds, Atlantic Records would distribute Asylum Records. Although they knew they would sign Browne, the first act that Geffen asked to join the label was his close friend Laura Nyro, Nyro agreed, but without Geffens knowledge she changed her mind and re-signed with Columbia Records. Geffen said it was the biggest betrayal of his life up to that point, Asylums early releases were distributed by Atlantic Records. His seventh and final album for the label, Heartattack and Vine, was released in 1980, former Creedence Clearwater Revival frontman John Fogerty signed with the label in 1974. The biggest coup for Asylum was signing Bob Dylan, who had been with Columbia Records since the early 1960s but who, Dylan recorded two albums, Planet Waves and the live Before the Flood, for Asylum before returning to Columbia. Columbia reissued Dylans two Asylum albums in 1981, Asylum was taken over by Warner Communications in 1973, and merged with Elektra Records to become Elektra/Asylum Records. David Geffen and Elliot Roberts each received $2 million in cash and $5 million in Warner Communications stock, Geffen served as president and chairman of Elektra/Asylum Records until 1975, when he crossed over to film and was named vice-chairman of Warner Bros. By the middle of the decade, the company was calling itself Elektra Records. By this time Asylums remaining acts had been shifted to the Elektra roster, although catalog recordings, Asylum was reformatted into a Country music label, still operated by Elektra, in 1992. Under the new format, Asylum scored successful recordings by acts as Emmylou Harris, Brother Phelps, Thrasher Shiver, Kevin Sharp, Bryan White. They also produced many critically acclaimed albums by such as Mandy Barnett, Guy Clark, The Cox Family, Bob Woodruff, John Douglas Myers
Asylum Records
–
Asylum Records
Asylum Records
–
Original logo
10.
Rhino Records
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Rhino Entertainment Company is an American specialty record label and production company founded in 1978. It is currently the division for the Warner Music Group. Founded in 1978, Rhino was originally a novelty and reissue label during the 1970s and 1980s, one of Rhinos early artists was The Twisters, whose Los Angeles popularity far exceeded their album sales. The labels on early Rhino records featured the mascot character. Some of the labels earliest successes with reissues were achieved by acquiring the rights to the White Whale Records catalog that included the Turtles, by the mid-1980s, most of Rhinos releases were reissues of previously released recordings licensed from other companies. Rhino was quick to get into the disc market, releasing dozens of oldies CDs at the dawn of the CD age in 1984. Their retrospective compact disc releases, such as those in the Billboard Top Hits series, are often remastered to restore or improve upon the original analog audio quality. Through the 1980s and 1990s, the company continued to sign artists and release new music, on the main Rhino label and on subsidiary labels such as RNA. In 1985, Rhino signed a distribution agreement with Capitol Records. During 1989 Rhino and Capitol’s parent EMI made a deal to jointly acquire Roulette Records, Rhino received the US rights to Roulettes catalog, excluding jazz. When the distribution deal with Capitol ended in 1992, Rhino signed a new deal with Atlantic Records. In 1998, Time Warner bought the other half of Rhino, the Rhino Records retail store, which was not part of the sale, closed in 2005. Periods, in addition to WBs own post-1949 period, Rhinos soundtrack releases include Gone with the Wind, The Wizard of Oz, Easter Parade, North by Northwest, Casablanca, King Kong, Doctor Zhivago, Superman, and Finians Rainbow. The Turner Entertainment and Warner Bros. film soundtrack libraries are managed by Warner Bros. in-house label subsidiary. In 1999, Rhino started the Rhino Handmade division of limited-edition releases available primarily from their website, all Handmade deluxe editions were limited to about 3,000 copies or less, and once sold out were not re-pressed. In 2003, co-founders and longtime executives Richard Foos and Harold Bronson left Rhino, soon after, Foos inaugurated a new label, Shout. Factory, which began releasing dozens of CDs and videos mirroring the original early-1990s Rhino philosophy, in 2004, Time Warner spun off its music divisions and today Rhino is part of the newly organized Warner Music Group. In June 2006, Warner Strategic Marketing in the U. K. was dissolved, the division has two main factions, TV-advertised compilations and catalog material from the Warner vaults
Rhino Records
–
Rhino Entertainment
11.
Nonesuch Records
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Nonesuch Records is an American record company and label owned by Warner Music Group, distributed by Warner Bros. Records, and based in New York City, founded by Jac Holzman in 1964 as a budget classical label, Nonesuch has developed into a label that records critically acclaimed music from a wide range of genres. Robert Hurwitz has been president of the company since 1984, Nonesuch was founded in 1964 by Jac Holzman to produce fine records at the same price as a trade paperback, which would be half the price of a normal LP. To achieve this he initially licensed European recordings of music as it would be too expensive to record new material. Originally the label concentrated heavily on chamber and baroque music, often with unique repertory, upon its formation, Nonesuch operated as a subsidiary label of Elektra Records, which Holzman had launched in 1950. In 1970, Holzman sold Elektra and Nonesuch to Kinney National Company, in 2004, Warner Music Group became an independently owned, publicly traded company. Sterne oversaw several firsts for the label, including early electronic releases, under Sterne, Nonesuch helped spark a ragtime revival in the United States with the release of a series of Scott Joplin piano rags performed by Joshua Rifkin. Sterne also launched the groundbreaking Explorer Series, building the foundation for the field of world music, Sterne was replaced by the founders younger brother, Keith Holzman, a production chief who, for the next five years, operated the label from Los Angeles. Records-distributed jazz label ECM Records, to run Nonesuch Records, within the first two years under Hurwitzs leadership, Nonesuch released albums by such new music pioneers as Steve Reich, John Adams, Philip Glass, John Zorn, and Kronos Quartet. Hurwitz established a roster at the label, which included Zorn, Wayne Horvitz. In 1994, Hurwitz hired David Bither, the Senior Vice President and General Manager of Elektra Records, bithers first signing, Emmylou Harris, signaled a new direction for the label. Harris, previously signed to Warner Bros. Records and Elektra Records, though she had long been a highly regarded interpreter of other writers’ songs, her Nonesuch debut was distinguished by being her first album to primarily feature self-penned compositions. In the decade that followed, k. d, laurie Anderson has put out three discs with the label, and Nonesuch reissued her seminal Big Science album, an avant-garde project that became an unlikely pop hit in 1982. That recounting of the life and loves of former Filipino leader Imelda Marcos, was turned into an Off-Broadway musical at The Public Theater in the spring of 2013. Forward-thinking traditional groups Carolina Chocolate Drops and Punch Brothers also joined the label, the Chocolate Drops, a group exploring the African-American roots of old-time music, won a Grammy Award for Best Traditional Folk Album for its Nonesuch debut, Genuine Negro Jig. Mandolinist and composer Chris Thile of Punch Brothers was named a 2012 MacArthur Fellow, receiving one of 23 “genius” grant awards to extraordinary practitioners in a variety of creative fields. As a solo artist, he has joined the classical ranks of the label. Nonesuch has been building a catalog of Broadway cast recordings, including works by multiple Tony
Nonesuch Records
–
Nonesuch Records
12.
Rodney Crowell
–
Rodney Crowell is an American musician, known primarily for his work as a singer and songwriter in country music. Crowell has had five number one singles on Hot Country Songs and he has also written songs and produced for other artists. He was influenced by songwriters Guy Clark and Townes Van Zandt, Crowell played guitar and sang for three years in Emmylou Harris Hot Band. He has won two Grammy Awards in his career, one in 1990 for Best Country Song for the song After All This Time, Crowell was born on August 7,1950 in Crosby, Texas, to James Walter Crowell and Addie Cauzette Willoughby. He had come from a family, with one grandfather being a church choir leader. His grandmother played guitar and his father sang semi-professionally at bars, at age 11, he starting playing drums in his fathers band. In his teen years, he played in garage rock bands in Houston. In August 1972 he moved to Nashville, Tennessee, in search of a musical career and he later met and befriended fellow songwriter Guy Clark, who became a major influence on his songwriting and vice versa. While there, he said, I got a real cold splash in the face of what songwriting is about. I started filling my mind with as many symbols and images as I could, I got real hungry to have something to contribute. Emmylou Harris had recorded one of Crowells songs, Bluebird Wine, on her Pieces of the Sky album and made a request to meet him. After he sat in with Emmylou at her gig at the Armadillo World Headquarters in early January 1975, she asked him to play guitar in her backing band. He accepted and left the day to join Emmylou in Los Angeles. In 1977 as a project, he formed a musical group, The Cherry Bombs, together with Vince Gill, Tony Brown. One year later, he signed a deal with Warner Bros. Records and in late 1978, released his debut album. His debut album, as well his following two albums, But What Will the Neighbors Think and Rodney Crowell, were not commercially successful despite garnering a cult following. Crowell himself criticized his debut album for not translating onto vinyl the same clarity and his single Ashes by Now from But What Will the Neighbors Think reached No.37 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1981. Though he had several country hits by artists covering his songs
Rodney Crowell
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Crowell onstage at
Whelan's, Dublin, January 2009
Rodney Crowell
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Crowell at the
Grammy Awards in February 1990
13.
Gram Parsons
–
Ingram Cecil Connor III, known professionally as Gram Parsons, was an American singer, songwriter, guitarist, and pianist. Parsons is best known for his work within the music genre, he also popularized what he called Cosmic American Music, a hybrid of country, rhythm and blues, soul, folk. Besides recording as a solo artist, he played with the International Submarine Band, The Byrds and his relatively short career is described by AllMusic as enormously influential for country and rock, blending the two genres to the point that they became indistinguishable from each other. Parsons was born in Winter Haven, Florida, and developed an interest in music while attending Harvard University. He founded the International Submarine Band in 1966 and, after months of delay. Parsons joined The Byrds in early 1968, and played a role in the making of the seminal Sweetheart of the Rodeo album. After leaving the group in late 1968, Parsons and fellow Byrd Chris Hillman formed The Flying Burrito Brothers in 1969, releasing their debut, The Gilded Palace of Sin, the same year. The album was received but failed commercially, after a sloppy cross-country tour. Parsons was fired from the band before its release in early 1970 and he soon signed with A&M Records, but after several unproductive sessions he canceled his intended solo debut in early 1971. Parsons moved to France, where he lived for a period at Villa Nellcôte with his friend Keith Richards of The Rolling Stones. Returning to America, Parsons befriended Emmylou Harris through his friend and she assisted him on vocals for his first solo record, GP, released in 1973. Although it received enthusiastic reviews, the failed to chart. His next album met with a reception, and peaked at number 195 on Billboard. Several years of alcoholism and drug abuse severely deteriorated his health, since his death, Parsons has been recognized as an artist credited with helping to found both country rock and alt-country. His posthumous honors include the Americana Music Association Presidents Award for 2003, Ingram Cecil Connor III was born on November 5,1946, in Winter Haven, Florida, to Ingram Cecil and Avis Connor. The Connors normally resided at their residence in Waycross, Georgia. She was the daughter of citrus fruit magnate John A. Snively, Parsons father was a famous World War II flying ace, decorated with the Air Medal, who was present at the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor. Biographer David Meyer characterized Parsons parents as loving, writing in Twenty Thousand Roads that they are remembered as affectionate parents, however, he also notes that unhappiness was eating away at the Connor family, Avis suffered from depression, and both parents were alcoholics
Gram Parsons
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Gram Parsons
Gram Parsons
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The Nudie suit of Parsons in the
Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville
Gram Parsons
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Parsons in 1972
Gram Parsons
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Parsons' makeshift memorial in
Joshua Tree, California
14.
Dolly Parton
–
After achieving success as a songwriter for others, Dolly Parton made her album debut in 1967, with her album Hello, Im Dolly. However, in the new millennium, Parton achieved commercial success again and has released albums on independent labels since 2000, including albums on her own label, Parton is the most honored female country performer of all time. Achieving 25 RIAA certified Gold, Platinum, and Multi-Platinum awards, she has had 25 songs reach No.1 on the Billboard country music charts, a record for a female artist. She has 41 career top 10 country albums, a record for any artist, all-inclusive sales of singles, albums, hits collections, and digital downloads during her career have topped 100 million worldwide. Parton has received 46 Grammy nominations, in 1999, Parton was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. She has composed over 3,000 songs, notably I Will Always Love You, Jolene, Coat of Many Colors and she is also one of the few to have received at least one nomination from the Academy Awards, Grammy Awards, Tony Awards, and Emmy Awards. As an actress, she starred in such as 9 to 5, The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, Rhinestone. Parton was born in Sevier County, Tennessee, the fourth of 12 children of Robert Lee Parton, a farmer and construction worker, Partons middle name comes from her maternal great-great grandmother, Rebecca Whitted. She has described her family as being dirt poor, Partons father paid the doctor who helped deliver her with a bag of oatmeal. She outlined her familys poverty in her early songs Coat of Many Colors and they lived in a rustic, one-room cabin in Locust Ridge, just north of the Greenbrier Valley of the Great Smoky Mountains, a predominantly Pentecostal area. Music played an important role in her early life and she was brought up in the Church of God, the church her grandfather, Jake Robert Owens pastored. Her earliest public performances were in the church, beginning at age six, at seven, she started playing a homemade guitar. When she was eight years old, her uncle bought her first real guitar, Parton began performing as a child, singing on local radio and television programs in the East Tennessee area. By ten, she was appearing on The Cas Walker Show on both WIVK Radio and WBIR-TV in Knoxville, Tennessee, the day after she graduated from high school in 1964, she moved to Nashville. Her songs were recorded by other artists during this period, including Kitty Wells. She signed with Monument Records in 1965, at 19, where she was pitched as a bubblegum pop singer. She released a string of singles, but the one that charted, Happy, Happy Birthday Baby. Although she expressed a desire to record country material, Monument resisted, after her composition, Put It Off Until Tomorrow, as recorded by Bill Phillips, went to number six on the country chart in 1966, the label relented and allowed her to record country
Dolly Parton
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Parton accepting an Applause award for Dollywood, November 2010
Dolly Parton
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Dolly Parton portrait for Goldband Records
Dolly Parton
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Dolly Parton holding a baby in
Honolulu, Hawaii, 1983
Dolly Parton
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Dolly Parton in
Australia, November 2011
15.
Linda Ronstadt
–
Linda Maria Ronstadt is an American popular music singer. She has also earned nominations for a Tony Award and a Golden Globe award and she was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in April 2014. On July 28,2014, she was awarded the National Medal of Arts, in total, she has released over 30 studio albums and 15 compilation or greatest hits albums. Ronstadt charted 38 Billboard Hot 100 singles, with 21 reaching the top 40,10 in the top 10 and this success did not translate to the UK, with only her single Blue Bayou reaching the UK Top 40. Her duet with Aaron Neville, Dont Know Much, peaked at number 2 in December 1989, in addition, she has charted 36 albums,10 top-10 albums and three number 1 albums on the Billboard Pop Album Chart. Her autobiography, Simple Dreams, A Musical Memoir, was published in September 2013 and it debuted in the Top 10 on The New York Times Best Seller list. She has lent her voice to over 120 albums and has more than 100 million records. Christopher Loudon, of Jazz Times, wrote in 2004 that Ronstadt is blessed with arguably the most sterling set of pipes of her generation, after completing her last live concert in late 2009, Ronstadt retired in 2011. She was diagnosed as having Parkinsons disease in December 2012, which left her unable to sing. Linda Maria Ronstadt was born in 1946 in Tucson, Arizona, daughter to Gilbert Ronstadt, a prosperous merchant who ran the F. Ronstadt Co. and Ruth Mary Ronstadt. Ronstadt was raised on the familys 10-acre ranch with her siblings Peter, Michael J. the family was featured in Family Circle magazine in 1953. Lindas father came from a pioneering Arizona ranching family and was of German, English, the familys influence on and contributions to Arizonas history, including wagon making, commerce, pharmacies, and music, are chronicled in the library of the University of Arizona. Her mother Ruth Mary, of German, English, and Dutch ancestry, was raised in Flint and she was a daughter of Lloyd Groff Copeman, a prolific inventor and holder of many patents. Copeman, with nearly 700 patents to his name, invented a form of the toaster, many refrigerator devices, the grease gun, the first electric stove. His flexible rubber ice cube tray earned him millions of dollars in royalties, later, as a solo artist, she released Hand Sown. Home Grown in 1969, which has described as the first alternative country record by a female recording artist. With the release of chart-topping albums such as Heart Like a Wheel, Simple Dreams and she set records as one of the top-grossing concert artists of the decade. Referred to as the First Lady of Rock and the Queen of Rock and her rock-and-roll image was as famous as her music, she appeared six times on the cover of Rolling Stone and on the covers of Newsweek and Time
Linda Ronstadt
–
Ronstadt performing in
New Haven, Connecticut at a
WPLR show,
New Haven Veterans Memorial Coliseum, August 16, 1978
Linda Ronstadt
–
Ronstadt, on the cover of the February 28, 1977, issue of
Time
Linda Ronstadt
–
Rex Smith, Ronstadt and
Kevin Kline, ca. 1980, from the
Central Park production of The Pirates of Penzance.
16.
Neil Young
–
Neil Percival Young, OC OM, is a Canadian singer-songwriter, musician, producer, director and screenwriter. Young began performing in a group covering Shadows instrumentals in Canada in 1960, in 1966, after a brief stint with the Rick James-fronted Mynah Birds, he moved to Los Angeles, where he formed Buffalo Springfield with Stephen Stills, Richie Furay and others. Young had released two albums by the time he joined Crosby, Stills & Nash in 1969, in addition to two as a member of Buffalo Springfield. From his early albums and those with his backing band Crazy Horse, Young has recorded a steady stream of studio and live albums. Youngs often-distorted electric guitar work, deeply personal lyrics and signature tenor singing voice transcend his long career, Young also plays piano and harmonica on many albums which frequently combine folk, rock, blues and other musical styles. Famed for emotional outbursts and ripping up live set lists, Young often plays acoustic versions of songs in one show and his gritty guitar work, especially with Crazy Horse, earned him the nickname Godfather of Grunge and led to his 1995 album Mirror Ball with Pearl Jam. More recently Young has been backed by Promise of the Real, Young directed films using the pseudonym Bernard Shakey, including Journey Through the Past, Rust Never Sleeps, Human Highway, Greendale, and CSNY/Déjà Vu. He also contributed to the soundtracks of the films Philadelphia and Dead Man, Young has received several Grammy and Juno awards. The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inducted him twice, as a solo artist in 1995, in 2000, Rolling Stone named Young the 34th greatest rock n roll artist. He has lived in California since the 1960s but retains Canadian citizenship and he was awarded the Order of Manitoba on July 14,2006, and was made an Officer of the Order of Canada on December 30,2009. Young was born on November 12,1945, in Toronto and his father, Scott Alexander Young, was a journalist and sportswriter who also wrote fiction. His mother, Edna Blow Ragland Rassy Young was a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution, although Canadian, his mother had American and French ancestry. Youngs parents married in 1940 in Winnipeg, Manitoba, and their first son, shortly after Youngs birth in 1945, his family moved to rural Omemee, Ontario, which Young later described fondly as a sleepy little place. Young suffered from polio in 1951 during the last major outbreak of the disease in Ontario, after his recovery, the Young family vacationed in Florida. During that period, Young briefly attended Chisolm Elementary School in New Smyrna Beach, in 1952, upon returning to Canada, Young moved from Omemee to Winnipeg for a year, before relocating to Toronto and Pickering. Young became interested in music he heard on the radio. When Young was twelve, his father, who had several extramarital affairs and his mother asked for a divorce which was granted in 1960. Young went to live with his mother, who moved back to Winnipeg, during the mid-fifties, Young listened to rock n roll, rockabilly, doo-wop, R&B, country, and western pop
Neil Young
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Young in 1983
Neil Young
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The Last Waltz, Young (center on left microphone) performing with Bob Dylan and
The Band, among others in 1976.
Neil Young
–
Young playing in
Barcelona, Spain, 1984
17.
Grammy Award
–
A Grammy Award, or Grammy, is an honor awarded by The Recording Academy to recognize outstanding achievement in the mainly English-language music industry. The annual presentation ceremony features performances by prominent artists, and the presentation of awards that have a more popular interest. It shares recognition of the industry as that of the other performance awards such as the Emmy Awards, the Tony Awards. The first Grammy Awards ceremony was held on May 4,1959, to honor, following the 2011 ceremony, The Academy overhauled many Grammy Award categories for 2012. The 59th Grammy Awards, honoring the best achievements from October 2015 to September 2016, was held on February 12,2017, the Grammys had their origin in the Hollywood Walk of Fame project in the 1950s. The music executives decided to rectify this by creating a given by their industry similar to the Oscars. This was the beginning of the National Academy of Recording Arts, after it was decided to create such an award, there was still a question of what to call it, one working title was the Eddie, to honor the inventor of the phonograph, Thomas Edison. They finally settled on using the name of the invention of Emile Berliner, the gramophone, for the awards, the number of awards given grew and fluctuated over the years with categories added and removed, at one time reaching over 100. The second Grammy Awards, also held in 1959, was the first ceremony to be televised, the gold-plated trophies, each depicting a gilded gramophone, are made and assembled by hand by Billings Artworks in Ridgway, Colorado. In 1990 the original Grammy design was revamped, changing the traditional soft lead for a stronger alloy less prone to damage, Billings developed a zinc alloy named grammium, which is trademarked. The trophies with the name engraved on them are not available until after the award announcements. By February 2009,7,578 Grammy trophies had been awarded, the General Field are four awards which are not restricted by genre. Album of the Year is awarded to the performer and the team of a full album if other than the performer. Record of the Year is awarded to the performer and the team of a single song if other than the performer. Song of the Year is awarded to the writer/composer of a single song, Best New Artist is awarded to a promising breakthrough performer who releases, during the Eligibility Year, the first recording that establishes the public identity of that artist. The only two artists to win all four of these awards are Christopher Cross, who won all four in 1980, and Adele, who won the Best New Artist award in 2009 and the other three in 2012 and 2017. Other awards are given for performance and production in specific genres, as well as for other such as artwork. Special awards are given for longer-lasting contributions to the music industry, the many other Grammy trophies are presented in a pre-telecast Premiere Ceremony earlier in the afternoon before the Grammy Awards telecast
Grammy Award
–
Grammy Awards
Grammy Award
18.
Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum
–
Chartered in 1964, the museum has amassed one of the world’s most extensive musical collections. The Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum is one of the world’s largest and most active popular music research centers, through CMF, industry leaders raised money to build the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, which opened on April 1,1967. Located at the head of Music Row, the museum was erected on the site of a small Nashville city park, at this point, artifacts began to be displayed and a small library was begun in a loft above one of the museum’s galleries. At the outset, CMA staff had run the museum, but by 1972 the museum acquired its own small staff, which has steadily increased to over 150 full-time professionals. Building expansion took place in 1974,1977, and 1984 to store and display the museum’s growing collection of costumes, films, historic cars, musical instruments, and other artifacts. To become more accessible, in May 2001 the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum moved to a new,130,000 square feet facility in the heart of downtown Nashville’s arts and entertainment district. In 2014, the museum unveiled a $100 million expansion, doubling its size to 350,000 square feet of galleries, archival storage, education classrooms, retail stores, and special event space. The story is revealed through artifacts, photographs, and text panels, recorded sound, vintage video, sing Me Back Home is enhanced by numerous, rotating limited-engagement exhibits. In addition to the galleries, the museum has the 776-seat CMA Theater, the Taylor Swift Education Center, the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum has developed multiple platforms to make its collection accessible to a wider audience. From weekly instrument demonstrations to its flagship songwriting program for schools, Words & Music, the Country Music Hall of Fame honor was created in 1961 by the Country Music Association, the first inductees were Hank Williams, Jimmie Rodgers, and Fred Rose. Roy Acuff, the first living artist to join the Hall of Fame, was elected in 1962, the most recent inductees are Jerry Reed, Don Schlitz and Alan Jackson. Over the Hall of Fame’s history, the number of new members inducted each year has varied from one to twelve, the election procedure is as follows, A small CMA nominating committee drafts slates of candidates from each category, categories have been defined variously over the years. Award recipients are determined through a two-stage balloting process, the first round of voting narrows each category to five candidates, the second round selects winners. The large select committee of electors that votes on Hall of Fame membership is composed of CMA members who have participated in the music industry for at least ten years. New Hall of Fame members receive special recognition in ceremonies at the Country Music Hall of Fame, today the plaques are displayed in a seventy-foot-high rotunda at the museum’s enlarged downtown Nashville facility. The museum’s archival and library storage, allows for the cultivation of the museum’s collection, hundreds of historic musical instruments, featuring Mother Maybelle Carter’s Gibson L-5, Earl Scruggs’s banjo, Bob Wills’ fiddle, and Bill Monroe’s mandolin. Oral histories, scrapbooks, correspondence, fan club newsletters, sheet music, periodicals, iconic Vehicles, Elvis Presley’s 1960 “Solid Gold” Cadillac limousine, Webb Pierce’s 1962 Pontiac Bonneville convertible, and Jerry Reed’s 1980 Pontiac Trans Am from Smokey and the Bandit II. When viewed from the air, the forms a massive bass clef
Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum
–
Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum
19.
Bob Dylan
–
Bob Dylan is an American songwriter, singer, painter, and writer. He has been influential in music and culture for more than five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s, when his songs chronicled social unrest, early songs such as Blowin in the Wind and The Times They Are a-Changin became anthems for the Civil Rights Movement and anti-war movement. Leaving behind his initial base in the American folk music revival, his six-minute single Like a Rolling Stone, recorded in 1965, Dylans lyrics incorporate a wide range of political, social, philosophical, and literary influences. They defied existing pop music conventions and appealed to the burgeoning counterculture, initially inspired by the performances of Little Richard and the songwriting of Woody Guthrie, Robert Johnson, and Hank Williams, Dylan has amplified and personalized musical genres. Dylan performs with guitar, keyboards, and harmonica, backed by a changing lineup of musicians, he has toured steadily since the late 1980s on what has been dubbed the Never Ending Tour. His accomplishments as a recording artist and performer have been central to his career, since 1994, Dylan has published seven books of drawings and paintings, and his work has been exhibited in major art galleries. As a musician, Dylan has sold more than 100 million records and he has also received numerous awards including eleven Grammy Awards, a Golden Globe Award, and an Academy Award. Dylan has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Minnesota Music Hall of Fame, Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, and Songwriters Hall of Fame. The Pulitzer Prize jury in 2008 awarded him a citation for his profound impact on popular music and American culture. In May 2012, Dylan received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama, in 2016, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition. Bob Dylan was born Robert Allen Zimmerman in St. Marys Hospital on May 24,1941, in Duluth, Minnesota and he has a younger brother, David. Dylans paternal grandparents, Zigman and Anna Zimmerman, emigrated from Odessa, in the Russian Empire and his maternal grandparents, Ben and Florence Stone, were Lithuanian Jews who arrived in the United States in 1902. Dylans father, Abram Zimmerman – an electric-appliance shop owner – and mother, Beatrice Beatty Stone, were part of a small, close-knit Jewish community. They lived in Duluth until Robert was six, when his father had polio and the returned to his mothers hometown, Hibbing. In his early years he listened to the radio—first to blues and country stations from Shreveport, Louisiana, and later and he formed several bands while attending Hibbing High School. In the Golden Chords, he performed covers of songs by Little Richard and their performance of Danny & the Juniors Rock and Roll Is Here to Stay at their high school talent show was so loud that the principal cut the microphone. In 1959, his high school yearbook carried the caption Robert Zimmerman, the same year, as Elston Gunnn, he performed two dates with Bobby Vee, playing piano and clapping
Bob Dylan
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Dylan onstage at Azkena Rock Festival,
Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain, June 26, 2010
Bob Dylan
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Zimmerman family home in Hibbing, Minnesota
Bob Dylan
–
With
Joan Baez during the civil rights "
March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom ", August 28, 1963
Bob Dylan
–
Bob Dylan in November 1963
20.
John Denver
–
He was one of the most popular acoustic artists of the decade and one of its best selling artists. By 1974, he was established as Americas best selling performer. After traveling and living in numerous locations while growing up in his military family, Denver recorded and released approximately 300 songs, about 200 of which he composed, with total record sales of over 33 million. He recorded and performed primarily with a guitar and sang about his joy in nature, his disdain for city life, his enthusiasm for music. Denver starred in films and several television specials in the 1970s and 1980s. He continued to record in the 1990s, also focusing on issues by lending vocal support to space exploration. He lived in Aspen, Colorado for much of his life and was known for his love of Colorado which he sang about numerous times, in 1974 Denver was named poet laureate of the state. The Colorado state legislature also adopted Rocky Mountain High as one of its two songs in 2007. Denver was a pilot and died at the age of 53 in a single-fatality crash of his personal experimental aircraft. Henry John Deutschendorf Jr. was born in Roswell, New Mexico, to Lt. Col. Henry John Deutschendorf, Sr. an Air Force officer, Henry Sr. was of German ancestry, and met and married his Oklahoma Sweetheart. Denvers Irish Catholic and German maternal grandmother was the one who imbued Denver with his love of music. In his autobiography, Take Me Home, Denver described his life as the eldest son of a family shaped by a father who could not show his love for his children. He is also the nephew of singer Dave Deutschendorf of The New Christy Minstrels, because Denvers father was in the military and his family moved often, it was difficult for him to make friends and fit in with other children of his own age. Constantly being the new kid was troubling for the introverted Denver, and he grew up feeling like he should be somewhere else. While living in Tucson, Arizona, Denver was a member of the Tucson Arizona Boys Chorus for two years, Denver was happy living in Tucson, but his father was transferred to Montgomery, Alabama, then in the midst of the Montgomery boycotts. The family later moved to Fort Worth, Texas, where Denver graduated from Arlington Heights High School, attending high school in Fort Worth was a distressing experience for the disenfranchised Denver. In his third year of school, he borrowed his fathers car and ran away to California to visit family friends. His father flew to California in a jet plane to retrieve him
John Denver
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John Denver, 1973
John Denver
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A Long-EZ two-seat canard plane similar to Denver's
John Denver
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The plaque marking the location of Denver's plane crash in
Pacific Grove, California
John Denver
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John Denver Memorial stone with the lyrics to "Rocky Mountain High" in Rio Grande Park, Aspen, Colorado
21.
Don Williams
–
Don Williams is an American country singer, songwriter, and 2010 inductee to the Country Music Hall of Fame. He grew up in Portland, Texas, and graduated in 1958 from Gregory-Portland High School, after seven years with the folk-pop group Pozo-Seco Singers, he began his solo career in 1971, singing popular ballads and amassing 17 number one country hits. His straightforward yet smooth bass-baritone voice, soft tones, and imposing build earned him the nickname, after the Pozo-Seco Singers disbanded, Williams briefly abandoned the music industry and got a job working for his father-in-law. Soon, however, Williams resumed his career in music, in December 1971, Williams signed on as a songwriter for Jack Music Inc. In 1972, Williams inked a contract with JMI Records as a country artist. His 1974 song, We Should Be Together, reached number five, and he signed with ABC/Dot Records. His first single with ABC/Dot, I Wouldnt Want to Live If You Didnt Love Me, became a one hit. Only four of his 46 singles didnt make it to the Top Ten, I Believe in You is a 1980 single written by Roger Cook and Sam Hogin and recorded by Don Williams. I Believe in You would be Don Williams eleventh #1 on the country chart, the single stayed at #1 for two weeks and spent 12 weeks on the country chart. I Believe in You would be Don Williams only Top 40 entry and it was also hit in Australia, New Zealand and Europe. Don also appeared as himself in the Universal Pictures movie, Smokey & The Bandit II, playing to a full house, the final event was well received and quite emotional for fans in attendance. In 2010, Williams came out of retirement and was again touring. In March 2012, Williams announced the release of a new record And So It Goes, the record is his first with the independent Americana label Sugar Hill Records. The record includes guest appearances by Alison Krauss, Keith Urban, to accompany his latest album release he embarked on a UK Tour. In March 2016, the Pensacola News Journal reported that Williams had announced he was retiring from touring and its time to hang my hat up and enjoy some quiet time at home. Im so thankful for my fans, my friends and my family for their love and support. Williams has had an influence over a variety of recording artists of different genres. His music is popular internationally, including Great Britain, Australia, Ukraine, India, Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, South Africa, Sierra Leone
Don Williams
–
Don Williams
22.
Roy Orbison
–
Roy Kelton Orbison, nicknamed the Big O, was an American singer-songwriter and musician, known for his distinctive, impassioned voice, complex compositions and dark emotional ballads. The combination led many critics to describe his music as operatic, between 1960 and 1964,22 of his songs placed on the Billboard Top 40, including Only the Lonely, Crying, and Oh, Pretty Woman. Orbison grew up in Texas and began singing in a rockabilly and country and he was signed by Sun Records in 1956, but his greatest success came with Monument Records in the early 1960s. His career stagnated in the 1970s, but was revived by several versions of his songs. In 1988, he was a member of the Traveling Wilburys supergroup, along with George Harrison, Bob Dylan, Tom Petty and he recorded his last solo album, Mystery Girl, the same year but died of a heart attack shortly thereafter. While most male rock and roll performers in the 1950s and 1960s projected a defiant masculinity, many of Orbisons songs instead conveyed a quiet, almost desperate and his voice ranged from baritone to tenor, and music scholars have suggested that he had a three- or four-octave range. During performances, he was known for standing still and solitary, and for wearing black clothes and dark sunglasses, which lent an air of mystery to his persona. His honors include inductions into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987, the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in the year. Rolling Stone placed him at number 37 on their list of the Greatest Artists of All Time, in 2002, Billboard magazine listed Orbison at number 74 in the Top 600 recording artists. Roy Kelton Orbison was born in Vernon, Texas, the son of Orbie Lee Orbison, an oil well driller and car mechanic, and Nadine Vesta Shults. Both of his parents were unemployed during the Great Depression and, searching for work, moved the family to Fort Worth, Texas and he attended Denver Avenue Elementary School until a polio scare prompted the family to return to Vernon. Later, they moved to Wink, Texas, Orbison later described life in Wink as football, oil fields, oil, grease and sand and expressed relief that he was able to leave the desolate town. All the Orbison children were afflicted with poor eyesight, Roy used thick corrective lenses from an early age and he was not confident about his appearance and began dyeing his nearly-white hair black when he was still young. He was quiet and self-effacing, remarkably polite and obliging — a product, biographer Alan Clayson wrote and he was readily available to sing, however, and often became the focus of attention when he did. He considered his voice memorable, if not great, on Roys sixth birthday, his father gave him a guitar. He later recalled that by the age of seven, I was finished, you know, for anything else and his major musical influence as a youth was country music. He was particularly moved by Lefty Frizzells singing, with its slurred syllables and he also enjoyed Hank Williams and Jimmie Rodgers. One of the first musicians he heard in person was Ernest Tubb, in West Texas, he was exposed to many forms of music, sepia, Tex-Mex, the orchestral arrangements of Mantovani and cajun
Roy Orbison
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Roy Orbison in 1965
Roy Orbison
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Orbison performing in New York in 1987
23.
The Band
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The Band was a Canadian roots rock group, originally consisting of four Canadians—Rick Danko, Garth Hudson, Richard Manuel, and Robbie Robertson —and one American, Levon Helm. The members of the Band first came together as they joined the rockabilly singer Ronnie Hawkinss backing group, in 1964, they separated from Hawkins, after which they toured and released a few singles as Levon and the Hawks and the Canadian Squires. The next year, Bob Dylan hired them for his U. S. tour in 1965, because they were always the band to various frontmen, Helm said the name The Band worked well when the group came into its own. The group began performing as the Band in 1968 and went on to ten studio albums. Dylan continued to collaborate with the Band over the course of their career, the original configuration of the Band ended its touring career in 1976 with an elaborate live ballroom performance featuring numerous musical celebrities. This performance was immortalized in Martin Scorseses 1978 documentary The Last Waltz, the Band recommenced touring in 1983 without guitarist Robertson, who had found success with a solo career and as a Hollywood music producer. Following a 1986 show, Manuel committed suicide, Danko died of heart failure in 1999, after which the group broke up for good. Helm was diagnosed with cancer in 1998 and was unable to sing for several years. He continued to perform and released several albums until he died in 2012. The group was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 1989, in 2004 Rolling Stone ranked them No.50 on its list of the 100 greatest artists of all time, and in 2008 they received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2004, The Weight was ranked 41st on Rolling Stones list of the 500 greatest songs of all time, in 2014, the Band was inducted into Canadas Walk of Fame. While most of the Hawks were eager to join Hawkinss group and he had earned a college degree, planned on a career as a music teacher, and was interested in playing rock music only as a hobby. The Hawks were in awe of his wild, full-bore organ sound, Hudson finally relented, as long as the Hawks each paid him $10 per week to be their instructor, all music theory questions were directed to Hudson. While pocketing a little cash, Hudson was also able to mollify his familys fears that his education had gone to waste. The piano–organ combination was uncommon in rock music, and for all his aggressive playing, there is a view that jazz is evil because it comes from evil people, but actually the greatest priests on 52nd Street, and on the streets of New York City were the musicians. They were doing the greatest healing work, and they knew how to punch through music which would cure and make people feel good. With Hawkins, they recorded a few singles in this period, Hawkins regularly convened all-night rehearsals following long club shows, with the result that the young musicians quickly developed great technical prowess on their instruments. In late 1963, the split from Hawkins over personal differences
The Band
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"Big Pink" in 2006
The Band
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The Band in 1969. Left to right:
Manuel,
Hudson,
Helm,
Robertson and
Danko.
The Band
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L to R:Danko, Helm and Manuel on tour in Hamburg, Germany in 1971
The Band
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Bob Dylan and The Band touring in Chicago in 1974. Left to right: Danko, Robertson, Dylan and Helm.
24.
Patty Griffin
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Patricia Jean Patty Griffin is an American singer-songwriter and musician. She is an accomplished vocalist and plays guitar and piano and she is known for her stripped-down songwriting style in the folk music genre. Her songs have been covered by musicians, including Emmylou Harris, Ellis Paul, Rory Block, Dave Hause. In 2007, Griffin received the Artist of the Year award from the Americana Music Association, in 2011, Griffins album Downtown Church won the Grammy Award for Best Traditional Gospel Album. Griffin is from Old Town, Maine, United States, next to the Penobscot Native American reservation, the youngest child in her family, with six older siblings, she bought a guitar for $50 at age 16. She sang and played but had no inclination to become a professional musician, after a short marriage, which ended in 1992, Griffin began playing in Boston coffee houses and was scouted by A&M Records, which signed her on the strength of her demo tape. Griffins second album, Flaming Red, released in 1998, was a departure from the sound of Living with Ghosts, with a mix of mellow songs and high-tempo rock. The title track, Flaming Red, is an example of the latter, another song from the album, Tony, is also featured on the charity benefit album Live in the X Lounge. Her third album, Silver Bell, has a similar to its predecessor. It was released by A&M in 2013,13 years after it was recorded, A&M dropped Griffins contract after Silver Bell was recorded, and she was then signed by Dave Matthewss ATO Records. Griffin re-recorded songs from that album for later releases, such as Making Pies, Mother of God, Standing, copies of the unreleased Silver Bell were leaked and bootlegged and can be easily acquired by the B&P method on message boards. In August 2013, it was announced that UMe planned to release Silver Bell, mixed by producer Glyn Johns, four albums followed on ATO,1000 Kisses, A Kiss in Time, Impossible Dream, and Children Running Through. In 2004, Griffin toured with Emmylou Harris, Buddy Miller, Gillian Welch, on February 6,2007, she released Children Running Through. The album debuted at number 34 on the Billboard 200, with 27,000 copies sold, of the album, Griffin told Gibson Lifestyle, I just kind of felt like singing what I wanted to sing, and playing how I wanted to play. Its not all dark and tragic and its a different way for me to look at things. Getting old—older, I should say, Im not so serious all the time and it was also said that the album was inspired by her childhood. Griffins version of the song was featured in episode 11 of the season of the ABC television show Greys Anatomy. 1965 Gibson J-50 Guitar 1993 Gibson J-200 Junior Guitar In September 2008, in October 2008, she sang background vocals on Todd Sniders cover of John Fogertys Fortunate Son for Sniders Peace Queer album
Patty Griffin
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Griffin performing at Sound Stage in Central Park on September 17, 2008
Patty Griffin
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Griffin performing at the North Carolina Museum of Art in 2006
25.
Mark Knopfler
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Mark Freuder Knopfler, OBE is a British singer, songwriter, guitarist, record producer and film score composer. He is best known as the lead guitarist, lead singer and songwriter for the rock band Dire Straits, since Dire Straits disbanded in 1995, Knopfler has recorded and produced eight solo albums and, as with his previous band, produced many hit songs. He has composed and produced film scores for nine films, including Local Hero, Cal, The Princess Bride, Wag the Dog and Altamira. In addition to his work with Dire Straits and as a solo artist and composer, Knopfler has recorded and performed with prominent musicians. He has produced albums for Tina Turner, Bob Dylan, Knopfler is a fingerstyle guitarist and was ranked 27th on Rolling Stones list of 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time. Knopfler and Dire Straits have sold in excess of 120 million records to date, Mark Freuder Knopfler was born on 12 August 1949 in Glasgow, Scotland, to an English mother, Louisa Mary, and a Hungarian-Jewish father, Erwin Knopfler. His mother was a teacher and his father was an architect, Knopfler later described his father as a Marxist agnostic. The Knopflers originally lived in the Glasgow area and Mark Knopflers younger brother David was also born there, the family re-settled in Knopflers mothers home town of Blyth, Northumberland, in North East England when he was seven years old. Mark had attended Bearsden Primary school in Scotland for two years, but both brothers attended Gosforth Grammar School, originally inspired by his uncle Kingsleys harmonica and boogie-woogie piano playing, Mark soon became familiar with many different styles of music. During the 1960s, he formed and joined bands and listened to singers like Elvis Presley and guitarists Chet Atkins, Scotty Moore, B. B King, Django Reinhardt, Hank Marvin. At 16, he made a television appearance as part of a harmony duo. In 1968, after studying journalism for a year at Harlow College, two years later, he decided to further his studies, and went on to graduate with a degree in English at the University of Leeds. In April 1970, while living in Leeds, Knopfler recorded a demo disk of a song he had written. The recording included Knopfler, Steve Phillips, Dave Johnson, Johnson, Granger, and vocalist Mick Dewhirst played with Knopfler in a band called Silverheels. On graduation in 1973, Knopfler moved to London and joined a High Wycombe-based band called Brewers Droop, appearing on the album The Booze Brothers. One night, while spending time with friends, the only guitar available was an old acoustic with a badly warped neck that had been strung with extra-light strings to make it playable, even so, he found it impossible to play unless he finger-picked it. He said in an interview, That was where I found my voice on guitar. After a brief stint with Brewers Droop, Knopfler took a job as a lecturer at Loughton College in Essex — a position he held for three years, throughout this time, he continued performing with local pub bands, including the Café Racers
Mark Knopfler
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Mark Knopfler, 2006
Mark Knopfler
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Knopfler performing in Dublin, 1981
Mark Knopfler
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Knopfler with Dire Straits performing in Belgrade, 10 May 1985
Mark Knopfler
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Knopfler performing in Bilbao, 2001
26.
Albert Lee
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Albert William Lee is an English guitarist known for his fingerstyle and hybrid picking technique. Lee has worked, both in the studio and on tour, with famous musicians from a wide range of genres. He has also maintained a career and is a noted composer. Lee was born in Lingen, Herefordshire, but grew up in Blackheath, London and his father was a musician, and Lee studied piano, taking up the instrument at age seven. During this time, Lee became a fan of Buddy Holly and he took up guitar in 1958 when his parents bought him a second-hand Höfner President which he later traded in for a Czechoslovakian Grazioso, the forerunner of the Futurama. Lee left school at the age of 16 to play full-time, Lee was with a variety of bands from 1959 onwards, playing mostly R&B, country music and rock and roll. In addition to Buddy Holly, his guitar influences included Cliff Gallup, Grady Martin. Lee first experienced success as the lead guitarist with Chris Farlowe. Lee says that he enjoyed playing the Stax-type material, but he wanted to play country music. Consequently, he left Farlowe and the Thunderbirds in 1968, during his time playing with Heads Hands & Feet, Lee became a guitar hero, playing his Fender Telecaster at breakneck speed. Heads Hands & Feet became a live band in the UK, making appearances on The Old Grey Whistle Test and also in Europe. In 1971, Lee performed with Deep Purples keyboard player Jon Lord on the recording of Lords Gemini Suite. That opus was a follow-up to Deep Purples Concerto for Group, other performers were Yvonne Elliman, Ian Paice, Roger Glover, Tony Ashton and the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Sir Malcolm Arnold. Lee left for Los Angeles in 1974 and, through his friend bassist Rick Grech, one of these releases is titled A Long Way From Lubbock. Lee also received other offers of session work. In 1976, he was asked to join Emmylou Harriss Hot Band, replacing one of his heroes, James Burton, the Hot Band featured other musicians including Ricky Skaggs and Rodney Crowell. Starting in 1978, Lee worked for five years with Eric Clapton, Lee was responsible for the Everly Brothers 1983 reunion concert and was its musical director. He played regularly with the Everlys for over twenty years, in 1987, Lee was invited by Gerry Hogan to headline at a steel guitar festival in Newbury, Berkshire
Albert Lee
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Albert Lee The Corner Hotel, Melbourne, August 2007
27.
Guy Clark
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Guy Charles Clark was an American Texas country and folk singer, musician, songwriter, recording artist, and performer. He released more than twenty albums, and his songs have been recorded by artists including Jerry Jeff Walker, Jimmy Buffett, Lyle Lovett, Ricky Skaggs, Steve Wariner. He won the 2014 Grammy Award for Best Folk Album, My Favorite Picture of You, Clark was born in Monahans, Texas, and eventually settled in Nashville, where he helped create the progressive country and outlaw country genres. His songs L. A. Freeway and Desperados Waiting for a Train that helped launch his career were covered by numerous performers and he was an accomplished luthier and often played his own guitars. He achieved success as a songwriter with Jerry Jeff Walkers recordings of L. A. Freeway, emmylou Harris has accompanied him on several recordings, particularly his own version of Desperados Waiting for a Train on his first album, Old No. Clark had been a mentor to other singers as Steve Earle. He organized Earles first job as a writer in Nashville, numerous artists have charted with Clark-penned tunes. In 1982, Bobby Bare made it to the Country Top Twenty with Clarks New Cut Road and that same year, bluegrass leader Ricky Skaggs hit No.1 with Clarks Heartbroke, a song that permanently established his reputation as an ingenious songwriter. Clark is frequently referred to as The Fifth Highwayman, Steve Wariner took his cover of Clarks Baby Im Yours to No.1 in 1988, Asleep at the Wheel charted with Clarks Blowin Like a Bandit the same year. Crowell was Clarks co-writer on Shes Crazy for Leavin, which in 1989 became the third of five straight #l hits for Crowell, brad Paisley and Alan Jackson cover Clarks Out in the Parkin Lot, co-written with Darrell Scott, on Paisleys Time Well Wasted CD. Jimmy Buffett obviously influenced by Jerry Jeff Walkers earlier quality cover of Boats to Build on 1997s Cowboy Boots & Bathin Suits, then covered Clarks Boats to Build, Clark credits Townes Van Zandt as being a major influence on his songwriting. One of the most famous photos in Country Music history was taken on Clarks porch in 1972 of Clark, wife Susanna, Van Zandt, and Daniel Antopolsky. Clark and Van Zandt were best friends for years until Van Zandts death in 1997. In 1995, he recorded an album with Van Zandt and Steve Earle, Together at the Bluebird Cafe. Other live material can be found on his album Keepers, in 2006, Clark released Workbench Songs. The album was nominated for Best Contemporary Folk/Americana Album at the Grammy Awards and he also toured with Lyle Lovett, Joe Ely, and John Hiatt in 2004,2005 and 2007. In May 2008, Clark canceled four concerts after breaking his leg, after two months on crutches, he began to perform again on July 4 at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival in Washington, DC, where he appeared with Verlon Thompson. On June 20,2009, Clark announced a new album entitled Somedays the Song Writes You which was released on September 22,2009 and it features originals along with a Townes Van Zandt song entitled If I Needed You
Guy Clark
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Clark at the 2009 Newport Folk Festival
28.
Willie Nelson
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Willie Hugh Nelson is an American musician, singer, songwriter, author, poet, actor, and activist. He was one of the figures of outlaw country, a subgenre of country music that developed in the late 1960s as a reaction to the conservative restrictions of the Nashville sound. Nelson has acted in over 30 films, co-authored several books, and has involved in activism for the use of biofuels. Born during the Great Depression, and raised by his grandparents, Nelson wrote his first song at age seven, during high school, he toured locally with the Bohemian Polka as their lead singer and guitar player. After graduating from school in 1950, he joined the Air Force but was later discharged due to back problems. After his return, Nelson attended Baylor University for two years but dropped out because he was succeeding in music, during this time, he worked as a disc jockey in Texas radio stations and a singer in Honky-tonks. Nelson moved to Vancouver, Washington, where he wrote Family Bible, in 1958, he moved to Houston, Texas after signing a contract with D Records. He sang at the Esquire Ballroom weekly and he worked as a disk jockey, during that time, he wrote songs that would become country standards, including Funny How Time Slips Away, Hello Walls, Pretty Paper, and Crazy. In 1960 he moved to Nashville, Tennessee, and later signed a contract with Pamper Music which allowed him to join Ray Prices band as a bassist. In 1962, he recorded his first album. And Then I Wrote, due to this success, Nelson signed in 1964 with RCA Victor and joined the Grand Ole Opry the following year. After mid-chart hits in the late 1960s and the early 1970s, Nelson retired in 1972 and moved to Austin, the ongoing music scene of Austin motivated Nelson to return from retirement, performing frequently at the Armadillo World Headquarters. In 1973, after signing with Atlantic Records, Nelson turned to country, including albums such as Shotgun Willie. In 1975, he switched to Columbia Records, where he recorded the acclaimed album. The same year, he recorded another outlaw country album, Wanted, the Outlaws, along with Waylon Jennings, Jessi Colter, and Tompall Glaser. In 1990, Nelsons assets were seized by the Internal Revenue Service, the difficulty of paying his outstanding debt was aggravated by weak investments he had made during the 1980s. In 1992, Nelson released The IRS Tapes, Wholl Buy My Memories, the profits of the double album—destined to the IRS—and the auction of Nelsons assets cleared his debt. During the 1990s and 2000s, Nelson continued touring extensively, reviews ranged from positive to mixed. He explored genres such as reggae, blues, jazz, Nelson made his first movie appearance in the 1979 film The Electric Horseman, followed by other appearances in movies and on television
Willie Nelson
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Nelson performing at
Farm Aid in 2009
Willie Nelson
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A young Nelson poses for a photograph
Willie Nelson
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Nelson's high school football portrait, c. 1950
Willie Nelson
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Nelson performing on a
Grand Ole Opry package show in 1965
29.
Bright Eyes (band)
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Bright Eyes is an American indie rock band founded by singer-songwriter and guitarist Conor Oberst. It consists of Oberst, multi-instrumentalist and producer Mike Mogis, trumpet and piano player Nate Walcott, Bright Eyes is signed to Saddle Creek Records, a Nebraska-based label founded by Conor Obersts brother Justin Oberst and Bright Eyes member Mike Mogis, now distributed by Sony Corporation. A founding member of Commander Venus – which disbanded in 1997 – guitarist/vocalist Conor Oberst turned to focus on his new project, Bright Eyes. In 1998, he released 20 of the songs he had been stockpiling as the first official Bright Eyes album, A Collection of Songs Written, the album saw Oberst beginning to experiment with drum machines, keyboards and other instruments. The sound of the ranges from bleating vocals to acoustic guitar songs. Critical reaction was negative, with AllMusic saying that many of the songs disintegrate as his vocals are reduced to the unintelligible babbling of a child. Any balance the music maintained up to point, however fragile, is lost and so. On November 2,1998, Saddle Creek released Letting Off the Happiness, according to the Saddle Creek press release, it features members of Lullaby for the Working Class, Neutral Milk Hotel, and of Montreal. Park Ave. bandmate Neely Jenkins also contributed vocals and it was predominantly recorded in the Oberst family basement in Omaha on an analog eight track reel to reel, with some work also done at keyboardist Andy Lemasters Athens, Georgia studio. Although almost all of the feature a full band, June on the West Coast is performed with only acoustic guitar. Padraic My Prince gives a fictional account of the death of his baby brother. Oberst has referenced the song Padraic My Prince more than once in his music, the song An Attempt To Tip the Scales on the album Fevers and Mirrors has a faux interview near the end of the track. It is not Oberst speaking, it is actually Todd Fink, the interviewer is Matt Silcock, another labelmate on Saddle Creek Records. The interview was meant to be sarcastic and most of what the Oberst impersonator said was not true. At one point the interviewer asks the question, So some of these references like babies in bathtubs are not biographical, the Oberst impersonator replies, Well I did have a brother who died in a bathtub. Well actually I had five brothers that drowned and my mother drowned one every year for five consecutive years. They were all named Padraic, and thats why they only got one song and its kind of like walking out a door and discovering that its a window. Oberst also references the song in Cartoon Blues on the Four Winds EP, in November 1999, Bright Eyes released the five-song Every Day and Every Night EP, which included Neely OHara and A Perfect Sonnet
Bright Eyes (band)
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Conor Oberst of Bright Eyes performs at the Lied Center in
Lawrence, Kansas on October 23, 2007
Bright Eyes (band)
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Conor Oberst and
M. Ward at
The Town Hall.
30.
John Prine
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John Prine is an American country/folk singer-songwriter. He has been active as a composer, recording artist, born and raised in Maywood, Illinois, Prine learned to play the guitar at the age of 14. Subsequently, serving in West Germany with the U. S. armed forces, by the late 1960s he had moved to Chicago, where he worked as a mailman, writing and singing songs as a hobby. Becoming a part of the folk revival, he was discovered by Kris Kristofferson. After receiving critical acclaim, Prine focused on his musical career and he then signed to Asylum Records, where he recorded an additional three albums. In 1984 he co-founded Oh Boy Records, an independent record label with which he would release most of his subsequent albums, after his battle with squamous cell cancer in 1998, Prines vocals deepened into a gravel-voice, resulting in the award-winning album Fair & Square. Prine is the son of William Prine and Verna Hamm and he started playing guitar at age 14, taught by his brother, David. Prine attended Proviso East High School in Maywood, Illinois and he was a mailman for five years and served in the Army during the Vietnam War era, serving in Germany, before beginning his musical career in Chicago. In the late 1960s, while Prine was delivering mail, he began to sing at open mic evenings at the Fifth Peg on Armitage Avenue in Chicago. Prine was initially a spectator, reluctant to perform, but eventually did so in response to a You think you can do better, comment made to him by another performer. Chicago Sun-Times movie critic Roger Ebert heard him there and wrote the first review Prine ever received and he became a central figure in the Chicago folk revival, which also included such singer-songwriters as Steve Goodman, Bonnie Koloc, Jim Post and Fred Holstein. In 1971 Prines self-titled debut album was released and he and friend Steve Goodman had each been active in the Chicago folk scene before being discovered by Kris Kristofferson. The album included his signature songs Illegal Smile, Sam Stone, the album received many positive reviews, and some hailed Prine as the next Dylan. Bob Dylan himself appeared unannounced at one of Prines first New York City club appearances, highlights include the allegorical The Great Compromise, which includes a recitation and addresses the Vietnam War, and the ballad Souvenirs, which Prine later recorded with Goodman. The latter album was Prines first to be charted in the US Top 100 by Billboard and it was produced by Steve Cropper. Many veteran Prine fans view the release of 1978s Bruised Orange as a creative highpoint, the Steve Goodman-produced album gave listeners songs such as The Hobo Song, Sabu Visits the Twin Cities Alone, and the title track. In 1974, singer David Allan Coe achieved considerable success on the charts with You Never Even Called Me By My Name, co-written by Prine. The song good-naturedly spoofs stereotypical country music lyrics, Prine refused to take a songwriters credit and the tune went to Goodman, although Goodman bought Prine a jukebox as a gift from his publishing royalties
John Prine
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Prine at MerleFest, Wilkesboro N.C. (2006)
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