The Lost Town of Mercer and the Bridges at The End of the Road
In December of 1979 or so, my parents had taken me to Jackson, Tennessee for my birthday. We had eaten at the Old English Steak …
entertainment
The Zulus and Rex Uptown on Mardi Gras Morning
I was exhausted enough that I didn’t wake up early on Mardi Gras morning, and I barely stirred when my friend’s wife got the kids …
TBC Brass Band Back at The Hi-Ho Lounge
My love affair with New Orleans brass bands actually began with a disappointment during the Cutting Edge Music Business Conference back in 2010. Hearing of …
Robert Kimbrough and Lady’s Night at The Hut
Authentic blues in an authentic environment is hard to come by these days, and when the Memphis juke joint Wild Bill’s closed in December, it …
Celebrating Women in the Blues at Rust College
Amy Verdon, the New York-based owner of the online magazine Fancy! and its record-label offshoot Go Ape Records has been quite a contributor to the …
Fife and Drum Returns to West Tennessee at the Sleepy John Estes Blues Jam
Although fife and drum bands once were common in West Tennessee, the phenomenon had largely died out by 1980. The Tennessee State Archives created a …
Soulful Sounds of Bird Williams and The Lyric Band at Mr. P’s Hot Wings in Southwind
The nightlife space at 4202 Hacks Cross Road in the Southwind area of Memphis has been through many incarnations, from its opening as The Daq …
Debut of the Lucky 7 Brass Band at Growlers
I got an invitation on Facebook a week or so ago from a musician friend, trombonist Victor Sawyer, to come to the debut performance of …
Akeem Kemp: The Future of the Blues
Sometime before New Year’s Eve, a lady friend had shared a link with me on social media about a young musician named Akeem Kemp who …
A Fife-and-Drum Workshop in Brownsville, Tennessee
Fife and drum music once flourished in West Tennessee, but similar to what happened in Georgia, disappeared rapidly in the 1970’s. The last evidence we …