Coinciding with Black History Month, the release of a new compilation titled Birthright: A Black Roots Music Compendium makes it easy for any listener to understand the incredible impact of Black artists on American music. Some of its recordings are decades old, while others are relatively new. Represented artists range from newcomers like Ranky Tanky to iconic groups such as the Staple Singers. More than a few lesser-known Black artists are given their due on the 40-track, double-disc collection, which was produced by author, professor, and Grammy-nominated music historian Dr. Ted Olson, along with Grammy-winning producer, musician, and author Scott Billington.
Olson tells BGS, “Birthright is both timely (to allow the powerful music of several generations of Black roots artists to be heard by a new generation) and timeless (Black roots music constitutes one of the essential canons of American vernacular music).” He also notes that the track list for Birthright was shaped by several factors: the complementary perspectives of the album’s compilers (Billington is based in New Orleans, whereas Olson lives in Appalachia); the compilers’ collective sense of which artists and recordings might effectively represent the varied genres and traditions of Black roots music; as well as the realities impacting the licensing of specific recordings.
Two leading voices in contemporary American roots music — Dom Flemons and Corey Harris — contributed powerful essays to the booklet for Birthright in order to express the cultural significance of the album. Both are featured artists among the 40 recordings celebrated on the album.
In the liner notes, Harris writes, “When we listen to the artists on this set, we are hearing the voice of a people determined to express themselves and be heard above the empty, metallic din of progress, above the saccharine pop and soulless glam of the industry. When the power goes out and the internet goes down, some of us will still be playing music and sharing our joys and pains with one another in song. Black roots music is a testament to the fact that if modern civilization were to collapse, we have the power and the spirit to rise up once again. We only need to hold on to our roots. This is an excellent place to start.”
Flemons tells BGS, “When I was first approached to be a part of the Birthright album, I knew that I wanted my essay to unravel the strange and twisted journey and history of Black American Roots Music. There has been a staggering amount of music left behind ranging from the legitimate Euro-classical arranged Jubilee groups of late 19th century to the down-home field recordings of the mid-to-late 20th century blues singers and songsters.”
He continues, “The two tracks on the collection where I am featured have been staples of my performing repertoire for close to 20 years. My version of ‘Polly Put the Kettle On’ was learned from a Sonny Boy Williamson I record which I translated into the string band style featuring double leads on harmonica and fiddle. The song was featured on my album Prospect Hill: The American Songster Omnibus.
“Finally, the track of ‘Georgie Buck’ by Joe Thompson accompanied by my old group the Carolina Chocolate Drops showcases the power of our group when we were backing up our mentor. Recorded in the fall of 2006, I had a strong hand in bringing this session together because I knew we would need to document our unique sound. At that time, the group had been together for close to a year and we were consistently going down to Joe’s house to learn his family’s music. After getting acquainted with Music Maker Foundation, I scheduled a session meant to record our group for posterity on the high-definition Cello digital recorder used by Timothy Duffy. Listeners will hear the nuances of the twin fiddles, 5-string banjo and stone mason jug on this recording. This track has gone unreleased until now.”
Artist: Dom Flemons Hometown: Phoenix, Arizona; now Chicago Song: “Slow Dance With You” Album:Traveling Wildfire Release Date: March 24, 2023 Label: Smithsonian Folkways
In Their Words: “Traveling Wildfire is not only a statement of my personal travel experiences but also a metaphor for rebirth in the wake of destruction. It reminded me that the album is in its own way a statement about emerging from the depths of uncertainty to find a new relevance during this unprecedented moment in modern history. At the same time, the image of the traveling wildfire reminded me of how music and stories can travel from generation to generation bringing important lessons from the past into the present and the future.” — Dom Flemons
Even if you’re from Nashville or you’ve visited Music City many times, AMERICANAFEST always offers something new. This year, the annual event encompasses more than a dozen places to hear live music, as well as an impressive slate of industry panels and a near-endless list of parties. Where to begin? Although this story is by no means definitive, here are some promising highlights from the 2022 Americanafest daily schedule.
Tuesday, September 13
If you’re in town early, come say hello to BGS at Station Inn, where Jason Carter & Friends will take the stage. Doors at 8. Although it’s not open to the public, all conference and festival passholders are welcome. To pick up your pass, you’ll need to swing by City Winery or the Westin (the host hotel) earlier that day. An exploration of East Nashville might also be in order, with The Old Fashioned String Band Throwdown from 6-9 p.m. at Dee’s Country Cocktail Lounge.
Wednesday, September 14
A plethora of panels awaits conference registrants at the Westin, along with a couple of notable interview sessions. The Indigo Girls will be interviewed by NPR Music’s Ann Powers at 10 a.m. (They’ll be honored with a Lifetime Achievement recognition at the Americana Music Honors & Awards later that night too). Stick around for a conversation between Dom Flemons and Asleep at the Wheel’s Ray Benson, presented by WSM’s American Songster Radio. After that, Stax Records’ Al Bell and Deanie Parker will discuss the historic Wattstax festival in 1972.
You can count on BGS for another party as we celebrate our 10-year anniversary with a happy hour at City Winery Lounge from 3 – 5 p.m. Conference and festival passholders welcome. Special performers include Kyshona, Rainbow Girls, and Willie Watson. And after the awards show, there’s an abundance of awesome shows to consider, including a rare solo set by Angel Olsen (our BGS Artist of the Month in August) at Riverside Revival, a set from Bill Monroe acolyte Mike Compton and a surprise headliner at Station Inn, and an acoustic showcase from members of North Mississippi Allstars at Analog at Hutton Hotel immediately followed by Texas great Joshua Ray Walker.
Thursday, September 15
One of the most intriguing panels on Thursday is titled The Narrators: How Jake Blount, Leyla McCalla and Kaia Kater Re-Mapped the Past, Present and Future With Concept Albums. As the Americanafest app points out, all three artists are students of musical and cultural traditions, as well as Black banjo players. The conversation takes place at noon with moderator Jewly Hight. Coincidentally, these three performers are showcasing at the exact same time later that night, so here’s your chance to catch them all at once.
Ishkōdé Records will celebrate Indigenous voices from Turtle Island at Dee’s Country Cocktail Lounge from 1-4 p.m., with performers such as Amanda Rheaume, Aysanabee, Digging Roots and Evan Redsky. If you’re lucky enough to get into the Bluebird Cafe for a 6 p.m. show, you can enjoy a songwriting round with Gabe Lee, Tristan Bushman and British artist Lauren Housley. A Tribute to Levon Helm with an all-star cast closes out the night at 3rd & Lindsley, following an evening of music with Arkansas roots.
Several of the most buzzed-about showcases of AMERICANAFEST will take place at the Basement East, with a strong lineup boasting Rissi Palmer, Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway, Trousdale, Bre Kennedy and Jade Bird. If you’re up for bluegrass, the City Winery Lounge lineup includes Tammy Rogers & Thomm Jutz alongside rising talent like the Tray Wellington Band and Troubadour Blue. If honky-tonk is more your style, stay up late for Jesse Daniel at 6th & Peabody, with original music that pays homage to the Bakersfield Sound without losing its contemporary appeal.
Friday, September 16
Diversity is a common theme on Friday’s daytime events, with panels like Booking With Intent: How Curating the Stage Impacts Industry Diversity and How Americana Music Is Embracing Minority Representation. Of particular note, British artist Lady Nade speaks on the influence of Black music in country and Americana in a panel titled You Can’t Be What You Can’t See: Why Representation Is Vital for the Americana Genre. Look for a conversation and performance at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum at noon with rising artists from the Black Opry Revue.
To list all the parties on Friday would take up this whole page. To socialize, you’ve got options ranging from songwriting rounds to label parties to multiple happy hours. (If you’re a craft beer drinker who loves to linger on the deck, it’s worth a visit to Tennessee Brew Works, where Hear Fort Worth is setting up shop.) As for BGS, you’ll find us at the Basement for a party presented with Nettwerk Records and Taylor Guitars. The public may RSVP through the invitation below.
This might be a good time to mention one of the festival’s new venues, The Well at Koinonia. This cozy coffee shop on Music Row played a crucial role in the development of contemporary Christian music, once lending its small stage to a then-unknown Amy Grant. For AMERICANAFEST, it’s providing a listening room environment for a number of quieter artists who still deserve to be heard, such as Nashville songwriter-producer Alex Wong, award-winning acoustic guitarist Christie Lenée, mesmerizing folk duo Ordinary Elephant, Australian troubadour Colin Lillie, and the accomplished Mexican-American musician Lisa Morales on Friday night. If you’re interested in early shows (starting at 6 p.m.), easy parking, and/or enjoying music in a non-alcoholic environment, make an effort to get refueled here.
Not far away lies one of Nashville’s musical landmarks, The Basement (a.k.a. “The Basement O.G.”), and if you’re in town to discover some overlooked voices, this might be an ideal spot to start. Drawing on blues and rock, Chicago musician Nathan Graham is making his AMERICANAFEST debut this year, followed by Southern slide guitarist-songwriter Michelle Malone, who’s touring behind new material like “Not Who I Used to Be.” At Exit/In at 9 p.m., Michigan Rattlers are among Americana music’s best storytellers, with a vibe that’s kind of brooding but still has some rock ‘n’ roll swagger. Hang around for 49 Winchester, a Virginia ensemble that’s been DIY for most of its career. However, 2022’s Fortune Favors the Bold is garnering some much-deserved attention. Listen closely for the Exit/In reference in standout track, “Damn Darlin’.”
For something more mellow, you can zoom over to City Winery for a late set by Milk Carton Kids. It wouldn’t even feel like AMERICANAFEST without seeing these guys. Earlier in the evening, longtime festival favorite Ruston Kelly will play alongside his dad, Tim Kelly, performing exquisite songs that they recorded together (with Ruston serving as producer). Gaby Moreno, Henry Wagons and Rainbow Girls are also on the well-rounded bill. Go ahead, order a bottle.
Saturday, September 17
By the time the weekend arrives, the panels have wrapped and the parties are well underway. You can peruse the Americanafest app for all the options, but first, settle in at City Winery for the Thirty Tigers Gospel Brunch from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. (It’s on Saturday this year, rather than Sunday.) Artists appearing include Alisa Amador, Brent Cobb, Emily Scott Robinson, Stephanie Lambring, The Fairfield Four and The McCrary Sisters. Musicians Corner in Centennial Park also features free afternoon sets from Nashville mainstay Josh Rouse, Brooklyn’s own Bandits on the Run, Los Angeles songwriter Chris Pierce, Canadian banjo player Ryland Moranz, and more.
Over at The 5 Spot, Alabama bluesman Early James anchors a lineup with Theo Lawrence (a French songwriter-guitarist who opened dates for Robert Plant and Alison Krauss in Europe), Canadian musician Megan Nash, and new ATO Records signing Honey Harper. The night concludes with an 11 p.m. showcase titled Luke Schneider & Friends: A Pedal Steel Showcase. For something similarly atmospheric, consider a one-night-only event, Phosphorescent Performing Songs From the Full Moon Project, also at 11 p.m. at Brooklyn Bowl. He’s promising to play more songs than just the covers he’s chosen for this unique album, so you can bask in the afterglow of an incredible week of music.
For more information about these events and countless more, visit AMERICANAFEST.COM.
Artists featured at top (L-R): Phosphorescent, Molly Tuttle, Dom Flemons, Angel Olsen
“I come to this project as a musicology outsider,” says Lukas Huffman, the writer and director of the short film, Night Music. As he became passionate about the field recordings made by John and Alan Lomax in the 1930s, a cinematic idea began to take shape. Wisely, Huffman sought guidance from an expert: Dom Flemons, also known as the American Songster.
As Flemons tells BGS, “Having spent the better part of twenty years performing and reimagining the songs collected by the Lomaxes in the field, I knew that I could help guide the film and curate the soundtrack accordingly.”
One of the most important and enduring bodies of work in the folk music realm, the Lomax field recordings have captured the imagination of listeners for generations and preserved countless voices and songs that would have otherwise been lost to history. However, by taking an unexpected approach to the script, Night Music allows longtime enthusiasts to approach the familiar narrative in a new way.
“We have chosen to tell a story that explores the racial tension inherent in the recording interactions,” Huffman explains. “From a contemporary perspective, considering the power inequality of these interactions helps to mature our understanding of music history. More importantly, focusing on the situation of the musician allows a deeper listening and feeling of the actual music on record. I’ve been surprised by how unsettling it is for audiences to experience this tension for themselves as we show the recreated scenes. The tension in the audience is palpable. This speaks to the power of cinema and the unresolved problems in the history of field recordings.”
After viewing Night Music below, read our BGS interview with Huffman and Flemons.
BGS: How did you first learn about John and Alan Lomax’s 1930s prison recordings?
Lukas Huffman: Around 2009, I stumbled on some of Alan’s Prison Songs CDs from the collection he recorded in Parchman Penitentiary. I found them in the Columbia University library when I was a student there. I did not have a CD player at the time and would sit in the library and listen. When I first heard the songs it was like a bolt of lightning. The hair on my neck stood up and they shot right through me. From there I went both back in time and forward in time through John and Alan Lomaxes discography.
Dom Flemons: I was first introduced to the work of John and Alan Lomax through the public library. When I first became interested in folk music, I made sure the early Library of Congress field recordings of Lead Belly and Woody Guthrie were staples within my collection. As I began to spend more time listening to the music of the 1960s folk revival, I found the name Alan Lomax mentioned again and again on any number of albums and publications. After a while, I decided to look up a few books on Alan Lomax and found not just one but many books written by the famed folklorist spanning from Mister Jelly Roll, his treatise on jazz pioneer Jelly Roll Morton to his later works on Cantometrics and Choreometrics. Alan believed that folk culture must be distributed on stage, on the air and in the classroom. In the 21st century, the need for folk culture to be portrayed as fair and accurately as possible on film is more necessary than ever. If it is not, it’s only a commercialized and watered down version of the real thing. Alan spent his whole career making sure the public had access to the “real thing,” as unfiltered and as human as the experiences that produced it.
I found the work of his father John A. Lomax to be much more challenging. One of the reasons for this was that John’s work was much more calculated and stoic in nature. While Alan’s work was based on the voice of his informant, John’s work was built on the composite literature of the anonymous “folk.” For Alan, the storyteller was always seen as a self-contained cultural librarian of sorts while John used the story teller as a means to get to the broader cultural message, a bigger communal story might convey. As a person who came of age in the 21st century, it was clear to me that both men were products of their time and their views on race, politics and social discourse were very different from my own. While I did not agree with everything they wrote or said about the music they collected, like most people, I could not deny the beauty of the music they documented for future generations.
David Patrick Kelly as musicologist John Lomax
What is it about those recordings that captivated you, and inspired you to make a film?
Huffman: Listening to the recording instantly transported me through time and into a place of tension. You can hear the humanity in the lyrics of the song, but even more so in the voices. I had (and still have) a visceral reaction to the music. Literally in my stomach and chest. As a filmmaker, when I get that feeling, I know there’s a creative potential to do something meaningful. That led me to researching the Lomaxes and ask, who are the guys making these recordings during this time — and what are their transactions like with the musicians? Within a small amount of research I knew there was a story here, which turned out to be an untold story.
I wrote a feature-length script set in 1933 that focuses on John and Alan’s first recording trip together. In real life that trip was a father-son road trip through the South. It was Alan’s first taste of life as a field recordist. John was already an established musicologist at this time, but it was his first time focusing on incarcerated African American musicians. These recordings would go on to be some of the most important music documentation of all time. The short film, Night Music, that is being released now is an excerpt from the feature. I took some scenes from the longer version and reworked them so they can tell a powerful, small story about the Lomaxes and their work.
Flemons: The first thing that drew me to these recordings was the hypnotic quality of the songs. As most song performances are made on a stage for the benefit of a paying audience, these performances were made by men singing for their own survival. As an African American person interested in the continuity of music in my own community, I could not help but think of the subversive nature of the lyrics which brings up a thin but poignant link to modern day hip-hop. These men are not rappers, but like rappers they are using pieces of the song tradition to create a platform for lyrical improvisation. Not unlike a musical “hook” as heard in most hip-hop songs, the polyphonic singing of the prison group sets the stage for the “lead” man to tell his tale of woes whether it is a story about himself, his relationship with his family or a woman, or a passive aggressive jab at the very prison guards no more than a few feet from him, standing at gunpoint.
Manny Dunn as Walter Richardson, with Michael Potts as Father Dobie
Listening back to these recordings and understanding that the Lomaxes had limited supplies and resources to create this unique documentation made me see the brilliance of their work as folklorists. While in one way it is easy to question the intentions of the documentarians, it made me think of the world these unfortunate individuals experienced. No one cared about the songs they created for their own personal enjoyment. John and Alan Lomax, taking an anthropological approach to “Negro Folk Songs” captured performances that would have otherwise evaporated into thin air, never to be heard again. In a world dominated by three decades of strict segregation, the Lomaxes dared to say that the homegrown music of the African American community was just as important and “American” as the most high brow Euro-classical music of the day. They dared to present a style of music that could be documented for future generations paving the way for a much more informed and authentic “black folk music” aesthetic.
How did Dom Flemons get involved? What special qualities did he bring to the piece?
Huffman: I tracked down Dom because his musical career embodies the story of Night Music. He works to engage with the musical legacy of African American traditional and roots musicians. His perspective as a musician and Lomax scholar has been crucial in shaping the voices of the musicians in our story. There has been a lot of non-fiction storytelling around the Lomax legacy, which follows their perspective from experience to experience. I was interested in learning what the musicians in penitentiaries are feeling in the scenes before — and after — they record with the Lomaxes.
Dom understands, as much as anybody can, this perspective. He’s been instrumental in offering script feedback. In pre-production of the short film, Dom did singing rehearsals with Manny Dunn and Michael Potts, who play the prisoners. Dom gave some historical context about what the prisoners are bringing to their singing. Song was a form of spiritual communion, subversive resistance against the prison wardens, and emotional release. Each song has its own purpose in their daily life and there’s an emotional nuance for how it would have been vocalized. I think that getting these performance details right are so important if we want to help people reengage in an authentic way with the Lomax recordings.
David Patrick Kelly as musicologist John Lomax, pictured with Manny Dunn and Michael Potts.
Flemons: When I received my first message from Lukas Huffman, I was instantly drawn to his approach to the film. It is almost impossible to imagine what John and Alan Lomax experienced on the road during their early field recording sessions. It’s even harder to fathom the subtlety required to capture and document the songs of the forgotten. The environment was never ideal, the recording technology was temperamental and primitive and the discs which captured the audio were fragile and brittle.
When I began to work with actors Manny Dunn and Michael Potts, I wanted for them to understand the subtlety of the performers they were portraying and the context of their performances. The “subjects” are prisoners who have been pulled out of the fields where they are being worked like literal slaves. They do not know who these “men from the government” are and they do not have a full concept of why they would want to capture their music. Many had not even seen a recording machine before. Also the tension of racial violence and injustice is so mind-numbing these men have to appease both the folklorists and the prison guards while still retaining some sense of their own dignity. Their songs are their armor. Both actors as men of color understood that the situation was a precarious balancing act between taking pride in one’s own self and making the “boss” happy.
There are several perspectives to consider. In a situation where racial prejudice is one of the dominating features, there are expectations. The Lomaxes expect a song. The prisoners, hoping that their song goes back to Washington, expect freedom. The warden expects no trouble, from the Lomaxes or the prisoners before or after the recording session. All parties have very outlooks on life and the music being made. They all contributed to our national identity because the records are now a part of the Library of Congress in the American Folklife Center.
Luke Slattery as Alan Lomax, with David Patrick Kelly as John Lomax
What did you enjoy the most about creating this film?
Huffman: One of the reasons I’ve wanted to make the feature and short film is so that I can make it my job to be saturated in this music and surround myself with musicians. I have fallen in love with the John and Alan Lomax characters, so I enjoy being with them on their fictional character development. But, the unique pleasures of this film comes from listening to the music of these prisoners in the research and then experiencing the performers sing the traditional songs in real life, on set. When we were filming the singing sequences Manny and Michael knocked it out of the park. They did such justice to the power and beauty of the original pieces of music. When we’d do those takes everybody on set, cast and crew, would be drawn into the singing.
Flemons: What I have enjoyed the most about Night Music is that it is the first time the folkloric work of the Lomaxes has been given a full dramatic treatment. The musicians recorded by the Lomaxes were not professionals in the modern sense of the word. Alan Lomax always attested that the main purpose of he and his father’s early work was to empower disenfranchised people by giving them the means to hear themselves playing out of a loudspeaker. This single moment changed everything for these musicians who were now given a sense of pride and worth in their own songs in a world where no one would look twice at them or their music. Any number of musicians from Lead Belly, Muddy Waters to Pete Seeger were inspired by the Lomax’s recording machine and their recordings. The early prison recordings only emphasize this dynamic even more so as the prisoners documented in these acetate discs would never hear nor see the legacy that their contributions left behind. It is our job as the makers of this film to make sure that Night Music is a combination of brilliant music and a revealing portrayal of the people and the moments that created it.
Photo Credit: Clay Rodriguez
Festival Screenings and Awards Breckenridge Film Festival, CO – Winner, Best Short Narrative & Best Editing SCAD Savannah Film Festival, GA Lake Country Film Festival, IL SFIndie Fest Decibels Film Festival, CA Cinema on the Bayou, LA Made Here Film Festival, VT
Cast & Crew Credits Written & Directed by: Lukas Huffman Starring: David Patrick Kelly, Michael Potts, Kevin Breznahan, Luke Slattery, Manny Dunn Produced by: Anthony Santos Casting Director: Kate Geller Musical Director: Dom Flemons Director of Photography: Michael Belcher Production Designer: Ambika Subra Editor: Lukas Huffman Composer: Ryder McNair Colorist: Alexia Salingaros Finishing Services: Ancillary Post Executive Producer: Huffman Studio, Inc.
In Their Words: “I wrote ‘Steel Pony Blues’ after reading The Life and Adventures of Nat Love, an autobiography written by the famous black cowboy Nat Love in 1907. Born into slavery in 1854, Nat Love left his native Tennessee for Holbrook, Arizona, following Emancipation and began working as a cowboy on the range. He became known as ‘Deadwood Dick’ after demonstrating his skill at shooting, riding and roping at a cowboy contest in the Hills of South Dakota. The name ‘Deadwood Dick’ would go on to gain legendary status in dime novels, eventually discarding the real legend and the man with it. This prompted Love to write his own book about his own life and adventures claiming each word to be the honest truth.
“By 1890, Nat Love would become a railroad porter on the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad continuing to ride the range on a ‘steel pony.’ I became intrigued by Nat Love’s life story and it opened my eyes to an aspect of my own family story based in Northern Arizona. My paternal grandparents migrated from East Texas and Arkansas to Northern Arizona in a similar manner to Nat Love. They were driven by the same desire for a better life than the one that could be found on the farm. In the last verse, I say ‘They call Mr. Flemons, cause I done tore that guitar down,’ which is a sentiment of the progress that I have seen in my own lifetime being two generations removed from the farm, having now traveled the world performing American roots music that reflect my cultural values of movement and progress.
“I chose this song for the Americana Railroad album because it presents the image of working class Pullman porters, like Nat Love, who used their freedom to forge their own destiny on the technological marvel of their time: the train. This is a powerful collection of songs and I’m glad to be a part of it.” — Dom Flemons, The American Songster
Known as the Gate City, Greensboro, North Carolina is a transitional town: hub of the Piedmont between the mountain high country to the west and coastal Sandhill Plains to the east, and a city defined by the people who have come, gone, and passed through over the years. As a crossroads location, it has long been a way station for many endeavors, including touring musicians – from the likes of the Rolling Stones and Jimi Hendrix at the Greensboro Coliseum, the state’s largest indoor arena, to James Brown and Otis Redding at clubs like the El Rocco on the Chitlin’ Circuit. Throw in the country and string band influences from the textile mill towns in the area, and the regional style of the Piedmont blues, and you’ve got yourself quite the musical melting pot.
This historical mixture was not lost on one of Greensboro’s own, Rhiannon Giddens – one of modern day Americana’s ultimate crossover artists. A child of black and white parents, she grew up in the area hearing folk and country music, participating in music programs in local public schools, and eventually going on to study opera at Oberlin Conservatory in Ohio. Once she returned to North Carolina and came under the study of fiddler Joe Thompson and the Black string band tradition, she began playing folk music and forged an artistic identity steeped in classical as well as vernacular music. In this episode of Carolina Calling, we spoke with Giddens about her background in Greensboro and how growing up mixed and immersed in various cultures, in a city so informed by its history of segregation and status as a key civil rights battleground, informed her artistic interests and endeavors, musical styles, and her mission in the music industry.
Subscribe to Carolina Calling on any and all podcast platforms to follow along as we journey across the Old North State, visiting towns like Durham, Wilmington, Shelby, and more.
Music featured in this episode:
Rhiannon Giddens – “Black is the Color” Andrew Marlin – “Erie Fiddler” Carolina Chocolate Drops – “Cornbread and Butterbeans” The Rolling Stones – “Rocks Off” Count Basie and His Orchestra – “Honeysuckle Rose” Roy Harvey – “Blue Eyes” Blind Boy Fuller – “Step It Up and Go” Rhiannon Giddens, Francesco Turrisi – “Avalon” Carolina Chocolate Drops – “Snowden’s Jig (Genuine Negro Jig)” Barbara Lewis -“Hello Stranger” The O’Kaysions – “Girl Watcher” Joe and Odell Thompson – “Donna Got a Rambling Mind” Carolina Chocolate Drops – “Country Girl” Carolina Chocolate Drops – “Hit ‘Em Up Style” Our Native Daughters – “Moon Meets the Sun” Rhiannon Giddens, Francesco Turrisi – “Si Dolce é’l Tormento”
BGS is proud to produce Carolina Calling in partnership with Come Hear NC, a campaign from the North Carolina Department of Natural & Cultural Resources designed to celebrate North Carolinians’ contribution to the canon of American music.
Photo Credit: Ebru Yildiz
Enter to win a prize bundle featuring a signed copy of author and Carolina Calling host David Menconi’s ‘Step It Up and Go: The Story of North Carolina Music,’ BGS Merch, and surprises from our friends at Come Hear North Carolina.
Artist:Paula Boggs Band Hometown: Seattle, Washington Song: “King Brewster” (ft. Dom Flemons) Album:Janus Release Date: April 1, 2022
In Their Words: “This true story is about my enslaved-then-emancipated ancestor. I knew nothing about King Brewster before Covid and his story inspires me to learn more about my people. When I shared the lyrics with Dom Flemons, he responded by saying, ‘Every line you’ve written Paula is poetry.’ I’m so grateful Dom joined us on this song. In addition to singing he’s playing banjo, bones and jug.” — Paula Boggs
At BGS, we firmly believe that Black history is American roots music history. Full stop.
Last year, following the extrajudicial murder of George Floyd and the civil unrest, protests, and rebellions against racial injustice and systemic inequality in this country, we realized that that belief wasn’t present enough in our daily content and editorial. We knew that it needed to be overt, expressed within every aspect of what we do.
Which is why this month, we’ve invited you to celebrate Black History Month as we always do, by denoting that celebrating Black contributions in bluegrass, country, and old-time — and roots music as a whole — requires centering Black creators, artists, musicians, and perspectives in our community daily, not just in February. (Though, for the entire month we’ve been sharing music, stories, and songs featuring Black artists every day, too!)
In the past year we’ve recommitted ourselves to fully incorporating Black Voices into everything we do and we hope that our readers and listeners, our followers and fans, and our family of artists constantly celebrate, acknowledge, and pay credit to Blackness and Black folks, who we have to thank for everything we love about American roots music. To bid adieu to Black History Month 2021, we’re spotlighting Black artists who have graced our pages in the last year in a two-part roundup.
Fresh off of an appearance at President Biden’s inauguration, Grammy nominees Black Pumas are our current Artist of the Month honorees, but they aren’t the only ones to hold down our most prestigious monthly series and editorial spotlight. Drawing on folk songwriting as much as soul groove, both men agree that the term “American Roots” fits their sound well. The Americana Music Association seconds that notion, as the duo picked up that organization’s Emerging Act of the Year award in late 2020.
Modern blues legend Shemekia Copeland was our Artist of the Month in November, when we celebrated her latest release, Uncivil War from Alligator Records. The song sequence offers quite a few topical numbers ranging from gun rights (“Apple Pie and a .45”) to LGBT affirmation (“She Don’t Wear Pink”). But a standout is certainly the title track, Copeland’s most bluegrassy foray yet, which features Sam Bush and Jerry Douglas
Song-interpreter extraordinaire Bettye LaVette held down the AOTM post in August, reminding us of the value of persistence, perseverance, and perspective – especially by Black women. Her interpretation of the ubiquitous “Blackbird” recalls the fact that Paul McCartney wrote the song about a Black woman (as British slang refers to a girl as a “bird”). In LaVette’s rendition, though, she is the one who’s been waiting… and waiting… and waiting for this moment to arrive. And, in a specific allusion to this moment in history, to be free.
On the Cover
Both country & western crooner Charley Crockett and old-time banjoist, fiddler, and ethnomusicologist Jake Blount graced our digital covers in the past year, demonstrating the width, depth, and breadth of Black contributions to American roots music across the country and drawing from various regions and traditions.
In our interview and on his most recent release, Crockett doesn’t just reckon with the current historical moment. With Welcome to Hard Times, which is comprised of 13 tracks of searing anguish set to slick, ’60s-style, country-western production, he’s also examining his own place in this moment, and how his music has a different impact with different audiences. Even as he — a man living somewhere between Black and white, privileged and not — feels that his message is obvious.
Queer old-time musician and scholar Jake Blount is intimately familiar with the history of Black artists in the twentieth century who spoke out against white supremacy and often paid for it with their lives. He sees his music — and his most recent album, Spider Tales — within that subversive, radical lineage, and rightly so. A critically acclaimed project that landed on seemingly dozens of year-end lists in 2020, Blount’s carefully curated tunes convey that racial inequality in this country is a long, self-feeding cycle and this current iteration of the civil rights movement was neither surprising nor unpredictable. In a year defined by music created in response to current events or simply passively shaped by them, Blount’s Spider Tales stands out, an example of action rather than reaction.
Last week, we celebrated the grand opening of the National Museum of African American Music in Nashville with a feature that explores the ways Music City has always been a major player in the African American music world — from the days of the Fisk Jubilee Singers to radio station WLAC breaking R&B, soul, and blues hits, and the Jefferson Street nightclub scene providing both valuable training for emerging artists and a vital showcase for established ones. The 56,000-square-foot museum, something of a musical equivalent to the the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington D.C. (definitely with the same level of visual splendor and attractiveness) is a testament to the Black, African American, and Afro contributions that have touched, impacted, and influenced every sphere of American pop culture and art.The striking marquee of the National Museum of African American Music in Nashville, TN
The BGS Podcast Network
Over the course of the past year, the BGS Podcast Network has been proud to feature many Black artists over our shows about bluegrass, Americana, touring, wellness, and of course, music. On Harmonics season one, three Black women joined host Beth Behrs to talk about living through so much stress and tumult and how self-care, wellness, and music are all woven so tightly together.
Country singer and 2020 breakout star Mickey Guyton (who, for the record, has been a recording artist for more than a decade despite her recent meteoric rise) appeared on Episode 3, talking about writing “Black Like Me” — a song about her pain and struggles growing up as a Black woman in America — amidst the protests against police brutality across the nation. They also discuss country artists speaking out against racism and injustice, the power and importance of “three chords and the truth” in the midst of Music Row fluff, lifting other women up as a form of therapy, and, of course, Dolly Parton.
Two of Behrs’ closest friends, sisters Tichina & Zenay Arnold also appeared on the show. Tichina, Behr’s co-star on CBS’s The Neighborhood, and her sister are something like spiritual coaches for Beth. The three discuss the spirituality of music and the musicality of comedy, the timeliness of The Neighborhood as well as the pure spirit on the set, the absolutely necessity of open conversation in active anti-racism, balancing professional and familial relationships, and much more.
Finally, Birds of Chicago frontwoman and multi-instrumentalist Allison Russell decided to dig deep into her childhood traumas, the healing power of music and artistic community, the history of the banjo, and the intersectionality of the honest conversations in our culture on her episode of Harmonics. In addition to her career with Birds of Chicago, Russell is one quarter of the supergroup Our Native Daughters, with Rhiannon Giddens, Amythyst Kiah, and Leyla McCalla, and is preparing to release her first solo album.
On The Show On The Road, host Z. Lupetin curated a special episode last summer featuring clips and snippets from past editions of the show featuring Sunny War, Bobby Rush, Dom Flemons, and more. As he put it, “I’ve been lucky to talk with truly amazing Black artists, songwriters, and performers in the two years I’ve been creating The Show on the Road. I ask you to go back into our archives and listen to these voices.”
Later in the season, SOTR episodes featured Leyla McCalla — a talented, multilingual cellist, banjoist, and singer-songwriter and member of Our Native Daughters — and a special podcast swap with Under The Radar featuring truly fantastic Oakland-based artist, Fantastic Negrito. And just a couple of weeks ago, the show dropped an episode honoring Black History Month, featuring an interview with Jimmy Carter and Ricky McKinnie of the legendary Blind Boys of Alabama.
Plus, on the String, Craig Havighurst interviewed new lead singer for the Time Jumpers, Wendy Moten, and southern Gothic poet, songwriter, and Americana-blues wizard Adia Victoria.
And, not to be left out, the BGS Radio Hour always includes music, premieres, and features of Black artists every week, as we round-up the best stories from our pages to include on the airwaves. Like this week, Allison Russell’s Sade cover and Valerie June’s cosmic new single, “Call Me a Fool” — which features Stax soul legend Carla Thomas — both appear on the show. And, on Episode 194, Chris Pierce, our Whiskey Sour Happy Hour friend Ben Harper, and Charley Crockett all make the playlist as well.
Shout & Shine
Our annual IBMA showcase celebrating representation and diversity in 2020 focused entirely on Black performers, building upon our collaboration with PineCone, who co-presents the event each year. Brandi Pace of Decolonizing the Music Room curated the lineup, showing our audience how seamlessly our missions intersect and build off of each other. The showcase lineup included Rissi Palmer, Tray Wellington, Stephanie Anne Johnson, Jerron “Blind Boy” Paxton, and more, drawing a direct line between Black musicians and bluegrass while highlighting the important role Black folks played in the genre’s creation as well as influencing all of its contemporary forms.
To build on this intention, we retooled our monthly column version of Shout & Shine as well, turning the interview series into a regular livestream event. Sponsored by Preston Thompson Guitars, each episode includes thirty-plus minutes of exclusive performances by Lizzie No, Sunny War, Julian Taylor, and Jackie Venson with more to come. Each set of music — and each interview as well — reinforces just how vibrant and varied roots music created by Black musicians and songwriters can be and just how valuable the perspectives and lived experiences of all kinds of people are to our communities.
Photo credit (L to R): Shemekia Copeland by Mike White; Rissi Palmer courtesy of the artist; Bettye LaVette by Joseph A. Rosen; and Mickey Guyton by Chelsea Thompson.
The O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack, which was just starting to pick up momentum twenty years ago this winter, was both a forethought and an afterthought. The Coen Brothers had an idea for a film and even a title borrowed from Preston Sturges’ 1940 comedy, Sullivan’s Travels, but no screenplay. They commissioned T Bone Burnett to assemble a sprawling playlist of old-time music for them to use as writing prompts — original recordings from the first half of the twentieth century as well as new recordings of old songs. He gathered some of the finest vocalists and players, including Emmylou Harris, Gillian Welch, Alison Krauss, and members of Union Station, as well as Norman Blake, Sam Bush, and John Hartford. In various combinations they produced around sixty tracks covering hillbilly plaints, gospel numbers, Protestant hymns, children’s songs, labor songs, even prison songs.
From that pool the Coens selected a handful of tracks that served as the skeleton for their screenplay, which became a Deep South retelling of The Odyssey. As three yokel chain-gang fugitives wander the backwoods and cotton fields and gravel roads of Depression-era Mississippi, they inadvertently become country stars thanks to a hasty version of “Man of Constant Sorrow,” originally recorded in 1917 by Dick Burnett and re-recorded for the film by Dan Tyminski. Along the way they encounter a parade of white-clad Christians singing “Down to the River to Pray,” a blues singer who regales them with a campfire rendition of Skip James’ “Hard Time Killing Floor,” and a KKK klavern performing a Busby Berkley routine in white sheets and hoods.
Whittled down to eighteen tracks, the soundtrack hit stores just a few weeks before the film, and it seemed designed to stand alone as an upscale release. As Luke Lewis, formerly chairman/CEO of Universal Nashville, told Billboard in 2015: “When we were putting it together, a bunch of us said, ‘This is probably going to be a coffee table kind of a CD, where people will leave it around and be proud to have it.’ That turned out to be pretty much true… A lot of people that don’t buy records at all, or buy one a year, bought that record.”
Still, no one figured it would sell any more copies than your typical soundtrack, and certainly no one predicted it would so completely eclipse the film. Its success has been astounding: It has sold nearly 9 million copies, hung around the upper reaches of the Billboard Top 200 for several years, won the Grammy for Album of the Year (beating out Bob Dylan and Outkast, among others), spun off a sequel, inspired a series of tours and live albums, and redefined a massive market for traditional music in America.
Twenty years later, the gulf separating film and soundtrack remains remarkably wide. The former is glib to the point of nihilism, as though every line of dialogue and every camera angle is surrounded by quote marks. The soundtrack, by contrast, is sincere to the point of evangelism, as though these old songs were pieces of secular scripture. The music plays everything straight, while the film can’t keep a straight face. The soundtrack became a phenomenon, while the film sits in the lower tiers of its auteurs’ sprawling catalog.
Both are products of a very particular time: They were released during that short window between two defining events — the hand-wringing spectacle of Y2K and the horrific televised tragedy of 9/11. With the benefit of twenty years’ hindsight, they represent a pop-cultural pivot from the irony that defined the 1990s and much of the Coens’ output to the “New Sincerity” that defined the 2000s.
Why did this niche soundtrack become such a massive hit? Some have credited the popularity of O Brother to fin de siècle jitters and a desire to return to a rosier, more comfortable American past (never mind that the past, especially the 1930s, was never rosy or comfortable). Others have chalked it up to a rejection of the late ’90s pop music excess embodied by Britney Spears and the Backstreet Boys.
Perhaps the best reason for its success is also the most obvious: This is a good album, and an accessible one. It’s a well-curated tour through old-time music, a sampler of rural American traditions that serves as a primer on the subject without sounding like a textbook. All of these different styles are presented with an eloquence that is homespun yet modern: a balance that highlights rather than dampens their charms.
Burnett puts such an emphasis on the human voice that even the instrumental tracks sound a cappella. He wants you to hear the exquisite grain in the voices of Emmylou Harris, Gillian Welch, and Alison Krauss on “Didn’t Leave Nobody But the Baby” as well as the weight pressing on Chris Thomas King as he moans through “Hard Time Killing Floor.” Curiously, Dr. Ralph Stanley had to convince the producer to let him sing “Oh Death” without banjo, which was absolutely the right call. His voice is high and keening, a serious a death, shaken by the very subject he’s singing about.
If there’s a breakout song on O Brother — something resembling a hit — it was this very intense performance, which remains one of the finest renditions of this very odd and oft-covered song. Stanley was 73 years old when the album was released, had been playing since 1946, and was already celebrated as one of the fathers of bluegrass, but O Brother gave his career a considerable boost, introducing him to a significantly wider audience. (That said, it always struck me as deeply disrespectful that the Coens have a Klansman lip-synching Stanley’s performance in the film, as though they feared the words might actually mean something.)
Stanley performed the song a cappella at the 2002 Grammys — imagine anything a cappella at such a glitz-bound ceremony — not long before the soundtrack won Album of the Year. It might have been the climax of the soundtrack’s shelf life, but it kept selling and kept selling. It created an instant audience for old-time music, and upstart string-bands found themselves with readymade audiences, many of them shouting “Man of Constant Sorrow” the way they once might have yelled “Free Bird!” Every artist on the album got a boost, especially Alison Krauss & Union Station, who crossed over from bluegrass to pop and launched a series of hit records with the aptly titled New Favorite in August 2001. Similarly, Welch, Harris, and even Stanley enjoyed boosts in album and ticket sales in the wake of O Brother.
As with any sweeping change, there are new opportunities as well as new losses. The alt-country acts of the 1990s had already lost much of their luster, but roots suddenly had no room for punk anymore. Gone were the dark, twangy experiments like Daniel Lanois’s Americana trilogy — Harris’ Wrecking Ball in 1996, followed by Bob Dylan’s Time Out of Mind the next year and Willie Nelson’s Teatro the year after that. All three proved that roots music could accommodate new sounds, that it could look to the future without completely letting go of the past, and all three stand among the best entries in their artists’ remarkable catalogs.
But O Brother seemed to wipe most of those new avenues away, turning roots music into something largely acoustic, uniform, polite, conservative — beholden to the past and largely dismissive of the present. Watching certain acts riding that wave was like watching Civil War reenactors march on a makeshift battlefield, and ten years later groups like Mumford & Sons and the Lumineers were using roots music to sell arena-size sentiments.
Another aspect of old-time lost in the O Brother wave: politics. Previous folk revivals had a populist bent, extolling the music as the sound of the people and as an expression of a specifically American community. Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger were branded subversives and communists, while Dylan and his early ‘60s cohort found radical possibilities in Harry Smith’s legendary Anthology of American Folk Music. But no one on O Brother is in any danger of being branded a pinko. The film itself nods to issues of race and class, but without really commenting on them in any serious or specific way. The soundtrack, by contrast, foregrounds songs about yearning, about breaking free of turmoil and hardship to find peace and contentment. Often that can be humorous, as on Harry McClintock’s fantastical “Big Rock Candy Mountain,” but more often it’s poignant, as on Krauss and Welch’s “I’ll Fly Away.” It’s a collection more concerned with needs of the spirit than of the flesh, so any earthly implications are largely ignored.
The roots market that sprang up in the soundtrack’s wake was consequently blanched of anything resembling social commentary, despite there being so much to comment on. That wave of bands might have provided a counterpart to the entrenched political conservatism that defined mainstream country music of the early 2000s, but instead it offered merely escapism.
A few artists did manage to question this rosy thinking about the past, in particular the Carolina Chocolate Drops. They traced strains of Black influence, craft, and contribution to old-time music, which is generally considered to be white, and therefore expanded its historical scope and current impact. As players, however, they injected their songs with no small amount of joy, as though taking great delight in what these old forms allowed them to express. The group’s three primary players — Dom Flemons, Rhiannon Giddens, and Justin Robinson — have carried that particular balance into their solo careers.
Any of the soundtrack’s shortcomings weren’t the fault of the musicians, who play and sing these songs much more beautifully and sympathetically than the film ever demanded. Nor is it the fault of the songs themselves, which obviously spoke to people as clearly in 2001 as they did in 1937. And it continues to speak loudly in 2021: The coffee table product wasn’t designed to bear the burden of the market it created, but the songs still inspire subsequent generations well into a new century, with its own tribulations and hardships.
Over the last 10 years, in a series of albums recorded with producers Oliver Wood and Will Kimbrough, Shemekia Copeland has progressed from a first-class blues belter into a wider-ranging, more nuanced artist whose music touches on Americana, rock, and country — and she’s still a first-class blues belter.
In addition to working with Kimbrough on her new album Uncivil War and 2018’s America’s Child, Copeland has recorded with artists like John Prine, Emmylou Harris, and ZZ Top’s Billy Gibbons. In part two of our interview with Copeland, whose father is the late Texas blues great, Johnny Clyde Copeland, we discuss her musical development and the lessons she learned while teaming with these and other unlikely collaborators.
BGS: Over your last four albums, you’ve worked with producers Oliver Wood and Will Kimbrough, mostly in Nashville, and really started to open up the instrumentation and type of songs you’ve recorded. So I have a chicken and the egg question: did you start working differently because you wanted to change, or did you change because you worked with different people in different places?
SC: It happened organically. The first record with Oliver was in Atlanta and then he moved to Nashville, because everybody moves to Nashville, because that’s where musicians and studios are, and it’s inexpensive to work there. Oliver had Will Kimbrough come in and play and I was a big fan of his. When he played on my record, it was love at first note, because he’s just a musical genius.
We did our last record America’s Child with him and he just knows everyone. Nashville is such a small town in that way. All the musicians know, respect, and love each other. Will would say, “So-and-so would sound good on this. Let’s call him,” and within a day they’d have these guys in the studio that you couldn’t imagine working with as a blues artist, because you don’t know them. The gates of Heaven opened up being in Nashville because that’s where everybody is.
How about Oliver Wood?
I love him. He’s a very talented player and writer, and the best thing about him was that he really encouraged me to think about how I sing. I came from the blues shouter way of singing, and from him I learned that you don’t have to do that to move people. That was huge for me, to learn that you can capture people with subtlety just as much as you can capture them with the hugeness of your voice. We had that conversation and I took that away from working with him and have carried it on.
“Uncivil War” is a perfect example. I did not want to sing that song. I thought it was is a pretty song for somebody with a pretty voice to sing. I wanted the world to hear it and figured they would not if it was coming from me, because I don’t have a pretty voice. That’s when they all yelled at me and said I was being completely ridiculous and to just sing the damn song. But I still struggle with thinking that the subtleties of my voice work. I was just using the power of my voice more like a Koko Taylor, or Etta James.
Let’s talk about some of these people you’ve worked with. You did a duet with John Prine on his lesser-known blues song “Great Rain.” Tell me about that.
That happened completely organically, but here in Chicago, though he lived in Nashville. He’s originally from Illinois and we were both on a concert called Voices of Chicago. I was there to represent blues and John was there to represent the fact that he’s just frickin’ amazing. We were backstage and I’m standing there looking at John Prine thinking, “Oh my God, I’m standing here looking at John Prine.” And he looked down at my feet and said, “I love your shoes!” We started talking and I fell in love with his wife, Fiona. Amazing people. We got to talkin’, started working on projects together, and the rest is history. People like him know how to break the ice with people when they’re nervous around them.
How about Emmylou Harris?
That was just a Will Kimbrough connection. I met her a couple times, like in passing at festivals, but her being on “America’s Child” was Will. He plays with her. She heard the song, loved it, and wanted to sing on it, which was beautiful.
Steve Cropper, who produced The Soul Truth (2005), also plays on the new one.
Who doesn’t love Steve Cropper? He wrote all the hit songs that you can think of. I love working with him, loved his energy. We wanted to do something different after the Dr. John record [2002’s Talking to Strangers], so we thought, why not try to get a soulful record? And who better to make a soulful record than Steve Cropper? He also played on all the songs and Steve Cropper plays like Steve Cropper. He has a sound all his own. You know when you’re listening to him.
What about Billy Gibbons?
Billy was a big fan of Johnny Copeland; he went and saw my dad perform all the time when he was a kid. I was hanging out with him in India [at the 2017 Mahindra Blues Festival in Mumbai] and we were talking about all that. I wanted to do “Jesus Just Left Chicago” and John [Hahn, Copeland’s manager] had the bright idea to ask him. I never would have been ballsy enough to do that. Thank God for managers and producers.
I love Rhiannon Giddens on “Smoked Ham and Peaches.”
Yeah, and she sounded amazing on it. Oh, my gosh. I was a big fan of her and Dom Flemons and the Carolina Chocolate Drops! Just a group of interesting, amazing, talented people. But then I saw her perform as a headliner of the Chicago Blues Festival and she was just incredible. I really wanted to work on it and was so happy when she said she was aware of me, and would love to do it.
It’s probably the most acoustic, downhome song you’ve done and a good example of why some people started talking about you and Americana and not just blues.
I’ve always listened to country and bluegrass, even if I didn’t know who I was listening to. I just liked the instrumentation of it and the singers and lyrics. Americana was not on my radar, but I grew up listening to country music because my dad grew up in Texas and loved it. I’d walk around the house singing Patsy Cline and Hank Williams songs that my dad loved, but I hadn’t really even heard anything about the blend of country and roots music until a few years ago, so I think it’s kind of hilarious that people are saying I’m crossing over to Americana. But I welcome all listeners!
Has your audience changed over the course of these last few albums?
Yes, especially since America’s Child, but even going back to [2009’s] Never Going Back, I started getting people at my shows saying stuff like, “You know, I’m not really into blues, but I love what you do.” And I’m like, “Well, if you’re listening to me, then you could probably say you’re into blues. I think you’re more into the blues than you think you are!” I always hoped that I was getting fans that weren’t just blues fans, and I think the audience is growing a little bit for me — at least I hope so!
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