1.
Florence, Alabama
–
Florence is a city in and the county seat of Lauderdale County, Alabama, United States, in the states northwest corner. According to the 2010 census, the population was 39,319. Florence is the largest and principal city of the Metropolitan Statistical Area known as The Shoals, Florence is considered northwestern Alabamas primary economic hub. Annual tourism events include the W. C, Handy Music Festival in the summer and the Renaissance Faire in the fall. Landmarks in Florence include the Rosenbaum House, the only Frank Lloyd Wright-designed home located in Alabama, the type of municipal government is mayor-council. According to the U. S. Census Bureau, Florence has an area of 25.0 square miles, of which 24.9 square miles is land. Florence is located on Wilson Lake and Pickwick Lake, bodies of water on the Tennessee River dammed by Pickwick Dam, Pickwick Lake was created by the Tennessee Valley Authority, one of several alphabet agencies of President Franklin Delano Roosevelts New Deal. Wilson Dam was authorized by President Woodrow Wilson in 1918 and was the first dam constructed on the Tennessee River, Florence was surveyed for the Cypress Land Company in 1818 by Italian surveyor Ferdinand Sannoner, who named it after Florence, the capital of the Tuscany region of Italy. Florence, Alabama was incorporated in 1826, Florence is also home to a long-running dispute between RegionalCare Hospital Partners and the City of Florence on one side and Helen Keller Hospital and the RetEd Animal Shelter on the other. The city and RegionalCare are seeking to build a 280-bed hospital in a area of East Florence. Helen Keller Hospital officials opposed building a new hospital and delayed the project for years before the project was finally approved by the Alabama Court of Civil Appeals in July 2015. RegionalCare has acquired, and demolished, all the properties in a 25-acre area of East Florence with the exception of the RetEd Animal Shelter, the population density was 1,454.6 people per square mile. There were 17,707 housing units at a density of 710.2 per square mile. The racial makeup of the city was 78. 39% White,19. 20% Black or African American,0. 24% Native American,0. 62% Asian,0. 03% Pacific Islander,0. 54% from other races, and 0. 97% from two or more races. 1. 34% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race, nearly 33. 8% of all households were made up of individuals, and 13. 3% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.20, and the family size was 2.82. In the city, the population was out with 21. 4% under the age of 18,13. 7% from 18 to 24,25. 7% from 25 to 44,21. 7% from 45 to 64. The median age was 37 years, for every 100 females there were 84.0 males
2.
Rock and roll
–
While elements of rock and roll can be heard in blues records from the 1920s and in country records of the 1930s, the genre did not acquire its name until the 1950s. For the purpose of differentiation, this deals with the first definition. The beat is essentially a blues rhythm with an accentuated backbeat, classic rock and roll is usually played with one or two electric guitars, a double bass or string bass or an electric bass guitar, and a drum kit. Beyond simply a style, rock and roll, as seen in movies and on television, influenced lifestyles, fashion, attitudes. In addition, rock and roll may have contributed to the civil rights movement because both African-American and white American teens enjoyed the music and it went on to spawn various genres, often without the initially characteristic backbeat, that are now more commonly called simply rock music or rock. The term rock and roll now has at least two different meanings, both in common usage, the American Heritage Dictionary and the Merriam-Webster Dictionary both define rock and roll as synonymous with rock music. Encyclopædia Britannica, on the hand, regards it as the music that originated in the mid-1950s. In 1934, the song Rock and Roll by the Boswell Sisters appeared in the film Transatlantic Merry-Go-Round, in 1942, Billboard magazine columnist Maurie Orodenker started to use the term rock-and-roll to describe upbeat recordings such as Rock Me by Sister Rosetta Tharpe. By 1943, the Rock and Roll Inn in South Merchantville, in 1951, Cleveland, Ohio disc jockey Alan Freed began playing this music style while popularizing the phrase to describe it. The origins of rock and roll have been debated by commentators. The migration of former slaves and their descendants to major urban centers such as St. The immediate roots of rock and roll lay in the rhythm and blues, then called race music, particularly significant influences were jazz, blues, gospel, country, and folk. The 1940s saw the use of blaring horns, shouted lyrics. In the same period, particularly on the West Coast and in the Midwest, similarly, country boogie and Chicago electric blues supplied many of the elements that would be seen as characteristic of rock and roll. Rock and roll arrived at a time of technological change, soon after the development of the electric guitar, amplifier and microphone. It was the realization that relatively affluent white teenagers were listening to music that led to the development of what was to be defined as rock. Because the development of rock and roll was a process, no single record can be identified as unambiguously the first rock. Other artists with rock and roll hits included Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis
3.
Rockabilly
–
Rockabilly is one of the earliest styles of rock and roll music, dating back to the early 1950s in the United States, especially the South. As a genre it blends the sound of Western musical styles such as country with that of rhythm and blues, leading to what is considered classic rock, some have also described it as a blend of bluegrass with rock and roll. The term rockabilly itself is a portmanteau of rock and hillbilly, other important influences on rockabilly include western swing, boogie woogie, jump blues, and electric blues. An interest in the genre endures even in the 21st century, Rockabilly has left a legacy, spawning a variety of sub-styles and influencing other genres such as punk rock. There was a relationship between blues and country music from the very earliest country recordings in the 1920s. The first nationwide country hit was Wreck of the Old 97, backed with Lonesome Road Blues, during the 1930s and 1940s, two new sounds emerged. Recordings of Willss from the mid 1940s to the early 1950s include two beat jazz rhythms, jazz choruses, and guitar work that preceded early rockabilly recordings, wills is quoted as saying Rock and Roll. Why, man, thats the kind of music weve been playin since 1928. But its just basic rhythm and has gone by a lot of different names in my time and its the same, whether you just follow a drum beat like in Africa or surround it with a lot of instruments. The Maddox Brothers and Rose were at the edge of rockabilly with the slapped bass that Fred Maddox had developed. Maddox said, Youve got to have somethin they can tap their foot, or dance to, after World War II the band shifted into higher gear leaning more toward a whimsical honky-tonk feel, with a heavy, manic bottom end - the slap bass of Fred Maddox. They played hillbilly music but it sounded real hot and they played real loud for that time, too. The Maddoxes were also known for their antics and stuff. I mean it just wasnt us up there pickin and singing, there was something going on all the time. The demonstrative Maddoxes, helped release white bodies from traditional motions of decorum, more and more younger white artists began to behave on stage like the lively Maddoxes. Others believe that they were not only at the leading edge, Bill Monroe is known as the Father of Bluegrass, a specific style of country music. Many of his songs were in form, while others took the form of folk ballads, parlor songs. Bluegrass was a staple of music in the early 1950s
4.
Country music
–
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
5.
Blues
–
Blues is a genre and musical form originated by African Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the end of the 19th century. The genre developed from roots in African musical traditions, African-American work songs, spirituals, Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads. Blue notes, usually thirds or fifths flattened in pitch, are also a part of the sound. Blues shuffles or walking bass reinforce the trance-like rhythm and form a repetitive effect known as the groove, Blues as a genre is also characterized by its lyrics, bass lines, and instrumentation. Early traditional blues verses consisted of a single line repeated four times, Early blues frequently took the form of a loose narrative, often relating the troubles experienced in African-American society. Many elements, such as the format and the use of blue notes. The origins of the blues are closely related to the religious music of the Afro-American community. The first appearance of the blues is often dated to after the ending of slavery and, later and it is associated with the newly acquired freedom of the former slaves. Chroniclers began to report about blues music at the dawn of the 20th century, the first publication of blues sheet music was in 1908. Blues has since evolved from unaccompanied vocal music and oral traditions of slaves into a variety of styles and subgenres. Blues subgenres include country blues, such as Delta blues and Piedmont blues, as well as urban blues styles such as Chicago blues, World War II marked the transition from acoustic to electric blues and the progressive opening of blues music to a wider audience, especially white listeners. In the 1960s and 1970s, a form called blues rock evolved. The term blues may have come from blue devils, meaning melancholy and sadness, the phrase blue devils may also have been derived from Britain in the 1600s, when the term referred to the intense visual hallucinations that can accompany severe alcohol withdrawal. As time went on, the phrase lost the reference to devils, by the 1800s in the United States, the term blues was associated with drinking alcohol, a meaning which survives in the phrase blue law, which prohibits the sale of alcohol on Sunday. Though the use of the phrase in African-American music may be older, it has been attested to in print since 1912, in lyrics the phrase is often used to describe a depressed mood. The lyrics of traditional blues verses probably often consisted of a single line repeated four times. Two of the first published songs, Dallas Blues and Saint Louis Blues, were 12-bar blues with the AAB lyric structure. Handy wrote that he adopted this convention to avoid the monotony of lines repeated three times, the lines are often sung following a pattern closer to rhythmic talk than to a melody
6.
Sun Records
–
Sun Records is an American independent record label founded by Sam Phillips in Memphis, Tennessee in 1952. Sun was the first company to record Elvis Presley, Roy Orbison, Sun Records discovered and first recorded such influential musicians as Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, Roy Orbison, Jerry Lee Lewis and Johnny Cash. Presleys recording contract was sold to RCA Victor Records for $35,000 in 1955 to relieve Suns financial difficulties. Before those records, Sun had concentrated mainly on African-American musicians because Phillips loved rhythm and blues, Sun record producer and engineer Jack Clement discovered and recorded Jerry Lee Lewis while Phillips was away on a trip to Florida. The original Sun Records logo was designed by John Gale Parker, Jr. a resident of Memphis, Sun was founded with the financial aid of Jim Bulliet, one of many record executives for whom Phillips had scouted artists before 1952. Some of the artists at Sun were Roscoe Gordon, Rufus Thomas, Little Milton, Tex Weiss, Charlie Rich, Howlin Wolf, Bill Justis. In the Lovin Spoonful song Nashville Cats, John Sebastian used poetic license when he referred to Sun as the Yellow Sun Records from Nashville, there were also sixteen female recording artists whose records were released on the Sun and Phillips international label. These include Barbara Pittman and the Miller Sisters, in 1969, Mercury Records label producer Shelby Singleton purchased the Sun label from Phillips. Singleton merged his operations into Sun International Corporation, which re-released and re-packaged compilations of Suns early artists in the early 1970s and it later introduced rockabilly tribute singer Jimmy Orion Ellis in 1980, with Orion taking on the persona of Elvis Presley. The company remains in business as Sun Entertainment Corporation, and currently licenses its brand, Sun Entertainment also includes SSS International Records, Plantation Records, Amazon Records, Red Bird Records, Blue Cat Records among other labels the company acquired over the years. Its website sells collectible items and compact discs bearing the original 1950s Sun logo, Sun Records is located in Nashville, Tennessee. It has been mainly a reissue label since the 1970s but signed country musician Julie Roberts to a contract in 2013. The music of many Sun Records musicians helped lay part of the foundation of late 20th-century rock and roll and influenced younger musicians. In 2001, Paul McCartney appeared on a compilation album titled Good Rockin Tonight. List of record labels Elvis Presleys Sun recordings Johnny Cashs Sun recordings Roy Orbisons Sun Recordings Official website Sun Studio official site Chronology, session files, discography
7.
Elvis Presley
–
Elvis Aaron Presley was an American singer and actor. Regarded as one of the most significant cultural icons of the 20th century, he is referred to as the King of Rock and Roll. Presley was born in Tupelo, Mississippi, and relocated to Memphis and his music career began there in 1954, when he recorded a song with producer Sam Phillips at Sun Records. Accompanied by guitarist Scotty Moore and bassist Bill Black, Presley was a popularizer of rockabilly. RCA Victor acquired his contract in a deal arranged by Colonel Tom Parker, Presleys first RCA single, Heartbreak Hotel, was released in January 1956 and became a number-one hit in the United States. He was regarded as the figure of rock and roll after a series of successful network television appearances. In November 1956, Presley made his debut in Love Me Tender. In 1958, he was drafted into military service, in 1973, Presley featured in the first globally broadcast concert via satellite, Aloha from Hawaii. Several years of drug abuse severely damaged his health. Presley is one of the most celebrated and influential musicians of the 20th century and he won three Grammys, also receiving the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award at age 36, and has been inducted into multiple music halls of fame. Presley was born on January 8,1935, in Tupelo, Mississippi, to Gladys Love and Vernon Elvis Presley, Jesse Garon Presley, his identical twin brother, was delivered stillborn 35 minutes before his own birth. Thus, as a child, Presley became close to both parents and formed an especially close bond with his mother. The family attended an Assembly of God, where he found his musical inspiration. Although he was in conflict with the Pentecostal church in his later years, rev. Rex Humbard officiated at his funeral, as Presley had been an admirer of Humbards ministry. Presleys ancestry was primarily a Western European mix, including Scots-Irish, Scottish, German, gladyss great-great-grandmother, Morning Dove White, was possibly a Cherokee Native American. Gladys was regarded by relatives and friends as the dominant member of the small family, Vernon moved from one odd job to the next, evincing little ambition. The family often relied on help from neighbors and government food assistance, the Presleys survived the F5 tornado in the 1936 Tupelo–Gainesville tornado outbreak. In 1938, they lost their home after Vernon was found guilty of kiting a check written by the landowner, Orville S. Bean and he was jailed for eight months, and Gladys and Elvis moved in with relatives
8.
Johnny Cash
–
Johnny Cash was an American singer-songwriter, guitarist, actor, and author. He is widely considered one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century and one of the music artists of all time. Although primarily remembered as an music icon, his genre-spanning songs and sound embraced rock and roll, rockabilly, blues, folk. This crossover appeal won Cash the rare honor of multiple inductions in the Country Music, Rock and Roll and he traditionally began his concerts with the simple Hello, Im Johnny Cash, followed by his signature Folsom Prison Blues. Much of Cashs music contained themes of sorrow, moral tribulation and redemption and his signature songs include I Walk the Line, Folsom Prison Blues, Ring of Fire, Get Rhythm, and Man in Black. During the last stage of his career, Cash covered songs by several late 20th-century rock artists, notably Hurt by Nine Inch Nails, Cash was born on February 26,1932, in Kingsland, Arkansas, one of seven children born to Ray Cash and Carrie Cloveree. He was mostly of Scottish and English ancestry, and as an adult traced his surname to 11th-century Fife, Scotland, after meeting with the then-laird of Falkland, Fife, Cash Loch and other locations in Fife bear the name of his family. At birth, Cash was named J. R. Cash, when Cash enlisted in the United States Air Force, he was not permitted to use initials as a first name, so he changed his name to John R. Cash. In 1955, when signing with Sun Records, he took Johnny Cash as his stage name, the Cash children were, Roy, Margaret Louise, Jack, J. R. Reba, Joanne, and Tommy. Tommy Cash also became a country artist. In March 1935, when Cash was three years old, the family settled in Dyess, Arkansas and he started working in cotton fields at age five, singing along with his family while working. The family farm was flooded on at least two occasions, which inspired him to write the song Five Feet High and Rising. His familys economic and personal struggles during the Great Depression inspired many of his songs, Cash was very close to his older brother, Jack. In May 1944, Jack was pulled into a head saw in the mill where he worked and was almost cut in two. He suffered for over a week before he died on May 20,1944, Cash often spoke of the horrible guilt he felt over this incident. Jack insisted on working, as the family needed the money, on his deathbed, Jack said he had visions of Heaven and angels. Decades later, Cash spoke of looking forward to meeting his brother in Heaven, Cashs early memories were dominated by gospel music and radio. Taught guitar by his mother and a friend, Cash began playing and writing songs at the age of twelve
9.
Carl Perkins
–
Carl Lee Perkins was an American singer-songwriter who recorded most notably at the Sun Studio, in Memphis, Tennessee, beginning in 1954. His best-known song is Blue Suede Shoes, according to Charlie Daniels, Carl Perkins songs personified the rockabilly era, and Carl Perkins sound personifies the rockabilly sound more so than anybody involved in it, because he never changed. Perkins songs were recorded by artists as influential as Elvis Presley, the Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, and Johnny Cash, Paul McCartney claimed that if there were no Carl Perkins, there would be no Beatles. Called the King of Rockabilly, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the Rockabilly Hall of Fame, the Memphis Music Hall of Fame, and he also received a Grammy Hall of Fame Award. Perkins was born near Tiptonville, Tennessee, the son of sharecroppers, Buck. He grew up hearing Southern gospel music sung by friends in church. During spring and autumn, school days would be followed by a few hours of work in the fields, in the summer, workdays were 12 to 14 hours, from can to cant. Perkins and his brother Jay together would earn 50 cents a day, All his family members worked, so there was enough money for beans and potatoes, tobacco for Perkinss father, and occasionally the luxury of a five-cent bag of hard candy. On Saturday nights Perkins would listen to the Grand Ole Opry on his fathers radio, Roy Acuffs broadcasts inspired him to ask his parents for a guitar. Since they could not afford one, his father made one from a cigar box, finally, a neighbor in hard times offered to sell his dented and scratched Gene Autry model guitar with its worn-out strings. Buck Perkins bought it for his son for a couple of dollars, Perkins taught himself parts of Acuffs Great Speckled Bird and The Wabash Cannonball, having heard them played on the Opry. He also cited Bill Monroes fast playing and vocals as an early influence, Perkins learned more about the guitar from John Westbrook, an African American field worker in his sixties. Uncle John, as Perkins called him, played blues and gospel music on an old acoustic guitar, Westbrook advised Perkins to Get down close to it. You can feel it travel down the strangs, come through your head, Perkins could not afford new strings, and when they broke he had to retie them. The knots cut his fingers when he would slide to another note, so he began bending the notes, Perkins was recruited to be a member of the Lake County Fourth Grade Marching Band. Since his family was too poor to afford them, Lee McCutcheon, the woman in charge of the band, gave him a new shirt, cotton pants, a white band cap. In January 1947, the Perkins family moved from Lake County, Tennessee, to Madison County, a new radio that ran on house current rather than a battery, and the closeness to Memphis exposed Perkins to a greater variety of music. At age fourteen, using the I-IV-V chord progression common in music of the day, he wrote a song that came to be known around Jackson as Let Me Take You to the Movie
10.
Jerry Lee Lewis
–
Jerry Lee Lewis is an American singer-songwriter, musician, and pianist, often known by his nickname, The Killer. He has been described as rock & rolls first great wild man, a pioneer of rock and roll and rockabilly music, Lewis made his first recordings in 1956 at Sun Records in Memphis. Crazy Arms sold 300,000 copies in the South, and he followed this with Great Balls of Fire, Breathless and High School Confidential. However, Lewiss rock and roll career faltered in the wake of his marriage to his 13-year-old first cousin once removed when he was 23 years old and he had minimal success in the charts following the scandal, and his popularity quickly eroded. His live performance fees plummeted from $10,000 per night to $250, in the meantime he was determined to gain back some of his popularity. In the early 1960s, he did not have much success, with few exceptions. His live performances at this time were increasingly wild and energetic and his 1964 live album Live at the Star Club, Hamburg is regarded by music journalists and fans as one of the wildest and greatest live rock albums ever. In 1968 Lewis made a transition into country music and had hits with such as Another Place. His No.1 country hits included To Make Love Sweeter for You, There Must Be More to Love Than This, Would You Take Another Chance on Me and Me and Bobby McGee. Lewiss successes continued throughout the decade and he embraced his rock and roll past with songs such as a cover of the Big Boppers Chantilly Lace, in the 21st century Lewis continues to tour around the world and still releases new albums. His album Last Man Standing is his best selling to date and this was followed by Mean Old Man, which has received some of the best sales of Lewiss career. Lewis has a dozen gold records in rock and country. He won several Grammy awards, including a Lifetime Achievement Award, Lewis was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1986, and his pioneering contribution to the genre has been recognized by the Rockabilly Hall of Fame. He was also a member of the inaugural class inducted into the Memphis Music Hall of Fame, in 1989, his life was chronicled in the movie Great Balls of Fire, starring Dennis Quaid. In 2003, Rolling Stone listed his box set All Killer, No Filler, in 2004, they ranked him number 24 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. Lewis is the last surviving member of Sun Records Million Dollar Quartet and the Class of 55 album and his parents mortgaged their farm to buy him a piano. Lewis was influenced by an older cousin, Carl McVoy, the radio, and the sounds from Haneys Big House. On the live album By Request, More of the Greatest Live Show on Earth and he was also influenced by the Great American Songbook and popular country singers like Jimmie Rodgers and Hank Williams
11.
Howlin' Wolf
–
Chester Arthur Burnett, known as Howlin Wolf, was a Chicago blues singer, guitarist, and harmonica player, originally from Mississippi. With a booming voice and looming physical presence, he is one of the best-known Chicago blues artists. Musician and critic Cub Koda noted, no one could match Howlin Wolf for the ability to rock the house down to the foundation while simultaneously scaring its patrons out of its wits. Producer Sam Phillips recalled, When I heard Howlin Wolf, I said and this is where the soul of man never dies. Several of his songs, including Smokestack Lightnin, Back Door Man, Killing Floor, in 2004, Rolling Stone magazine ranked him number 51 on its list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. Burnett was born on June 10,1910, in White Station, Mississippi and he was given the name Chester Arthur, after Chester A. Arthur, the 21st president of the United States. His physique garnered him the nicknames Big Foot Chester and Bull Cow as a man, he was 6 feet 3 inches tall. The blues historian Paul Oliver wrote that Burnett once claimed to have given his nickname by his idol Jimmie Rodgers. Burnetts parents separated when he was one year old and his mother, Gertrude, threw him out of the house while he was a child for refusing to work on the farm. He then moved in with his uncle, Will Young, who treated him badly, when he was 13, he ran away and claimed to have walked 85 miles barefoot to join his father, where he finally found a happy home with his fathers large family. In 1930, Burnett met Charlie Patton, the most popular bluesman in the Mississippi Delta at the time and he would listen to Patton play nightly from outside a nearby juke joint. There he remembered Patton playing Pony Blues, High Water Everywhere, A Spoonful Blues, the two became acquainted, and soon Patton was teaching him guitar. Burnett recalled that the first piece I ever played in my life was, a tune about hook up my pony and saddle up my black mare—Pattons Pony Blues. Burnett would perform the tricks he learned from Patton for the rest of his life. He played with Patton often in small Delta communities, Burnett was influenced by other popular blues performers of the time, including the Mississippi Sheiks, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Ma Rainey, Lonnie Johnson, Tampa Red, Blind Blake, and Tommy Johnson. Two of the earliest songs he mastered were Jeffersons Match Box Blues and Leroy Carrs How Long, country singer Jimmie Rodgers was also an influence. Burnett tried to emulate Rodgerss blue yodel but found that his efforts sounded more like a growl or a howl, I couldnt do no yodelin, and its done me just fine. His harmonica playing was modeled after that of Sonny Boy Williamson II, lockwood, Willie Brown, Son House and Willie Johnson
12.
Sun Studio
–
Sun Studio is a recording studio opened by rock-and-roll pioneer Sam Phillips at 706 Union Avenue in Memphis, Tennessee, on January 3,1950. It was originally called Memphis Recording Service, sharing the building with the Sun Records label business. Blues and R&B artists like Howlin Wolf, Junior Parker, Little Milton, B. B. King, James Cotton, Rufus Thomas, Sam Phillips opened the larger Sam C. Phillips Recording Studio, better known as Phillips Recording, in 1959 to replace the older facility. Since Phillips had invested in the Holiday Inn Hotel chain earlier, in 1957, Bill Justis recorded his Grammy Hall of Fame song Raunchy for Sam Phillips and worked as a musical director at Sun Records. In 2005, Brian Setzer released his Rockabilly Riot Vol.1, A Tribute To Sun Records album, although not recorded at Sun it did feature various Sun Records recordings including some hits and other more obscure songs. In 2007, Canadian rockabilly band the Kingmakers recorded a selection of originals and classics such as Elvis Presleys Thats All Right at Sun Studio, released as their first CD Live at SUN Studio. In May 2009, Canadian blues artist JW-Jones recorded with blues legend Hubert Sumlin, Larry Taylor, in July 2009, John Mellencamp recorded nine songs for his album No Better Than This at the studio. In 2011, Chris Isaak released Beyond the Sun, a collection of songs recorded at Sun Studio, in January 1950, WREC radio engineer Sam Phillips opened the Memphis Recording Service at 706 Union Avenue with his assistant and long-time friend, Marion Keisker. Phillips had dreamed of opening his own recording studio since he was a young man, however, getting the company off the ground was not an easy task. To create revenue at the beginning, Phillips would record conventions, weddings, choirs and he also held an open door policy, allowing anybody to walk in and, for a small fee, record their own record. Phillips slogan for his studio was We Record Anything, Anywhere, in June, Phillips and a friend, local DJ Dewey Phillips who was no relation, set up their own record label called Phillips Records. The purpose of the label was to record artists of the South who wanted to make a recording but had no place to do so. The label failed to make an impact and folded after just one release, Boogie in the Park by Joe Hill Louis and it was during this time that Phillips recorded what many consider to be the first rock and roll song, Jackie Brenstons Rocket 88. The Sun Studio tour lends credence to the latter, with the tour guide saying the amplifier was stuffed with wads of newspaper, in early 1952, Phillips once again launched his own record label, this time calling it Sun Records. During his first year he recorded several artists who would go on to have successful careers, among them were B. B. King, Joe Hill Louis, Rufus Thomas, and Howlin Wolf. Despite the amount of singers who recorded there, Phillips found it difficult to keep profits up. He reportedly drove over 60,000 miles in one year to promote his artists with radio stations, to keep costs down, he would pay his artists 3% royalties instead of the usual 5% that was more common at the time. Phillips turned to alcohol when it looked like his label would once again fail, Rufus Thomas Bearcat, a recording that was similar to Hound Dog, was the first real hit for Sun in 1953
13.
Memphis, Tennessee
–
Memphis is a city in the southwestern corner of the U. S. state of Tennessee and the county seat of Shelby County. The city is located on the fourth Chickasaw Bluff, south of the confluence of the Wolf, Memphis had a population of 653,450 in 2013, making it the largest city in the state of Tennessee. It is the largest city on the Mississippi River, the third largest in the greater Southeastern United States, the greater Memphis metropolitan area, including adjacent counties in Mississippi and Arkansas, had a 2014 population of 1,317,314. This makes Memphis the second-largest metropolitan area in Tennessee, surpassed by metropolitan Nashville, Memphis is the youngest of Tennessees major cities, founded in 1819 as a planned city by a group of wealthy Americans including judge John Overton and future president Andrew Jackson. A resident of Memphis is referred to as a Memphian, and the Memphis region is known, particularly to media outlets, as Memphis and the Mid-South. Occupying a substantial bluff rising from the Mississippi River, the site of Memphis has been a location for human settlement by varying cultures over thousands of years. The historic Chickasaw Indian tribe, believed to be their descendants, French explorers led by René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle and Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto would encounter the Chickasaw in that area, in the 16th century. J. D. L. Chickasaw Bluffs, located on the Mississippi River at the present day location of Memphis, spain and the United States vied for control of this site, which was a favorite of the Chickasaws. The United States gained the right to navigate the Mississippi River, the Spanish dismantled the fort, shipping its lumber and iron to their locations in Arkansas. Captain Isaac Guion led an American force down the Ohio River to claim the land, by this time, the Spanish had departed. The forts ruins went unnoticed twenty years later when Memphis was laid out as a city, the city of Memphis was founded on May 22,1819 by John Overton, James Winchester and Andrew Jackson. They named it after the ancient capital of Egypt on the Nile River, Memphis developed as a trade and transportation center in the 19th century because of its flood-free location high above the Mississippi River. Located in the delta region along the river, its outlying areas were developed as cotton plantations. The cotton economy of the antebellum South depended on the labor of large numbers of African-American slaves. Through the early 19th century, one million slaves were transported from the Upper South, Many were transported by steamboats along the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. This gave planters and cotton brokers access to the Atlantic Coast for shipping cotton to England, the citys demographics changed dramatically in the 1850s and 1860s under waves of immigration and domestic migration. Due to increased immigration since the 1840s and the Great Famine, ethnic Irish made up 9.9 percent of the population in 1850, but 23.2 percent in 1860, when the total population was 22,623. They had encountered considerable discrimination in the city but by 1860 and they also gained many elected and patronage positions in the Democratic Party city government, and an Irish man was elected as mayor before the Civil War
14.
Holiday Inn
–
Holiday Inn is an American brand of hotels, and a subsidiary InterContinental Hotels Group. Founded as a U. S. motel chain, it has grown to be one of the worlds largest hotel chains, the hotel chain is based in Atlanta, Georgia. C. Their first hotel/motel opened in August 1952 as Holiday Inn Hotel Courts at 4925 Summer Avenue in Memphis, in the early 1990s, it was demolished, leaving behind a plaque commemorating the site. Wilson partnered with Wallace E. Johnson to build additional motels on the roads entering Memphis, at the time Holiday Inns corporate headquarters was in a converted plumbing shed owned by Johnson. In 1953, the company built its three hotels which, along with their first hotel, covered the roads that led to Memphis. The second motel was built on U. S.51 South and it was followed by two more in 1953, one on Highway 51 North, and another on U. S.61. Upon Johnsons death in 1988, Wilson was quoted as saying and he was the greatest partner a man could ever have. What they started together, with Wilson later helming the project, became the Holiday Corporation, by the beginning of 1956, there were 23 Holiday Inns operating with seven more due to open by the years end. In 1957, Wilson began marketing the chain as Holiday Inn of America, mandating its properties be standardized, clean, predictable, family-friendly, and readily accessible to road travelers. The chain grew dramatically as a result, with 50 locations across the country by 1958,100 by 1959,500 by 1964, and the 1, 000th Holiday Inn opening in 1968. In 1965, the chain launched Holidex, a reservation system where a visitor to any Holiday Inn could obtain reservations, by teleprinter. The only comparable systems at the time were operated by airlines, by June 1972, with over 1,400 Holiday Inns worldwide, Wilson was featured on the cover of Time magazine and the franchises motto became The Worlds Innkeeper. In the 1960s, Holiday Inn began franchising and opening campgrounds under the Holiday Inn Trav-L-Park brand and these recreational campgrounds were listed in the Holiday Inn directories. S. and Interstate highways. The arrangement was copied by competing lodging chains and major oil companies during the mid-to-late 1960s, the Gulf/Holiday Inn arrangement ended around 1982. In 1971, the company constructed the Holiday Inn University and Conference Center, in 1973, the company built the Olive Branch Airport north of the University as a home base for its corporate aircraft. Wilson also developed the Orange Lake Resort and Country Club near Orlando, the acquisition of Trailways in 1968 lasted until 1979, when Holiday Inn sold Trailways to private investor Henry Lea Hillman Sr of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In the years during which Trailways was a subsidiary of Holiday Inn, Wilson retired from Holiday Inn in 1979. As of 2014, Wilsons family still operates hotels as part of the Kemmons Wilson Companies of Memphis, the Great Sign was the roadside sign used by Holiday Inn during its original era of expansion from the 1950s to 1970s
15.
Tenant farmer
–
A tenant farmer is one who resides on land owned by a landlord. Depending on the contract, tenants can make payments to the either of a fixed portion of the product. The rights the tenant has over the land, the form, in some systems, the tenant could be evicted at whim, in others, the landowner and tenant sign a contract for a fixed number of years. In most developed countries today, at least some restrictions are placed on the rights of landlords to evict tenants under normal circumstances, historically, rural society utilised a three tier structure of landowners, tenant farmers, and farmworkers. Originally, tenant farmers were known as peasants, many tenant farmers became affluent and socially well connected, and employed a substantial number of labourers and managed more than one farm. Tenancy could be either in perpetuity or rotated by the owners, high rates of inheritance taxes in the postwar period led to the breakup or reduction of many large estates, allowing many tenants to buy their holdings at favourable prices. The landmark 1948 Act was enacted at a time when food rationing was still in force. Succession rights were withdrawn for new tenancies in 1984 and this was consolidated in the Agricultural Holdings Act 1986. These two statutes also laid down rules for the determination of rents by the arbitration process, in addition, there was a uniform rent ascertainment scheme contained in section 12. The protection of the 1986 Act remains in respect of tenancies created prior to the existence of the 1995 Act, for all other tenancies granted on or after 1 September 1995 their regulation is within the 1995 Act framework. That Act was altered with effect from 18 October 2006 by the Regulatory Reform Order 2006 SI 2006/2805, there is for all tenancies within the scope of the Act a mandatory tenants right to remove fixtures and buildings together with compensation for improvements. The rent review provisions in Part II may be the subject of choice to a greater extent than previously. Disputes under the Act are usually, by the terms of Part IV, in the cycle of animal husbandry and land use and improvement, the long-term effect of the Farm Business Tenancy on the landscape of Britain is not yet proven. Tenant farming immigrants came to Canada not just from the British Isles but also the United States of America. Until about 1900, the majority of Ireland was held by landlords, as much as 97% in 1870, the majority of the people had no access to land. 1. 5% of the population owned 33. 7% of the nation, absenteeism was common and detrimental to the countrys progress. Tenants often sub-rented small plots on a basis from local farmers paying for them by labour service in a system known as conacre most without any lease or land rights. Irish smallholders were indistinguishable from the cottiers of England, the abuse of tenant farmers led to widespread emigration to the United States and the colonies and was a key factor within the Home Rule Movement
16.
Cotton
–
Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus Gossypium in the family of Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure cellulose, under natural conditions, the cotton bolls will tend to increase the dispersal of the seeds. The plant is a native to tropical and subtropical regions around the world, including the Americas, Africa. The greatest diversity of wild species is found in Mexico, followed by Australia. Cotton was independently domesticated in the Old and New Worlds, the fiber is most often spun into yarn or thread and used to make a soft, breathable textile. Current estimates for world production are about 25 million tonnes or 110 million bales annually, China is the worlds largest producer of cotton, but most of this is used domestically. The United States has been the largest exporter for many years, in the United States, cotton is usually measured in bales, which measure approximately 0.48 cubic meters and weigh 226.8 kilograms. Cotton cultivation in the region is dated to the Indus Valley Civilization, the Indus cotton industry was well-developed and some methods used in cotton spinning and fabrication continued to be used until the industrialization of India. Between 2000 and 1000 BC cotton became widespread across much of India, for example, it has been found at the site of Hallus in Karnataka dating from around 1000 BC. Cotton fabrics discovered in a cave near Tehuacán, Mexico have been dated to around 5800 BC, the domestication of Gossypium hirsutum in Mexico is dated between 3400 and 2300 BC. Cotton was grown upriver, made into nets, and traded with fishing villages along the coast for supplies of fish. The Spanish who came to Mexico and Peru in the early 16th century found the people growing cotton and this may be a reference to tree cotton, Gossypium arboreum, which is a native of the Indian subcontinent. According to the Columbia Encyclopedia, Cotton has been spun, woven and it clothed the people of ancient India, Egypt, and China. Hundreds of years before the Christian era, cotton textiles were woven in India with matchless skill, in Iran, the history of cotton dates back to the Achaemenid era, however, there are few sources about the planting of cotton in pre-Islamic Iran. The planting of cotton was common in Merv, Ray and Pars of Iran, in Persian poets poems, especially Ferdowsis Shahname, there are references to cotton. Marco Polo refers to the products of Persia, including cotton. John Chardin, a French traveler of the 17th century who visited the Safavid Persia, during the Han dynasty, cotton was grown by Chinese peoples in the southern Chinese province of Yunnan. Mohamed Ali Pasha accepted the proposition and granted himself the monopoly on the sale and export of cotton in Egypt, and later dictated cotton should be grown in preference to other crops
17.
Beale Street
–
Beale Street is a street in Downtown Memphis, Tennessee, which runs from the Mississippi River to East Street, a distance of approximately 1.8 miles. It is a significant location in the history, as well as in the history of the blues. Today, the clubs and restaurants that line Beale Street are major tourist attractions in Memphis. Festivals and outdoor concerts periodically bring large crowds to the street, Beale Street was created in 1841 by entrepreneur and developer Robertson Topp, who named it for a forgotten military hero. The original name was Beale Avenue and its western end primarily housed shops of trade merchants, who traded goods with ships along the Mississippi River, while the eastern part developed as an affluent suburb. In the 1860s, many black traveling musicians began performing on Beale, the first of these to call Beale Street home were the Young Mens Brass Band, who were formed by Sam Thomas in 1867. In the 1870s, the population of Memphis was rocked by a series of fever epidemics. During this time, Robert Church purchased land around Beale Street that would lead to his becoming the first black millionaire from the south. In 1890, Beale Street underwent renovation with the addition of the Grand Opera House, in 1899, Church paid the city to create Church Park at the corner of 4th and Beale. It became a recreational and cultural center, where musicians could gather. A major attraction of the park was an auditorium that could seat 2,000 people, speakers in the Church Park Auditorium included Woodrow Wilson, Booker T. Washington, and Franklin D. Roosevelt. In the early 1900s, Beale Street was filled with clubs, restaurants and shops. In 1889, NAACP co-founder Ida B, wells was a co-owner and editor of an anti-segregationist paper called Free Speech based on Beale. Beale Street Baptist Church, Tennessees oldest surviving African American Church edifice built in 1864, was important in the early civil rights movement in Memphis. Mayor Thornton contacted Handy, and Memphis became the home of the musician who created the Blues on Beale Street, Mayor Thornton and his three sons also played in Handys band. Handy wrote Mr. Crump as a song for political machine leader E. H. Crump. The song was later renamed The Memphis Blues, Handy also wrote a song called Beale Street Blues in 1916 which influenced the change of the streets name from Beale Avenue to Beale Street. From the 1920s to the 1940s, Louis Armstrong, Muddy Waters, Albert King, Memphis Minnie, King, Rufus Thomas, Rosco Gordon and other blues and jazz legends played on Beale Street and helped develop the style known as Memphis Blues
18.
Great Depression
–
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression that took place during the 1930s. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, in most countries it started in 1929 and it was the longest, deepest, and most widespread depression of the 20th century. In the 21st century, the Great Depression is commonly used as an example of how far the economy can decline. The depression originated in the United States, after a fall in stock prices that began around September 4,1929. Between 1929 and 1932, worldwide GDP fell by an estimated 15%, by comparison, worldwide GDP fell by less than 1% from 2008 to 2009 during the Great Recession. Some economies started to recover by the mid-1930s, however, in many countries, the negative effects of the Great Depression lasted until the beginning of World War II. The Great Depression had devastating effects in both rich and poor. Personal income, tax revenue, profits and prices dropped, while international trade plunged by more than 50%, unemployment in the U. S. rose to 25% and in some countries rose as high as 33%. Cities all around the world were hit hard, especially dependent on heavy industry. Construction was virtually halted in many countries, farming communities and rural areas suffered as crop prices fell by about 60%. Facing plummeting demand with few sources of jobs, areas dependent on primary sector industries such as mining and logging suffered the most. Even after the Wall Street Crash of 1929 optimism persisted for some time, john D. Rockefeller said These are days when many are discouraged. In the 93 years of my life, depressions have come, prosperity has always returned and will again. The stock market turned upward in early 1930, returning to early 1929 levels by April and this was still almost 30% below the peak of September 1929. Together, government and business spent more in the first half of 1930 than in the period of the previous year. On the other hand, consumers, many of whom had suffered losses in the stock market the previous year. In addition, beginning in the mid-1930s, a severe drought ravaged the agricultural heartland of the U. S, by mid-1930, interest rates had dropped to low levels, but expected deflation and the continuing reluctance of people to borrow meant that consumer spending and investment were depressed. By May 1930, automobile sales had declined to below the levels of 1928, prices in general began to decline, although wages held steady in 1930
19.
Grocery store
–
A grocery store is a retail store that primarily sells food. A grocer is a seller of food. Grocery stores often offer non-perishable food that is packaged in cans, bottles and boxes, with also having fresh produce, butchers, delis. Large grocery stores that stock significant amounts of products, such as clothing. Some large supermarkets also include a pharmacy, and customer service, redemption, in the United States, Canada, and United Kingdom, supermarkets and convenience stores are sometimes described as grocery businesses, or simply grocers. Some grocery stores form the centerpiece of a complex that includes other facilities, such as gas stations. This setup is especially common in the United Kingdom, with chains such as Tesco. Some groceries specialize in the foods of a nationality or culture, such as Italian, Polish. These stores are known as ethnic markets and may serve as gathering places for immigrants. In many cases, the range of products carried by larger supermarkets has reduced the need for such speciality stores. The variety and availability of food is no longer restricted by the diversity of locally grown food or the limitations of the growing season. Beginning as early as the 14th century, a grocer was a dealer in dry goods such as spices, peppers, sugar. These items were bought in bulk, hence the term grocer from the French grossier meaning wholesaler, as increasing numbers of staple foodstuffs became available in cans and other less-perishable packaging, the trade expanded its province. Today, grocers deal in a range of staple food-stuffs including such perishables as meats, produce. These trading posts evolved into larger retail businesses known as general stores and these facilities generally dealt only in dry goods such as flour, dry beans, baking soda, and canned foods. Many rural areas still contain general stores that sell goods ranging from cigars to imported napkins, traditionally, general stores have offered credit to their customers, a system of payment that works on trust rather than modern credit cards. This allowed farm families to buy staples until their harvest could be sold, the first self-service grocery store, Piggly Wiggly, was opened in 1916 in Memphis, Tennessee by Clarence Saunders, an inventor and entrepreneur. The early supermarkets began as chains of grocers shops, a small grocery store may also compete by locating in a mixed commercial-residential area close to, and convenient for, its customers
20.
Funeral home
–
A funeral home, funeral parlor or mortuary, is a business that provides interment and funeral services for the dead and their families. These services may include a prepared wake and funeral, and the provision of a chapel for the funeral, funeral homes arrange services in accordance with the wishes of surviving friends and family, whether immediate next of kin or an executor so named in a legal will. The funeral home takes care of the paperwork, permits, and other details, such as making arrangements with the cemetery. In recent years many funeral homes have started posting obituaries online, there are a few common types of services in North America. A traditional funeral service consists of a viewing, a service in a place of worship or the funeral home chapel. Direct cremation consists of the funeral home receiving the corpse, preparing it for the crematory, direct/immediate burial is the forgoing of a funeral ceremony for a prompt, simple burial. Moving a corpse between mortuaries involves preparing it for shipment in a coffin strapped into an arbitrary or a combination unit and this is common when it is to be buried in a different locality than where the person died. When a corpse is brought to a home, it is sometimes embalmed to delay decomposition or to make the viewing of the body more pleasant. The procedure typically involves removing sufficient blood material to accommodate the preservative chemicals and dyes, aspirating the internal organs, cosmetics are used with the consent of the family to improve the appearance of face and hands for a more natural look. If the face or hands are disfigured by accident, illness or decomposition, if this isnt possible, or the family wishes, the funeral home can perform a closed casket service. The funeral home often sets aside one or more areas for people to gather at a visitation. This area may contain a space to display the body in a casket to visitors who may pay their respects, funeral and memorial services may also take place at the funeral home. Many funeral homes offer prearrangement options for those who wish to plan their own funerals, several large multi-national corporations in this service field have received exposure from high-profile litigation. The Loewen Group, Inc. received a large jury verdict in the State of Mississippi which was later found to be in error as the allegations against Loewen Group proved false. The Canadian-based company then brought suit against the United States alleging violations under N. A. F. T. A, houston based Service Corporation International has also had their share of legal troubles with the operations of both their funeral home and cemetery operations
21.
DJ
–
A disc jockey is a person who mixes different sources of pre-existing recorded music as it is playing, usually for a live audience in a nightclub or dance club or via broadcasting. DJs typically perform for an audience in a nightclub or dance club or a TV, radio broadcast audience, or in the 2010s. DJs also create mixes, remixes and tracks that are recorded for later sale, in hip hop music, DJs may create beats, using percussion breaks, basslines and other musical content sampled from pre-existing records. In hip hop, rappers and MCs use these beats to rap over, DJs use equipment that can play at least two sources of recorded music simultaneously and mix them together. This allows the DJ to create seamless transitions between recordings and develop unique mixes of songs, DJ equipment, notably the specialized DJ mixer, a small audio mixer with a crossfader and cue functions. The crossfader enables the DJ to blend or transition from one song to another, the cue knobs or switches allow the DJ to preview a source of recorded music in headphones before playing it for the live club or broadcast audience. Previewing the music in headphones helps the DJ pick the track they want to play. DJs may also use a microphone to speak to the audience, effects such as reverb to create sound effects, drum machines. The title DJ is also used by DJs in front of their real names or adopted pseudonyms or stage names as a title to denote their profession. Some DJs focus on creating a mix of songs for the club dancers or radio audience. Other DJs use turntablism techniques such as scratching, in which the DJ or turntablist manipulates the record player turntable to create new sounds. In many types of DJing, including club DJing and radio/TV DJing, there are several types of disc jockey. Radio DJs or radio personalities introduce and play music that is broadcast on AM, FM, club DJs select and play music in bars, nightclubs or discothèques, or at parties, raves, or even in stadiums. Mobile DJs travel with portable sound systems and play recorded music at a variety of events. Some mobile DJs also serve as the master of ceremonies at weddings or other events, directing the attention of attendees, there are also many competitions for DJs that specialize in different turntablism techniques, such as mixing, hip hop music-style scratching or other kinds of techniques. Other types of DJ use musical performance techniques that allow them to be categorized as performing musicians, hip hop DJs and are also often songwriters or music producers who use turntablism and sampling to create backing instrumentals for new tracks. In reggae, the DJ is a vocalist who raps, toasts, chants or chats over pre-recorded rhythm tracks, the individual who helps the DJ by selecting tracks or records to be played is called the selector. Many electronica artists and producers who work as DJs often perform music by combining turntablism with keyboards, digital musical instruments
22.
WLAY (AM)
–
WLAY was a radio station serving the Florence/Muscle Shoals, Alabama, market and was heard at 1450 AM and on a translator at 92.3 on the FM band, it is licensed to the city of Muscle Shoals, Alabama. WLAY is owned by URBan Radio Broadcasting and is part of a six-station cluster operated by URBan in northwestern Alabama, WLAY is one of the oldest broadcast radio stations in Alabama and the Southern United States. It presently airs only music written and recorded in Muscle Shoals, in addition, the station broadcasts live concerts in the area and highlights area charitable events. Its program/music director and curator is Brian Rickman, WLAY ceased transmitting in December 2014. The station signed on in 1933 as WNRA, and has secured its place in American music history thanks to its contribution to what is now commonly referred to as The Muscle Shoals Sound. In the American Deep South, this was certainly unique, a number of bluegrass and delta blues musicians made regular live appearances on the radio station including Bill Monroe, Earl Scruggs, Sonny Boy Williamson and Son House. In the 1950s, the WLAY balanced both country music and Rock and Roll music on its playlist, in the early 1960s, Muscle Shoals began to develop as a popular music capital in the United States and WLAY played an important role in this growth. Following the success of local resident Arthur Alexander, the area saw the rise of numerous recording studios. With this, WLAY became a place for numerous Muscle Shoals musicians. Percy Sledges When A Man Loves A Woman was recorded at Norala Sound Studio by WLAY disc jockey Quin Ivy, Kelley built Norala with equipment borrowed from WLAYs studios. With the establishment of Rick Halls FAME Studios, WLAY would often play recordings as they were completed at the legendary studio, the stations independent owners sold the station and it has changed hands many times since. Following the development of WLAY-FM, the AM frequency altered its format a number of times and it has been a Sports station and Oldies station in addition to a Country formatted station. When the frequency was purchased by URBan Radio Broadcasting, the format was changed to reflect the stations history and it now plays only local music recorded or written in Muscle Shoals. The original sound board for WLAY-AM is now housed in the Alabama Music Hall of Fame. The radio station is regarded as a Historic Landmark by the Alabama Historical Society. In 2007,2010 and 2012 WLAY-AM was nominated for Radio Station of the Year by the Alabama Broadcasters Association and it was announced in October 2007, that WLAY had received permission from the Federal Communications Commission to re-broadcast its programming on the FM band at 92.3. The rebroadcast began on October 31,2007 and this move significantly increased the radio stations reach in the market. The station celebrated the FM launch with a marathon, broadcasting live from two of the city’s most celebrated recording studios
23.
Muscle Shoals, Alabama
–
Muscle Shoals is the largest city in Colbert County, Alabama, United States. As of the 2010 census, the population of Muscle Shoals was 13,146, the estimated population in 2015 was 13,706. Both the city and the Florence-Muscle Shoals Metropolitan Area are commonly called the Shoals, northwest Alabama Regional Airport serves the Shoals region, located in the northwest section of the state. It was also the site of a community development project by Henry Ford in 1922. Since the 1960s, the city has known for music – developing the Muscle Shoals Sound. There are several explanations on how the city got its name, one is that the city gets its name from a former natural feature of the Tennessee River, namely a shallow zone where mussels were gathered. When the area was first settled, the distinct spelling mussel to refer to a shellfish had not yet fully adopted. Another is that the name comes from the bend of the Tennessee River around the area, the city is one of four municipalities known as the Quad Cities, the others being Florence, Sheffield and Tuscumbia, all in Alabama. Muscle Shoals was a part of the Cherokee hunting grounds dating to at least the eighteenth century. After the American Revolution, the Cherokees were divided over attitudes toward the new U. S. republic and they claimed Muscle Shoals as part of their domain, and when Anglo-Americans attempted to settle the region in the 1780s and 1790s, the Chickamaugas bitterly resisted them. Upper Creeks, residing in what is now north and central Alabama, a major incident occurred in 1790, when U. S. President George Washington sent an expedition under Major John Doughty in an attempt to establish a fort and trading post at Muscle Shoals. This expedition was annihilated by a Chickamauga and Creek party sent to destroy it, and the project was abandoned by Doughty. Anglo-American settlers in Tennessee continued to agitate for control of the region, the site was particularly desirable, as it controlled access to fine cotton-producing land immediately to its south. At Seviers behest, Jackson attempted to persuade Congress and President John Adams to fund a new expedition to control of the site. U. S. officials finally took control of the region in the wake of the U. S. invasion of Creek country during the War of 1812. Jackson and General John Coffee obtained cession of the land from both the Cherokee and Creek by treaty, without permission to do so from the federal government. When Jackson, as President, implemented the policy of Indian Removal, during World War I President Wilson authorized a dam just downstream of Muscle Shoals to help power nitrate plants for munitions. The first plant started producing nitrates two weeks after the armistice, but the dam was not completed until 1924, meanwhile, in 1922 Henry Ford tried to buy the nitrate works and the unfinished dam
24.
WREC
–
WREC is an AM radio station broadcasting a Talk radio format, and calling itself Newsradio 600 WREC. WREC is licensed to Memphis, Tennessee, and serves the Memphis metropolitan area, the station is owned by iHeartMedia, Inc. and operates with 5,000 watts day and night. The station also broadcasts on HD radio, on a subchannel of co-owned 102.7 WEGR, the stations studios are located in Southeast Memphis, and the transmitter site is in North Memphis. WREC airs mostly syndicated shows from Premiere Networks, a subsidiary of parent company iHeartMedia. Weekdays start with This Morning with Gordon Deal, also heard are Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Dave Ramsey, Clyde Lewis and Coast to Coast AM with George Noory. In late mornings Glenn Beck from TheBlaze network airs, nation of Jake, hosted by a DJ from sister station Rock 103 WEGR, airs in late afternoons, the only local weekday program. Weekends feature shows on money, real estate, gardening and home improvement, nationally syndicated shows from Kim Komando and Bill Cunningham round out the weekend schedule. WREC is an affiliate of the Fox News Radio Network, in the fall of 2006, WREC assumed the broadcast rights for the football and basketball teams of the University of Memphis. Before carrying the Tigers, the station had long been the Memphis affiliate for Tennessee Volunteers football and basketball, the station signed on for the first time on September 22,1922 as KFNG, owned by electrical engineer and radio dealer Hoyt Wooten. The station operated from a 10-watt transmitter in his fathers home in Coldwater, in 1925, it moved to Whitehaven, Tennessee and adopted its current call letters. It originally shared the 600 AM frequency with WOAN in Lawrenceburg, the two stations merged in 1929, with WREC moving to studios in the basement of the Peabody Hotel in downtown Memphis, where it would remain for over 40 years. In 1956 WREC added a TV station, CBS affiliate WREC-TV3, Wooten sold his stations to Cowles Communications in 1963, earning a handsome return on his original investment. Query the FCCs AM station database for WREC Radio-Locator Information on WREC Query Nielsen Audios AM station database for WREC
25.
B.B. King
–
Riley Benjamin King, known professionally as B. B. King, was an American blues singer, electric guitarist, songwriter, and record producer. King introduced a style of soloing based on fluid string bending and shimmering vibrato that influenced many later electric blues guitarists. King was known for performing throughout his musical career, appearing at more than 200 concerts per year on average into his 70s. In 1956, he appeared at 342 shows. King was born on a plantation in Berclair, Mississippi. He was attracted to music and the guitar in church, and began his career in juke joints. He later lived in Memphis, Tennessee, and Chicago, King died at the age of 89 in Las Vegas, Nevada, on May 14,2015, from congestive heart failure and diabetic complications. Riley Benjamin King was born on September 16,1925, on a plantation called Berclair, near the town of Itta Bena, Mississippi. He considered the city of Indianola, Mississippi to be his home. When Riley was four years old, his mother left his father for another man, so the boy was raised by his grandmother, Elnora Farr, in Kilmichael. While young, King sang in the choir at Elkhorn Baptist Church in Kilmichael. King was attracted to the Pentecostal Church of God in Christ because of its music, the local minister led worship with a Sears Roebuck Silvertone guitar. The minister taught King his first three chords and it seems that at the age of 12 he purchased his first guitar for $15.00, although another source indicates he was given his first guitar by Bukka White, his mothers first cousin. In November 1941 King Biscuit Time first aired, broadcasting on KFFA in Helena and it was a radio show featuring the Mississippi Delta blues. King listened to it while on break at a plantation, a self-taught guitarist, he then wanted to become a radio musician. In 1946, King followed Bukka White to Memphis, Tennessee, White took him in for the next ten months. However, King returned to Mississippi shortly afterward, where he decided to prepare himself better for the next visit and he performed on Sonny Boy Williamsons radio program on KWEM in West Memphis, where he began to develop an audience. Kings appearances led to engagements at the Sixteenth Avenue Grill in West Memphis
26.
Junior Parker
–
Herman Junior Parker was an American Memphis blues singer and musician. He is best remembered for his voice, which has been described as honeyed. He was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2001, one music journalist noted, For years Junior Parker deserted downhome harmonica blues for uptown blues-soul music. Other birth dates in 1927 or 1932 have been suggested, and he sang in gospel groups as a child and, beginning in his teenage years, played on various blues circuits. His biggest influence as a player was Sonny Boy Williamson. Around 1950 he was a member of an ad hoc Memphis group, in 1951 he formed his own band, the Blue Flames, with the guitarist Pat Hare. Parker was discovered in 1952 by Ike Turner, who signed him to Modern Records and he put out one single on this record label, Youre My Angel. This brought him to the attention of Sam Phillips, and he, there they produced three successful songs, Feelin Good, Love My Baby, and Mystery Train, later covered by Elvis Presley. For Presleys version of Mystery Train, Scotty Moore borrowed the riff from Parkers Love My Baby. Love My Baby and Mystery Train are considered important contributions to the rockabilly genre, later in 1953, Parker toured with Bobby Bland and Johnny Ace, and also joined Duke Records. Parker and Bland headed the highly successful Blues Consolidated Revue, which performed on the southern blues circuit. His success was limited after he left Duke in 1966 and he recorded for various labels, including Mercury, Blue Rock, Minit, and Capitol. Parkers recording of Annie Get Your Yo-Yo was later sampled by the Wiseguys on their 1999 hit Start the Commotion, Parker died on November 18,1971, at age 39, in Blue Island, Illinois, during surgery for a brain tumor
27.
Peter Guralnick
–
Peter Guralnick is an American music critic, author and screenwriter. He specializes in the history of rocknroll and has written prominent works on Elvis Presley, Sam Phillips. Guralnick graduated from Boston University in 1971 with a degree in creative writing. He then began writing books about the history of rocknroll, blues, country music, mona Dickson, writing in MITs The Tech gave Almost Grown a favorable review. His two-volume biography of Elvis Presley, Last Train to Memphis in 1994, followed by Careless Love in 1999, placed the story of Presleys career into a rise and fall arc. Guralnick previously wrote about Presley in the The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock & Roll, in its first edition, in 1976 and he also contributed the complete text for the 240-page hardcover book accompanying the 2010 30-disc CD boxed set, The Complete Elvis Presley Masters. He has been called the dean of rock n roll storytellers, Guralnick wrote the 727-page biography of influential record producer Sam Phillips entitled Sam Phillips, The Man Who Invented Rock n Roll. He also penned the script for A&Es documentary of the same name, on October 21,2016, it was announced that Leonardo DiCaprio will portray Sam Phillips in the forthcoming film based on Guralnicks book. Guralnick scripted Sam Cooke – Legend, narrated by Jeffrey Wright and he has written liner notes for albums including Charlie Richs last album Pictures and Paintings and the last three Jerry Lee Lewis albums Last Man Standing, Mean Old Man and Rock and Roll Time. In 1971, he succeeded his grandfather as director of a camp for boys. It was located on Lake Winnipesaukee in Wolfeboro, New Hampshire and he has been married for over 45 years to Alexandra. He has a son and daughter, Jacob and Nina, feel Like Going Home, Portraits in Blues, Country, and Rock n Roll. Lost Highway, Journeys & Arrivals of American Musicians, the Listeners Guide to The Blues. Sweet Soul Music, Rhythm and Blues and the Southern Dream of Freedom, Last Train to Memphis, The Rise of Elvis Presley. Careless Love, The Unmaking of Elvis Presley, Elvis Day by Day, The Definitive Record of His Life and Music. Dream Boogie, The Triumph of Sam Cooke, Sam Phillips, The Man Who Invented RocknRoll. An Interview with Peter Guralnick by Griffin Ondaatje and Craig Proctor, Brick, A Literary Journal, Issue 62, caught in a Trap at the Wayback Machine. Peter S. Sholtes interviews Peter Guralnick, city Pages Media, January 13,1999
28.
Origins of rock and roll
–
Rock and roll emerged as a defined musical style in the United States in the early to mid-1950s. Rock and roll in turn provided the basis for the music that. The phrase rocking and rolling originally described the movement of a ship on the ocean, in 1951, Cleveland-based disc jockey Alan Freed began playing this music style while popularizing the term rock and roll to describe it. The alliterative phrase rocking and rolling was originally used by mariners at least as early as the 17th century, prevent her from rocking and rolling. And an 1835 reference to a ship, Rocking and rolling on both beam-ends. Myers at about the time, and Gus Reed in 1908. By that time, the specific phrase rocking and rolling was also used by African Americans in spirituals with a religious connotation, another version was issued on the Little Wonder record label in 1916. Rocking was also used to describe the spiritual rapture felt by worshippers at certain religious events, at the same time, the terminology was used in secular contexts, for example to describe the motion of railroad trains. Rocking and rolling were also used, both separately and together, in a context, writers for hundreds of years had used the phrases They had a roll in the hay or I rolled her in the clover. In 1922, blues singer Trixie Smith recorded My Man Rocks Me, although it was played with a backbeat and was one of the first around the clock lyrics, this slow minor-key blues was by no means rock and roll in the later sense. Also in 1927, traditional country musician Uncle Dave Macon, with his group the Fruit Jar Drinkers, recorded Sail Away Ladies with a refrain of Dont she rock, daddy-o, and Rock About My Saro Jane. Duke Ellington recorded Rockin In Rhythm in 1928, and Robinsons Knights Of Rest recorded Rocking and Rolling in 1930, in 1932, the phrase rock and roll was heard in the Hal Roach film Asleep in the Feet. In 1934, the Boswell Sisters had a pop hit with Rock and Roll from the film Transatlantic Merry-Go-Round, where the term was used to describe the motion of a ship at sea. In 1935, Henry Red Allen recorded Get Rhythm in Your Feet and Music in Your Soul which included the lyric, If Satan starts to hound you, commence to rock, the lyrics were written by the prolific composer J. Russel Robinson with Bill Livingston. Allens recording was a record on the Vocalion label, but the tune was quickly covered by white musicians. Other notable recordings using the words, both released in 1938, were Rock It For Me by Chick Webb, a number with Ella Fitzgerald on vocals featuring the lyrics. Wont you satisfy my soul, With the rock and roll, and Rock Me by Sister Rosetta Tharpe, a gospel song originally written by Thomas Dorsey as Hide Me In Thy Bosom. Tharpe performed the song in the style of a city blues, with lyrics, ecstatic vocals
29.
Rocket 88
–
Rocket 88 is a rhythm and blues song that was first recorded in Memphis, Tennessee, on March 3 or 5,1951. The recording was credited to Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats, the record reached number one on the Billboard R&B chart. Many music writers acknowledge its importance in the development of rock and roll music, with several considering it to be the first rock, the original version of the twelve-bar blues song was credited to Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats, which hit number one on the R&B charts. The band was actually 19-year-old Ike Turner and his Kings of Rhythm band, Brenston sang the lead vocal and was credited with writing Rocket 88. The song was a hymn of praise to the joys of the Oldsmobile Rocket 88 automobile which had recently been introduced, and was based on the 1947 song Cadillac Boogie by Jimmy Liggins. It was also preceded and influenced by Pete Johnsons Rocket 88 Boogie Parts 1 and 2, Willie Sims played drums for the recording. The song also features one of the first examples of distortion, the song was recorded in the Memphis studio of producer Sam Phillips in March 1951, and licensed to Chess Records for release. The legend of how the sound came about says that Kizarts amplifier was damaged on Highway 61 when the band was driving from Mississippi to Memphis, Tennessee. An attempt was made to hold the cone in place by stuffing the amplifier with wadded newspapers, Robert Palmer has written that the amplifier had fallen from the top of the car, and attributes this information to Sam Phillips. Peter Guralnick, in his biography of Sam Phillips has the amplifier being dropped from the trunk when the band got a flat tire and was digging out the spare. Link Wray explains the development of his tone with a similar story. Ike Turners piano intro to the song was used nearly note-for-note by Little Richard in Good Golly Miss Molly. Ike Turner was only paid $20 for the record, many writers have suggested that Rocket 88 has strong claims to be called the first rocknroll record, but others take a more nuanced view. Charlie Gillett, writing in 1970 in The Sound of the City, music historian Robert Palmer, writing in The Rolling Stone History of Rock & Roll in 1980, described it as an important and influential record. He noted that Hills saxophone playing was wilder and rougher than on many jump blues records, echoing this view, Bill Dahl at AllMusic wrote, Determining the first actual rock & roll record is a truly impossible task. This all combined to create THE mother of all R&B songs for a white audience. From our perspective, Rocket 88 wasnt the first rock and roll record, because the beat is a rhythm, not the distinctive rock rhythm heard first in the songs of Chuck Berry. Still, the distortion and the place of the guitar in the overall sound certainly anticipate key features of rock style
30.
Ike Turner
–
Izear Luster Ike Turner, Jr. was an American musician, bandleader, songwriter, arranger, talent scout, and record producer. An early pioneer of rock and roll, he is most popularly known for his work in the 1960s and 1970s with his then-wife Tina Turner in the Ike & Tina Turner Revue. Turner began playing piano and guitar when he was eight, forming his group and he employed the group as his backing band for the rest of his life. His first recording, Rocket 88, credited to Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats, in 1951 is considered a contender for first rock and roll song. Relocating to St. Louis, Missouri, in 1954, he built the Kings into one of the most renowned acts on the club circuit. There he met singer Anna Mae Bullock, whom he renamed Tina Turner, forming The Ike & Tina Turner Revue, Turner recorded for many of the key R&B record labels of the 1950s and 1960s, including Chess, Modern, Trumpet, Flair and Sue. With the Ike & Tina Turner Revue, he graduated to larger labels Blue Thumb, throughout his career Turner won two Grammy Awards and was nominated for three others. With his former wife, Turner was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991, addicted to cocaine and crack for at least 15 years, Turner was convicted of drug offenses, serving seventeen months in prison between July 1989 and 1991. He spent the rest of the 1990s free of his addiction, near the end of his life, he returned to live performance as a front man and, returning to his blues roots, produced two albums that were critically well received and award-winning. Turner has frequently referred to as a great innovator of Rock and Roll by contemporaries such as Little Richard. Phil Alexander described Turner as the cornerstone of modernday rock n roll, Turner was born in Clarksdale, Mississippi, on November 5,1931, to Beatrice Cushenberry, a seamstress, and Isaiah Luster Turner, a Baptist minister. The younger of their two children, Turner had a sister named Ethel May. Turner believed that he had named after his father. Turner said that when he was young he witnessed his father beaten. His father lived for three years as an invalid in a tent in the yard before succumbing to his injuries. Writer and blues historian Ted Drozdowski told a different version of the story and his mother then married a man called Philip Reeves. Turner said his stepfather was a violent alcoholic and that they often argued, after one fight Turner knocked out his stepfather with a piece of wood. He then ran away to Memphis, where he lived rough for a few days before returning to his mother and he reconciled with his stepfather years later, buying a house for him in the 1950s around the time Turners mother died
31.
James Cotton
–
James Henry Cotton was an American blues harmonica player, singer and songwriter, who performed and recorded with many of the great blues artists of his time and with his own band. He played drums early in his career but is famous for his harmonica playing, Cotton began his professional career playing the blues harp in Howlin Wolfs band in the early 1950s. He made his first recordings in Memphis for Sun Records, under the direction of Sam Phillips, in 1955, he was recruited by Muddy Waters to come to Chicago and join his band. Cotton became Muddys bandleader and stayed with the group until 1965, in 1965 he formed the Jimmy Cotton Blues Quartet, with Otis Spann on piano, to record between gigs with the Muddy Waters band. He eventually left to form his own full-time touring group and his first full album, on Verve Records, was produced by guitarist Mike Bloomfield and vocalist and songwriter Nick Gravenites, who later were members of the band Electric Flag. In the 1970s, Cotton played harmonica on Muddy Waters Grammy Award–winning 1977 album Hard Again, born in Tunica, Mississippi, Cotton became interested in music when he first heard Sonny Boy Williamson II on the radio. He left home with his uncle and moved to West Helena, Arkansas, for many years Cotton claimed that he told Williamson that he was an orphan and that Williamson took him in and raised him, a story he admitted in recent years is not true. However, Williamson did mentor Cotton during his early years, Williamson left the South to live with his estranged wife in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, leaving his band in Cottons hands. Cotton was quoted as saying, He just gave it to me, but I couldnt hold it together cause I was too young and crazy in those days an everybody in the band was grown men, so much older than me. Cotton played drums early in his career but is famous for his harmonica playing and he began his professional career playing the blues harp in Howlin Wolfs band in the early 1950s. He made his first recordings as a solo artist for Sun Records in Memphis in 1953, in 1954, he recorded an electric blues single Cotton Crop Blues, which featured a heavily distorted power chord–driven electric guitar solo by Pat Hare. Cotton began working with the Muddy Waters Band around 1955, Cottons first recording session with Waters took place in June 1957, and he alternated with Little Walter on Waterss recording sessions until the end of the decade. In 1965 he formed the Jimmy Cotton Blues Quartet, with Otis Spann on piano and their performances were captured by producer Samuel Charters on volume two of the Vanguard recording Chicago/The Blues/Today. After leaving Waterss band in 1966, Cotton toured with Janis Joplin while pursuing a solo career and he formed the James Cotton Blues Band in 1967. The band mainly performed its own arrangements of blues and R&B from the 1950s and 1960s. Cottons band included a section, like that of Bobby Blands. After Blands death, his son told news media that Bland had recently discovered that Cotton was his half-brother, in the 1970s, Cotton recorded several albums for Buddah Records. He played harmonica on Waterss Grammy Award–winning 1977 album Hard Again, in the 1980s he recorded for Alligator Records in Chicago, he rejoined the Alligator roster in 2010
32.
Rufus Thomas
–
Thomas, Jr. was an American rhythm-and-blues, funk, soul and blues singer, songwriter, dancer, DJ and comic entertainer from Memphis, Tennessee. He recorded for labels, including Chess Records and Sun Records in the 1950s. He is best known for his novelty dance records, including Walking the Dog, Do the Funky Chicken and Push and Pull. According to the Mississippi Blues Commission, Rufus Thomas embodied the spirit of Memphis music perhaps more than any other artist, occupied many important roles in the local scene. He began his career as a tap dancer, vaudeville performer and he later worked as a disc jockey on radio station WDIA in Memphis, both before and after his recordings became successful. He remained active into the 1990s, and as a performer and he was the father of the singers Carla Thomas and Vaneese Thomas and the keyboard player Marvell Thomas. Thomas was born in the community of Cayce, Mississippi. He moved with his family to Memphis, Tennessee, around 1920 and his mother was a church woman. Thomas made his debut as a performer at the age of six, by the age of 10, he was a tap dancer, performing on the streets and in amateur productions at Booker T. Washington High School, in Memphis. From the age of 13, he worked with Nat D, after graduating from high school, Thomas attended Tennessee A&I University for one semester, but economic constraints led him to leave to pursue a career as a full-time entertainer. Thomas also began performing in traveling tent shows, in 1936 he joined the Rabbit Foot Minstrels, an all-black revue that toured the South, as a tap dancer and comedian, sometimes part of a duo, Rufus and Johnny. He married Cornelia Lorene Wilson in 1940, at a service officiated by Aretha Franklins father, Rev. C. L. Franklin, Thomas worked a day job in the American Finishing Company textile bleaching plant, which he continued to do for over 20 years. He also formed a comedy and dancing duo, Rufus and Bones, with Robert Bones Couch, one early winner was B. B. King, and others first discovered by Thomas later in the 1940s included Bobby Bland, in the early 1940s, Thomas began writing and performing his own songs. He regarded Louis Armstrong, Fats Waller and Gatemouth Moore as his musical influences, as an established performer in Memphis, aged 33 in 1950, Thomas recorded his first 78 rpm single, for Jesse Ericksons small Star Talent label in Dallas, Texas. Thomas said, I just wanted to make a record, I never thought of getting rich. I just wanted to be known, be a recording artist, the record sold five copies and I bought four of them. The record, Ill Be a Good Boy/Im So Worried, gained a Billboard review stating, in 1951 he made his first recordings at Sam Phillips Sun Studio, for the Chess label, but they were not commercially successful
33.
Rosco Gordon
–
Rosco N. Gordon III was an American blues singer and songwriter. He is best known for his 1952 No.1 R&B hit single, Booted, Gordon was born in Memphis, Tennessee, and grew up on Florida street. He was a pioneer of the Memphis blues style and he made a number of his early recordings for Sam Phillips at Sun Records. Gordon played piano in a known as the Rosco rhythm. This rhythm was an influence on the Jamaican pianist Theophilus Beckford, Booted and No More Doggin were both released in 1952. Phillips sold the master of Booted to both RPM and Chess Records, and both released the track as a single. The RPM release reached No.1 on the Billboard R&B record chart, Chess and the Bihari brothers later settled the conflict, with the Biharis getting exclusive rights to Gordon and Chess signing Howlin Wolf to an exclusive contract. Gordons last single to reach the charts was Just a Little Bit, in 1962, he gave up the music industry and moved to Queens, New York, with his new wife, where he purchased a partnership in a laundry business. Following his wifes death in 1984, he returned to performing in the New York area. C, the documentary, The Road to Memphis, aired on PBS television. Six weeks after filming finished, Gordon died of an attack at his apartment in Rego Park. He was interred in the Rosedale Cemetery in Linden, New Jersey, No More Doggin was covered by the Groundhogs on their 1972 album Hogwash and by Colin James on his 1993 album Colin James and the Little Big Band. Rosco Gordon full biography Rosco Gordon discography on Soulful Kinda Music website PBS website for The Road to Memphis Rosco Gordon overview Rosco Gordon interview Rosco Gordon biography
34.
Little Milton
–
Milton was born James Milton Campbell, Jr. in the Mississippi Delta town of Inverness and raised in Greenville by a farmer and local blues musician. By age twelve he was a musician, chiefly influenced by T-Bone Walker and his blues and rock. He joined the Rhythm Aces in the part of the 1950s. One of the group was Eddie Cusic who taught Milton to play the guitar, in 1952, while still a teenager playing in local bars, he caught the attention of Ike Turner, who was at that time a talent scout for Sam Phillips Sun Records. He signed a contract with the label and recorded a number of singles, none of them broke through onto radio or sold well at record stores, however, and Milton left the Sun label by 1955. As a record producer, Milton helped bring artists such as Albert King and Fontella Bass to fame, after a number of small format and regional hits, his 1962 single, So Mean to Me, broke onto the Billboard R&B chart, eventually peaking at #14. Following a short break to tour, managing other acts, and spending time recording new material, he returned to music in 1965 with a polished sound. After the ill-received Blind Man, he released hit singles. The first, Were Gonna Make It, a soul song, topped the R&B chart and broke through onto Top 40 radio. He followed the song with #4 R&B hit Whos Cheating Who, all three songs were featured on his album, Were Gonna Make It, released that summer. With the death of Leonard Chess the same year, Miltons distributor, Checker Records fell into disarray, and Milton joined the Stax label two years later. Adding complex orchestration to his works, Milton scored hits with Thats What Love Will Make You Do and What It Is from his album, What It Is. He appeared in the film, Wattstax, which was released in 1973. Stax, however, had been losing money since late in the decade and was forced into bankruptcy in 1975. His last hit single, Age Aint Nothin But a Number, was released in 1983 from the album of the same name, in 1988, Little Milton was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame and won a W. C. His final album, Think of Me, was released in May 2005 on the Telarc imprint, milton’s song Let Me Down Easy was recorded by the Spencer Davis Group on The Second Album, but his authorship was not acknowledged on the record. He released a single of it himself in 1968 on Checker and it was also chosen by Etta James as the final track in her final album The Dreamer in 2011. Milton died on August 4,2005 from complications following a stroke. C, — Little Milton Official Little Milton website including biography Discography, complete with original catalogue issue numbers Official Little Milton store
35.
Bobby Blue Bland
–
Robert Calvin Bobby Bland, known professionally as Bobby Blue Bland, was an American blues and R&B singer. Bland developed a sound that mixed gospel with the blues and R&B and he was described as among the great storytellers of blues and soul music. Created tempestuous arias of love, betrayal and resignation, set against roiling, dramatic orchestrations and he was sometimes referred to as the Lion of the Blues and as the Sinatra of the Blues. His music was influenced by Nat King Cole. Bland was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 1981, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992, and he received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1997. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame described him as second in only to B. B. King as a product of Memphiss Beale Street blues scene. Bland was born Robert Calvin Brooks in the town of Barretville. His father, I. J. Brooks, abandoned the family not long after Roberts birth, Robert later acquired the name Bland from his stepfather, Leroy Bridgeforth, who was also called Leroy Bland. Bobby Bland never graduated from school, with his mother, Bland moved to Memphis in 1947, where he started singing with local gospel groups, including the Miniatures. Between 1950 and 1952, Bland recorded unsuccessful singles for Modern Records and, at Ike Turners suggestion and he then signed a contract with Duke Records. When Bland returned to Memphis in 1954, several of his former associates and he joined Aces revue and returned to Duke Records, which was then being run by Houston entrepreneur Don Robey. According to biographer Charles Farley, Robey handed Bobby a new contract, which Bobby could not read, the deal gave Bland just half a cent per record sold, instead of the industry standard of 2 cents. Bland released his first single for Duke in 1955, unlike many blues musicians, Bland played no instrument. Blands first chart success came in 1957 with the R&B chart no.1 hit Farther Up the Road and it was followed by a series of hits on the R&B chart, including Little Boy Blue. He also shared an album with Parker, Blues Consolidated, in 1958, Blands craft was most clearly heard on a series of early-1960s releases, including Cry Cry Cry, I Pity the Fool and Turn On Your Love Light, which became a much-covered standard. Despite credits to the contrary—often claimed by Robey—many of these works were written by Joe Scott. Bland also recorded a hit version of T-Bone Walkers Call It Stormy Monday and his final R&B no.1 was Thats The Way Love Is, in 1963, but he continued to produce a consistent run of R&B chart entries through the mid-1960s. Blands records mostly sold on the R&B market rather than achieving crossover success and he had 23 Top Ten hits on the Billboard R&B chart
36.
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
37.
That's All Right
–
Thats All Right is a song written and originally performed by blues singer Arthur Crudup. It is best known as the first single recorded and released by Elvis Presley, Presleys version was recorded on July 5,1954, and released on July 19,1954 with Blue Moon of Kentucky as the B-side. It is #113 on the 2010 Rolling Stone magazine list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time, in July 2004, exactly 50 years after its first issuing, the song was released as a single in the United Kingdom, where it debuted and peaked at Number 3. The song was written by Arthur Big Boy Crudup, and originally recorded by him in Chicago on September 6,1946, some of the lyrics are traditional blues verses first recorded by Blind Lemon Jefferson in 1926. Crudups recording was released as a single on RCA Victor 20-2205, at the same session, he recorded a virtually identical tune with different lyrics, I Dont Know It, which was also released as a single. In early March 1949, the song was rereleased under the title, Thats All Right, Mama, Elvis Presleys version was recorded in July 1954. Its catalogue number was Sun 209, the label reads Thats All Right, and names the performers as Elvis Presley, Scotty and Bill. Arthur Crudup was credited as the composer on the label of Presleys single, an out-of-court settlement was supposed to pay Crudup an estimated $60,000 in back royalties, but never materialized. Crudup had used lines in his song that had been present in earlier blues recordings, a country music version by Marty Robbins peaked at number seven on the Billboard Hot Country Singles chart in 1955. Black began joining in on his bass, and soon they were joined by Moore on guitar. Producer Sam Phillips, taken aback by this sudden upbeat atmosphere, blacks bass and guitars from Presley and Moore provided the instrumentation. The recording contains no drums or additional instruments, the song was produced in the style of a live recording. The following evening the trio recorded Blue Moon of Kentucky in a similar style, the recording session was Presleys fifth visit to the Sun Studio. His first two visits, the summer of 1953 and January 1954, had been private recordings, followed by two more visits in the summer of 1954, upon finishing the recording session, according to Scotty Moore, Bill Black remarked, Damn. Get that on the radio and theyll run us out of town, Sam Phillips gave copies of the record to local disc jockeys Dewey Phillips of WHBQ, Uncle Richard of WMPS, and Sleepy Eyed John Lepley of WHHM. On July 7,1954, Dewey Phillips played Thats All Right on his radio show Red. On hearing the news that Dewey was going to play his record, interest in the record was so intense that Dewey reportedly played the record 14 times and received over 40 telephone calls. Presley was persuaded to go to the station for an interview that night
38.
Disc jockey
–
A disc jockey is a person who mixes different sources of pre-existing recorded music as it is playing, usually for a live audience in a nightclub or dance club or via broadcasting. DJs typically perform for an audience in a nightclub or dance club or a TV, radio broadcast audience, or in the 2010s. DJs also create mixes, remixes and tracks that are recorded for later sale, in hip hop music, DJs may create beats, using percussion breaks, basslines and other musical content sampled from pre-existing records. In hip hop, rappers and MCs use these beats to rap over, DJs use equipment that can play at least two sources of recorded music simultaneously and mix them together. This allows the DJ to create seamless transitions between recordings and develop unique mixes of songs, DJ equipment, notably the specialized DJ mixer, a small audio mixer with a crossfader and cue functions. The crossfader enables the DJ to blend or transition from one song to another, the cue knobs or switches allow the DJ to preview a source of recorded music in headphones before playing it for the live club or broadcast audience. Previewing the music in headphones helps the DJ pick the track they want to play. DJs may also use a microphone to speak to the audience, effects such as reverb to create sound effects, drum machines. The title DJ is also used by DJs in front of their real names or adopted pseudonyms or stage names as a title to denote their profession. Some DJs focus on creating a mix of songs for the club dancers or radio audience. Other DJs use turntablism techniques such as scratching, in which the DJ or turntablist manipulates the record player turntable to create new sounds. In many types of DJing, including club DJing and radio/TV DJing, there are several types of disc jockey. Radio DJs or radio personalities introduce and play music that is broadcast on AM, FM, club DJs select and play music in bars, nightclubs or discothèques, or at parties, raves, or even in stadiums. Mobile DJs travel with portable sound systems and play recorded music at a variety of events. Some mobile DJs also serve as the master of ceremonies at weddings or other events, directing the attention of attendees, there are also many competitions for DJs that specialize in different turntablism techniques, such as mixing, hip hop music-style scratching or other kinds of techniques. Other types of DJ use musical performance techniques that allow them to be categorized as performing musicians, hip hop DJs and are also often songwriters or music producers who use turntablism and sampling to create backing instrumentals for new tracks. In reggae, the DJ is a vocalist who raps, toasts, chants or chats over pre-recorded rhythm tracks, the individual who helps the DJ by selecting tracks or records to be played is called the selector. Many electronica artists and producers who work as DJs often perform music by combining turntablism with keyboards, digital musical instruments
39.
WHBQ (AM)
–
WHBQ is an AM radio station in Memphis, Tennessee, in the United States of America. Although today it broadcasts sports news exclusively, the station became famous in the 1950s for playing rhythm, owned by Flinn Broadcasting, the stations studios are located in Southeast Memphis, and the transmitter site is in North Memphis. WHBQ was once owned by RKO General and its reputation was developed by Dewey Phillips, a disc jockey who played rhythm and blues music on his night-time show, Red, Hot and Blue. In 1954, Phillips played a recording of Thats Alright Mama by Elvis Presley, for many years, WHBQ was considered a farm club for RKO. In the 1960s, under the guidance of Bill Drake, WHBQ became Boss Radio, by the early eighties, the once-mighty music station could no longer compete with the increasing popularity of FM-band musical stations. They tried an oldies oriented format from 1981 to 1983 before switching to News/Talk, in 1988, RKO sold WHBQ to Flinn Broadcasting, a local media company, who tried oldies again, country and even heavy metal late at night. It supplements its national coverage with Yahoo, sports 56 WHBQ-AMs Weekly Show Hosts include, Peter Edmiston, David Basham, Dave Woloshin, Greg Gaston, Eli Savoie, Rob Fischer, Brett Norsworthy, Keith Parker, Elliot Wender and John Hardin
