Carroline Shines Edwards joins Deb Boykin

This week, blues performer Carroline Shines Edwards joins Deb Boykin to talk about her songwriting, singing, and her work teaching children to sing and play blues music. She discusses growing up with her father, the legendary Johnny Shines and the upcoming Johnny Shines Festival she produces each year in his honor. This special radio series will air every Tuesday at 8:00 to 8:30 P.M., on the Troy University Public Radio Network at:   WTSU 89.9 (Montgomery and Troy) WRWA 88.7 (Dothan) WTJB 91.7 (Columbus and Phenix   City)  This radio series may not be broadcast in your area, but it can be accessed via the Internet at: http://www.arts.alabama.gov/actc/radioserieslist.aspx If you have been listening to, and enjoying this radio series, please send your comments to: barbara.reed@arts.alabama.gov Listen first hand using the link below. MP3 Download/Stream

Steve Grauberger interviewing Kevin Nutt of CaseQuarter Records

Photo by Steve Grauberger This week's program is a rebroadcast of Steve Grauberger interviewing Kevin Nutt of CaseQuarter Records talking about his research on early blues recording artist Ed Bell from Greenville, Alabama. His Tributaries article on the subject can be obtained at Alabamafolklife.org Kevin can be heard weekly, online, at WFMU with his radio program Sinners Crossroads. This special radio series will air every Tuesday at 8:30 to 9:00 P.M., on the Troy University Public Radio Network at: WTSU 89.9 (Montgomery and Troy) WRWA 88.7 (Dothan) WTJB 91.7 (Columbus and Phenix   City)  This radio series may not be broadcast in your area, but it can be accessed via the Internet at: http://www.arts.alabama.gov/actc/radioserieslist.aspx If you have been listening to, and enjoying this radio series, please send your comments to: barbara.reed@arts.alabama.gov Listen first hand using the link below. MP3 Download/Stream

Interviews and Blues music of Johnny Shines.

In this program we feature an edited version of a great Radiovisions production done in the 1990s by Russell Gulley and the Bill Wills Arts Council of Fort Payne, AL. This program features biographical interviews and blues music of Johnny Shines.  Shines received the Alabama Folk Heritage Award in 1989 by the Alabama State Council on the Arts. This award was established to recognize master folk artists who have made outstanding contributions to their particular artistic tradition. The award is intended to honor long-term achievement within art forms that are rooted in the traditional or ethnic culture of Alabama Johnny Shines (1915 - 1992) was one of the last of the old style blues musicians and a colleague of the legendary Robert Johnson, Howlin' Wolf and others. His life mirrored blues history from his delta beginnings to his move to Chicago where he was part of the electrification of the blues to his rediscovery during the 1970's by a generation of mostly white blues fans. This special radio series will air every Tuesday at 9:00 to 9:30 P.M., on the Troy University Public Radio Network at:   WTSU 89.9 (Montgomery and Troy) WRWA 88.7 (Dothan) WTJB 91.7 (Columbus and Phenix   City)  This radio series may not be broadcast in your area, but it can be accessed via the Internet at: http://www.arts.alabama.gov/actc/radioserieslist.aspx If you have been listening to, and enjoying this radio series, please send your comments to: barbara.reed@arts.alabama.gov Listen first hand using the link below. MP3 Download/Stream

This program originally aired in 2004. It is a repeat of ASCA Deputy Director Barbara Edwards interviewing Jazz musician Eric Essix

This program originally aired in 2004. It is a repeat of ASCA Deputy Director Barbara Edwards interviewing Jazz musician Eric Essix about his work with the rural schools touring program (now called Alabama Touring Artist Program) and his work as a producer, songwriter and musician.  The show includes his musical arrangements and composition. This special radio series will air every Tuesday at 9:00 to 9:30 P.M., on the Troy University Public Radio Network at:   WTSU 89.9 (Montgomery and Troy) WRWA 88.7 (Dothan) WTJB 91.7 (Columbus and Phenix   City)  This radio series may not be broadcast in your area, but it can be accessed via the Internet at: http://www.arts.alabama.gov/actc/radioserieslist.aspx If you have been listening to, and enjoying this radio series, please send your comments to: barbara.reed@arts.alabama.gov Listen first hand using the link below. MP3 Download/Stream

Black Belt Folk Roots Festival in Eutaw, Alabama

When Joey Brackner visited the Black Belt Folk Roots Festival in Eutaw, Alabama he talked to festival organizers, craft artists and a Fayette County step group that performed at the event. This re-aired progam is to help promote the 2014 festival to be held Aug 23-24 on the Old Courthouse Square in Eutaw, Alabama.

Here is a video produced by Russell Gulley about the 35th Annual Black Belt Folk Roots Festival in 2010.

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Gil Anthony and Dr Jeneve Brooks and the Wiregrass Blues Festival in Dothan Alabama

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In this program Steve Grauberger interviews Gil Anthony and Dr. Jeneve Brooks about the annual Wiregrass Blues Fest held in Dothan, Alabama. Gil Anthony is a well know local blues promoter and radio personality, located in Enterprise, Alabama, who produces a weekly Blues Power program airing on WWNT radio in Dothan. Dr. Jeneve Brooks is Assistant Professor in Sociology at Troy University, Dothan campus. Together with the Wiregrass Blues Society they are essential to the continuation of the Wiregrass Blues Fest that just finished its 3rd annual event on May 3rd, 2014. MP3 Download/Stream

Jimmy Johnson, one of the original Muscle Shoals Swampers

Jimmy Johnson

This week, Jimmy Johnson, one of the original Swampers, talks with Deborah Boykin about his work in Muscle Shoals music. He recalls the early days of the recording industry in the Shoals, describes the Swampers’s approach to recording and talks about working with artists ranging from Percy Sledge to Aretha Franklin, to Paul Simon.

Listen first hand using the link below.

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Alabama Blues Project Summer Camp

Alabama Blues Project Summer Camp

This week Summer Upchurch interviews Alabama Blues Project Program Director Cara Lynn Teague and musician Bruce Andrewsabout the Alabama Blues Project's annual summer blues camp.

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Leah Tucker, Executive Director of the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame and theCarver Theatre in Birmingham

Steve Grauberger interviews Leah Tucker, Executive Director of the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame and theCarver Theatre in Birmingham.  They discuss the history of the Carver Theatre and the Hall of Fame as well as various events and services provided by the organization. (more)

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Cast King and Matt Downer

This program is a rebroadcast of a 2005 interview by Anne Kimzey with musicians Cast King and Matt Downer from Sand Mountain.  Guitarist and songwriter Cast King and his former band The Country Drifters recorded with Sun Records of Memphis in the 1950s.  Matt Downer, a young musician, worked with Mr. King for a few years to learn his guitar style and to record his music and life history.   During the program Mr. King performed three of the approximately 500 songs he wrote in his lifetime. Cast King died in 2007. (more)

Alabama Arts Podcast, Russell Gulley

Russell Gulley, musician, songwriter, and co-founder of the band Jackson Highway, recalls his early days in Muscle Shoals, his work with producer Jimmy Johnson, and his return to roots music in current performances in an interview with Deborah Boykin, community arts program manager.
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http://www.arts.alabama.gov/actc/1/20120722russellgulley.mp3

Alabama Arts Radio Podcast, Singer-songwriter, Maxwell Russell

Singer-songwriter Maxwell Russell talks with Deborah Boykin about his career, his writing, and his efforts to promote other songwriters. A well-known North Alabama performer, Russell sponsors a songwriters’ showcase each week  at a Sheffield restaurant.  His son Kirk, also a musician, writer and vocalist, also appears to talk about his band, Abstract Theory.
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Alabama Arts Radio Podcast, Joyce Cauthen, recently retired director of the Alabama Folkife Association

Alabama Center for Traditional Culture Director Joey Brackner interviews Joyce Cauthen, recently retired as the director of the Alabama Folkife Association.  In this conversation Joyce discusses her many years as director of the AFA and how she developed the organization and the folklife research she accomplished over three decades as director. She also describes her work with the Birmingham Friends of Old-Time Music and Dance and her performance group, Red Mountain.

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Alabama Arts Radio Podcast, Ike Zimmerman

In June of 2011 a group of relatives came together in Alabama to commemorate a common bond, the late Isaiah "Ike" Zimmerman, an Alabama native originally from Grady. After making his home in Beauregard, Mississippi in the 1930s, he became a mentor to bluesman guitarist Robert Johnson. An accomplished blues guitarist and performer himself, Ike Zimmerman and his wife Ruth took Johnson into their home for over a year where Ike generously taught Johnson, then known as R.L., what he knew about the blues.  In this program Grey Brennan, Marketing Manager at the Alabama Department of Travel and Tourism and Steve Grauberger of ASCA interview two daughters of Ike Zimmerman, Loretha Z. Smith and Nelly Ruth Brown with their sons James Smith and Oscar Brown, to try and find more information about this interesting Alabamian and his relationship to Robert Johnson.

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Alabama Arts Radio Podcast, Marc Smirnoff, editor of the Oxford American

This week Joey Brackner, director of the Alabama Center for Traditional Culture interviews Marc Smirnoff, editor of the Oxford American. They discuss the current issue of the Oxford American dedicated to the music of Alabama and upcoming music events for the year of Alabama Music.
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AlabamaArts Radio Podcast, Bettie Fikes Blues Singer and Civil Rights Activist

This week Deborah Boykin interviews singer and civil rights activist Bettie Fikes, who discusses her experiences as a Freedom Singer and the performers who influenced her style as blues singer. Ms. Fikes recently performed in Tuscaloosa with the Alabama Blues Project and talks about returning to her home state to sing with these students.

Alabama Arts Radio podcast --MS Hill Country Bluesman Kenny Brown

This week Deborah Boykin interviews bluesman Kenny Brown, who recently appeared at the Chicken and Egg Festival in Moulton. Brown talks about R. L. Burnside and the other musicians who were his influences. He also discusses his North Mississippi Hill Country Picnic. The event pays tribute to Brown's musical roots by presenting most of the performers currently playing in the distinctive hill country blues style he learned as a child.

Alabama Arts Podcast, Henry Gipson and Lenny Madden of Gip's Juke Joint

In this program Joey Brackner interviews Henry Gipson and Lenny Madden of Gip's Juke Joint in Bessemer.

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Alabama Arts Radio Podcast, Christmas Music from Alabama Musicians

This week's program features Christmas songs selected from the Fretted Instruments Christmas CDs. For the past six years Herb Trotman, Wayne Anderson, and numerous Alabama musicians have put together CDs of Christmas music which are distributed each year at Fretted Instruments, Trotman's music store in Homewood.  The project involves what Herb calls "the Large and Amorphous Group", made up of area bands and musicians who record Christmas music especially for each year's CD. The songs include traditional carols, original songs such as Christmas in Alabama and Empty Stocking Blues, and popular favorites like White Christmas and The Christmas Song.

Alabama Arts Podcast, Susan Perry and Fred Fussell

Joey Brackner interviews Susan Perry of the Alabama Humanities Foundation and researcher Fred Fussell about the exhibit New Harmonies: Celebrating American Roots Music.

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