Author: Horace Logan
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
ISBN: 9780312206611
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 288

Get Book Here

Book Description

Author: Tracey E. W. Laird
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 019029051X
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 224

Get Book Here

Book Description
On a Saturday night in 1948, Hank Williams stepped onto the stage of the Louisiana Hayride and sang "Lovesick Blues." Up to that point, Williams's yodeling style had been pigeon-holed as hillbilly music, cutting him off from the mainstream of popular music. Taking a chance on this untried artist, the Hayride--a radio "barn dance" or country music variety show like the Grand Ole Opry--not only launched Williams's career, but went on to launch the careers of well-known performers such as Jim Reeves, Webb Pierce, Kitty Wells, Johnny Cash, and Slim Whitman. Broadcast from Shreveport, Louisiana, the local station KWKH's 50,000-watt signal reached listeners in over 28 states and lured them to packed performances of the Hayride's road show. By tracing the dynamic history of the Hayride and its sponsoring station, ethnomusicologist Tracey Laird reveals the critical role that this part of northwestern Louisiana played in the development of both country music and rock and roll. Delving into the past of this Red River city, she probes the vibrant historical, cultural, and social backdrop for its dynamic musical scene. Sitting between the Old South and the West, this one-time frontier town provided an ideal setting for the cross-fertilization of musical styles. The scene was shaped by the region's easy mobility, the presence of a legal "red-light" district from 1903-17, and musical interchanges between blacks and whites, who lived in close proximity and in nearly equal numbers. The region nurtured such varied talents as Huddie Ledbetter, the "king of the twelve-string guitar," and Jimmie Davis, the two term "singing governor" of Louisiana who penned "You Are My Sunshine." Against the backdrop of the colorful history of Shreveport, the unique contribution of this radio barn dance is revealed. Radio shaped musical tastes, and the Hayride's frontier-spirit producers took risks with artists whose reputations may have been shaky or whose styles did not neatly fit musical categories (both Hank Williams and Elvis Presley were rejected by the Opry before they came to Shreveport). The Hayride also served as a training ground for a generation of studio sidemen and producers who steered popular music for decades after the Hayride's final broadcast. While only a few years separated the Hayride appearances of Hank Williams and Elvis Presley--who made his national radio debut on the show in 1954--those years encompassed seismic shifts in the tastes, perceptions, and self-consciousness of American youth. Though the Hayride is often overshadowed by the Grand Ole Opry in country music scholarship, Laird balances the record and reveals how this remarkable show both documented and contributed to a powerful transformation in American popular music.

Author: John Maginnis
Publisher: Pelican Publishing Company, Inc.
ISBN: 9781455616275
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 396

Get Book Here

Book Description
A wild and hilarious odyssey through Louisiana politics. In 1983 Edwin Edwards, one of the most investigated, reviled, and successful figures in American politics was at top form and wanted to be governor again. The politics of the Cajun governor, who ran the state for eight years with equal parts charm and savvy while leading a personal life as freewheeling and uninhibited as his politics, is exposed in all his glory.

Author: Joey Kent
Publisher: Pelican Publishing Company
ISBN: 9781455624454
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Get Book Here

Book Description
This image-laden, entertaining chronology of the Louisiana Hayride radio and stage show is written by the historian and archivist for the venue. The Hayride is credited with introducing the world to Hank Williams, Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, George Jones, and so many others. The author's father ran the show in the 1970s and 1980s.

Author: Horace Logan
Publisher: Macmillan + ORM
ISBN: 1250108748
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 324

Get Book Here

Book Description
In 1948, Horace "Hoss" Logan, a young radio producer in Shreveport, Louisiana, started booking talent for a new weekly music show called the Louisiana Hayride. Performed for a live audience and broadcast nationally over the CBS Radio network, the show became known as the "Cradle of the Stars." In this affectionate memoir, Hoss Logan recalls the Hayride's heyday with behind-the-scenes anecdotes about the dozens of musicians he knew and nurtured, including Johnny Cash, Johnny Horton, George Jones, Willie Nelson, Elvis Presley, Jim Reeves, Kitty Wells, Slim Whitman, Hank Williams, Faron Young, and many more. As producer, emcee, and friend to the Hayride performers, Logan gives us a personal look into musical history - from Hank Williams's ups and downs to the teenage Elvis's first performance on national radio to the ways the Hayride's many emerging stars expanded our idea about what country music could be.

Author: Ron Yule
Publisher: Univ. Press of Mississippi
ISBN: 1604732962
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 363

Get Book Here

Book Description
Louisiana Fiddlers shines light on sixty-two of the bayou state's most accomplished fiddlers of the twentieth century. Author Ron Yule outlines the lives and times of these performers, who represent a multitude of fiddling styles including Cajun, country, western swing, zydeco, bluegrass, Irish, contest fiddling, and blues.Featuring over 150 photographs, this volume provides insight into the fiddlin' grounds of Louisiana. Yule chronicles the musicians' varied appearances from the stage of the Louisiana Hayride, honky tonks, dancehalls, house dances, radio and television, and festivals, to the front porch and other more casual venues. The brief sketches include observations on musical travels, recordings, and family history.Nationally acclaimed fiddlers Harry Choates, Dewey Balfa, Dennis McGee, Michael Doucet, Rufus Thibodeaux, and Hadley Castille share space with relatively unknown masters such as Mastern Brack, Cheese Read, John W. Daniel, and Fred Beavers. Each player has helped shape the region's rich musical tradition.

Author: Tom Aswell
Publisher: Pelican Publishing
ISBN: 1455607835
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 502

Get Book Here

Book Description
An in-depth history of rock and roll's Louisiana roots. Taking the position that rock and roll started in New Orleans in 1947 when Roy Brown recorded "Good Rockin' Tonight," Aswell provides an expansive history of this beloved American music form. By looking at the Louisianan influences of swamp pop, Cajun, zydeco, R&B, rockabilly, country, and blues music, the author explores the way these musical forms gave birth to rock and roll as we know it today.

Author: Joe Gray Taylor
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393243745
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 229

Get Book Here

Book Description
From the earliest colonists through the latest Mardi Gras, Louisiana has had a history as exotic as that of any state. Even its political corruption--extending from French governors for whom office was exploitable property through the "Louisiana Hayride" following the death of Huey Long--seems to have had a glamorous side. Handing the colony of Louisiana back and forth between their empires, the French and Spanish left a legacy that lives in such forms as the architecture of the Vieux Carre and a civil law deriving from the Napoleonic Code. Acadian refugees, German farmers, black slaves and free blacks, along with Italians, Irish, and the "Kaintucks" who helped Andrew Jackson win the Battle of New Orleans added to the state's distinctiveness. Made rich by sugar cane, cotton, and Mississippi River commerce before the Civil War, Louisiana faced poverty afterward. Battles between Bourbon Democrats and Reconstruction Republicans followed, ultimately involving the Custom House Ring and the Knights of the White Camelia. By methods that remain controversial, Huey Long ended "government by gentlemen" with economic transformations other had sought. Gas, oil, and industrialization have additionally "Americanized" the state. Something of Louisiana's historic joie de vivre remains, however, to the gratification of residents and visitors alike; both will enjoy Joe Gray Taylor's telling of the story.

Author: William MacEwen
Publisher: Back Bay Books
ISBN: 0316074632
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 267

Get Book Here

Book Description
- Long considered the last word on Hank Williams, this biography has remained continuously in print since its first publication in 1994.- This new edition has been completely updated and includes many previously unpublished photographs, as well as a complete catalog detailing all the songs Hank Williams ever wrote, even those he never recorded.- Colin Escott is codirector and cowriter of the forth-coming two-hour PBS/BBC television documentary on Hank Williams, set to broadcast in spring 2004, and coauthor of "Hank Williams: Snapshots from the Lost Highway.- HANK WILLIAMS was the third-prize winner of the prestigious Ralph J. Gleason Music Book Award.

Author: George Rodrigue
Publisher: Sterling Publishing Company
ISBN: 1402754086
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 516

Get Book Here

Book Description
"'Blue dog speaks' is the first book to emphasize Rodrigue's witty and insightful titles alongside his works. Both playful and thought-provoking, this beautifully illustrated gift book will delight Blue Dog fans and introduce newcomers to the pop culture phenomenon that is Blue Dog"--Back cover.