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A++ story of search for singers' history
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Subject: A++ story of search for singers' history From: Desert Dancer Date: 12 Apr 14 - 12:12 PM The New York Times has a wonderful long multimedia piece online titled, THE BALLAD OF GEESHIE AND ELVIE On the trail of the phantom women who changed American music and then vanished without a trace., by John Jeremiah Sullivan. Here are the opening paragraphs: IN THE WORLD of early-20th-century African-American music and people obsessed by it, who can appear from one angle like a clique of pale and misanthropic scholar-gatherers and from another like a sizable chunk of the human population, there exist no ghosts more vexing than a couple of women identified on three ultrarare records made in 1930 and '31 as Elvie Thomas and Geeshie Wiley. There are musicians as obscure as Wiley and Thomas, and musicians as great, but in none does the Venn diagram of greatness and lostness reveal such vast and bewildering co-extent. In the spring of 1930, in a damp and dimly lit studio, in a small Wisconsin village on the western shore of Lake Michigan, the duo recorded a batch of songs that for more than half a century have been numbered among the masterpieces of prewar American music, in particular two, Elvie's "Motherless Child Blues" and Geeshie's "Last Kind Words Blues," twin Alps of their tiny oeuvre, inspiring essays and novels and films and cover versions, a classical arrangement. As you can see, it's wonderfully written, so even if, like me, you're not a serious blues afficionado, if you have a thing for folk song/singer hunts don't pass this up. There are also many audio and video clips included. ~ Becky in Long Beach |
Subject: RE: A++ story of search for singers' history From: 12-stringer Date: 12 Apr 14 - 01:26 PM Wow. Becky, thanks so much for the link! - Rick in lower Appalachia |
Subject: RE: A++ story of search for singers' history From: Bonnie Shaljean Date: 13 Apr 14 - 05:50 AM Cheers, Becky! It's brilliant that they also give an audio link :-) Related thread here: Geeshie Wiley and Elvie Thomas http://www.mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=154271&messages=6 |
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