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September 1st from 8:00pm - 10:00pm |
| The Emergence of
Paul Simon |
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photo credit:
Robert Clark/Warner Music |
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Producer Paul Ingles hosts "The Emergence of Paul Simon," an
engrossing two-hour special on the creative output of
heralded songwriter Paul Simon.
Ingles draws from an impressive guest roster to explore
how Simon connected with audiences in the 1960s as part of
Simon & Garfunkel, in the 1970s as a solo artist and in the
1980s when he re-emerged as a world star with the release of
his Graceland album. Guest commentators include Simon
biographer Patrick Humphries and music writers Ann Powers,
Anthony DeCurtis, Paul Zollo, Lydia Hutchinson, Jim Fusilli
and more. The program includes excerpts from several
archival interviews of Simon and features musicians Joseph
Shabalala, Shawn Colvin, Deborah Holland and several others.
By mixing Simon's music from key moments in his career
with informed commentary from musicians and music critics,
"The Emergence of Paul Simon" articulates what two
generations of music lovers have found so compelling about
this thoughtful and innovative writer and performer.
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Paul Ingles has written and hosted many well-received specials
on popular musicians, including "The Emergence of Bob Dylan,"
"Everything Was Right: The Beatles' Revolver," "Shawn Colvin:
Inside These Four Walls," "The Day John Lennon Died" and "The
Beatles in America: 1964." He is also producer of the "Peace
Talks Radio" series. In addition, Ingles has contributed reports
and commentaries to NPR and PRI news programs. He has won
several awards for his work, including the prestigous Edward R.
Murrow Award for best use of sound.
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For more information about Paul Simon's life and career
visit:
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Simon & Garfunkel:
Featured on "The Graduate" |
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photo credit: Don Hunstein/Sony
Music Archives/BMG |
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Saturday, September 1st at 10:00pm |
| Sly & The Family
Stone 40th anniversary |
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Seven musicians walked on the stage, some were black,
some white, some were men, some women, and all of them
were dressed in bright, colorful outfits. That was Sly
and the Family Stone, and for seven wild years
(1967-1974), they left a mark on music and culture that
continues to inspire countless musicians - both black
and white. Members changed, times got rough, but Sly and
the Family Stone's sound and message of love and unity
still speaks to the world today. |
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FAMILY AFFAIR is hosted
by Ben Fong-Torres, and includes a wide range of Sly &
the Family Stone tracks - from the big hits ("Dance to
the Music," Everyday People," and others) to deep cuts
from all their albums. |
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songs accentuate the points made by the many interview subjects, others
speak for themselves. All of them stand up as examples of Sly Stone's
"watershed point in the development of rhythm and blues," as detailed by
biographer and journalist Joel Selvin. |
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members Rose Stone, Larry Graham, Greg Errico and Andy Newmark provide
rarely-heard, first-hand accounts of the zeniths and nadirs of Sly
Stone's universe, taking us from their family roots to their mainstream
success to later sessions "surrounded by really crazy people...out there
in the twilight zone." Musicians Isaac Hayes and Chuck D, however, break
down how music from all those episodes influence d Sly's contemporaries
as well as future generations of musicians. |
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Sly and the Family Stone are
credited as one of the first racially integrated bands in music history,
belting their message of peace, love and social consciousness through a
string of hit anthems that fused R&B, soul, funk and rock n roll. On
'Different Strokes by Different Folks' a stylistically, culturally and
racially disparate group of chart-toppers mirrors that idealistic
diversity. Understand this: There was no precedent for Sly &
the Family Stone. |
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1967, when the interracial, mixed-gender combo burst onto the scene with
their debut album, the burgeoning rock & roll subculture was, as always,
hungry for fresh kicks and different sounds. But no one was quite
prepared for the magical, multi-faceted musical mix Sly and company
served up. Their music was an inspired blend of rock, soul, pop, jazz,
and an emerging genre soon to be dubbed funk. It packed a powerful,
joyous wallop, delivering all the things one hoped to find in music: The
thrill of the new, the excitement of the unexpected, a galvanizing
groove, and lyrics that actually said something. |
| Sly's
been sampled by Janet Jackson, Beastie Boys, Kid Rock, Fatboy Slim, Ice
Cube and Public Enemy to name just a few! He was inducted into the Rock
& Roll Hall Of Fame in 1992, and is the recipient of the 2002 R&B
Foundation Pioneer Award. |
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Saturday, September 1st at 11:00pm |
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Willie Nelson Sings the Blues with Wynton Marsalis and Friends |
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Two bright stars, country maverick Willie Nelson
and Jazz-icon Wynton Marsalis, unexpectedly meet on
common ground: the blues! This soulful concert
features song by well-known American composers such
as Hoagy Carmichael, Duke Ellington and Merle
Travis, as well as songs written by more obscure
bluesmen Harry Warren, Spencer Williams and Jimmy
Reed. |
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Willie Nelson (born William Hugh Nelson, April 30,
1933) was raised in Abbott, Texas. He reached his
greatest fame during the so-called "outlaw country"
movement of the 1970s. |
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Growing up, music had been a central part of
Willie's life. He was fascinated by by big band,
country (Texas-Style), and especially by the music
of Frank Sinatra. At age twenty three Willie
singehandedly recorded, financed, and sold his first
song, entitled "No Place For Me". |
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At that time he was working as a full time disk-jockey
and wrote songs in his spare time. The next year Nelson
finally made a decent amount of money from selling
songs, particulary "Night Life," which he sold for and
undisclosed amount to three Texas businessmen. Willie
bought a buick convertible and set off, bound for
Nashville. After only two years he was well established
as a writer and had already sold two number one hits to
Faron Young and Patsy Cline. This began a real change of
Nelson's attitude toward things. |
| Willie continued
writing and selling music until December of 1970 when
his house burnt down. Nelson packed up his things and
headed back to Texas. After living in Nashville for ten
years, Nelson had forgot about the lack of musicians in
Texas. With very few candidates in the market for |
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A fixture on the American cultural scene, Wynton
Marsalis has brought jazz back to centre stage in the
U.S.A. through his relentless work ethic and drive. He
is also a distinguished classical performer whose many
recordings for Sony Classical have been an important
aspect of his career since it began. In 1997 he became
the first jazz musician to win the Pulitzer Prize in
music, for his epic oratorio on the subject of slavery,
Blood on the Fields. As a composer and performer,
Marsalis is also represented on a quartet of Sony
Classical releases, At the Octoroon Balls: String
Quartet No. 1, A Fiddler's Tale, Reel Time and Sweet
Release and Ghost Story: Two More Ballets by Wynton
Marsalis. All are volumes of an eight-CD series, titled
"Swinging Into The 21st", that is an unprecedented set
of albums released in the past year featuring a
remarkable scope of original compositions and |
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Willie's music he soon became hard-pressed to sell anything.
Since he couldn't write and sell music, Nelson did the next best
thing; he began performing his own work. Within the first year
back in Texas, Willie had recorded two albums, "Shotgun Willie"
and "Phases And Stages". By 1973, as his popularity grew, he
started an Independence Day picnic that has grown and is still
around today. Then came 1975. One of his almost nameless albums,
"Red Headed Stranger", was introduced to the charts. It was a
smash success, placing the name Willie Nelson in the spotlight.
This prompted a collection of older Nelson music, released on
one album, "Wanted: The Outlaws". This Nelson album,
with over 1,000,000 copies, became the top selling country music
album in history. |
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standards, from jazz to classical to ballet, by
composers
from Jelly RollMorton to Stravinsky to Monk, in addition
to Marsalis. |
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Winner of eight Grammy awards for
his jazz and classical recordings, Marsalis has also
been creatively involved in musical education. His
four-part, Peabody Award-winning TV series Marsalis on
Music, released on home video by Sony Classical,
introduces young viewers to the adventure of making
music. USA Today hailed Marsalis on Music as "a
thrilling four-part seminar of music appreciation
written and literally conducted by the affable Wynton
Marsalis. Comparisons to
Leonard Bernstein's
famed "Young People's Concerts" are appropriate." ........................................................................................ |
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And thus, two
legends were born |
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Saturday, September 1st at 12:00mid |
| In Search of James
Brown |
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In 1999, radio producers Paul Ingles and Joe Warnes went
in pursuit of an
interview with the Godfather of Soul, James Brown at a
tour stop in Albuquerque. As they pursued a private
audience with Brown, they managed to capture his essence
by talking to fans and handlers and by taking listeners
inside the arena for a taste of a James Brown show.
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Over a 39 year period,
James Brown amassed an amazing total of 98 entries on
Billboard's top 40 R&B singles Charts, a record
unsurpassed by any other artist. Seventeen on them
reached number one, a feat topped only by Stevie Wonder
and Louis Jordan, and equaled only by Aretha Franklin.
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< Early Years |
From his most recent Anniversary > |
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Brown's rise from juvenile delinquent to Soul Brother Number One is
among the great modern day American success stories. The only child of a
poor backwoods family, he was sent to Augusta, Georgia at age five to
live at an aunt's brothel. He earned his keep by running errands for
soldiers at nearby Camp Gordon, entertaining them with his buckdancing
and enticing them into his aunt's establishment. Singing gospel music
and playing piano, drums, and guitar served as an emotional outlet for
the young Brown. |
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In
1952, Brown settled in Georgia and joined the Gospel Starlighters, a
quartet led by Bobby Byrd. Theirs was a raw southern gospel style
inspired by Julius Cheeks and the Sensational Nightingales and Reverend
Reuben Willingham and the Swanee Quintet. Eventually, however, the
Starlighters evolved into a rhythm and blues outfit. They were
originally known as the Avons, them as the Flames.
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In November 1955, while based in Macon, Georgia, the Flames cut
a demonstration record at radio station WIBB of an original tune
titled "Please, Please, Please". While passing through Atlanta,
record producer Ralph Bass heard the demo and was so impressed
with Brown's impassioned lead and the group's hard harmonies
that he immediately drove to Macon and signed them to King
Records, a Cincinnati company for which two of the Flames'
favorite groups, the Midnighters and the 5 Royales, were
recording. A session was held in Ohio the following week.
Released on King's Federal label two months later, in March of
1956, "Please, Please, Please" reached Number Five on the
Billboard's R&B chart. |
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Brown's boyhood dream of escaping poverty was not immediately realized,
however. Although he and the Flames continued to make records for
Federal, it would be nearly three years before they again hit the
national charts. "Try Me", produced by Andy Gibson, hit big during the
winter of 1958-59, giving the group its first Number One R&B record and
enabling Brown to hire a steady backup band. Through grueling rehearsals
and barnstorming
 onenighters,
Brown developed the band into the hottest R&B unit in the land. His
musicians' precision timing was geared to accent every blood curling
scream, every flying split, every knee drop, every one-legged skate, and
every shimmy of Brown's stunning array of acrobatics, which be now had
become the visual trademark of the group's stage act.
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While he continued scoring hit singles during the
early 1960's, now issued on the King
Label, Brown came up with the idea that if the
hysteria he was generating in person could be
captured on an album, people who hadn't seen him yet
could at least hear and feel the excitement of him
screaming and hollering until his back got soaking
wet. King Records was convinced that such an album
wouldn't sell, so Brown put up his own money to
record a performance at the Apollo Theater in
October 1962. Released nearly a year later, Live At
The Apollo went to Number Two on Billboard's album
chart, an unprecedented feat for a live R&B album.
Radio stations played it with a frequency formerly
reserved for singles, and attendance at Brown's
concerts mushroomed.
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Brown scored his first Top 10 pop single in 1965 with "Papa's Got A
Brand New Bag", and the hits kept coming for the next decade, one after
another at an unheard-of rate. He gradually phased out the Flames, and
the gospel and blues structure of his early records gave way to
open-ended vamps that emphasized his rhythmically riveting sandpaper
vocals and the complex funk syncopations of his band. His innovations
during this period had a profound influence on popular music styles
around the world, including fund, rock, Afro-pop, disco and eventually
rap. |
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James
Brown's status as "The Godfather Of Soul" remains undiminished.
Indeed, he has picked up a new generation of fans who have
become familiar with his funk grooves through their frequent use
as samples on rap records. A charter member of the Rock and Roll
Hall of Fame, Brown added to his collections of accolades when
he received a special lifetime achievement Grammy Award in 1992.
In 1993
James
Brown received a Lifetime Achievement Award at the fourth annual
Rhythm & Blues Foundation Pioneer Awards. MC Hammer was his
presenter. James Brown died on December 25th, 2006 after being
hospitalized with pneumonia. |
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