This will be a rather quick trip, but I will be in Oxford, Miss., March 2-3, playing and speaking at “Music of the South: A Southern Studies Homecoming.” This event features professional musicians who are alumni of the Southern Studies program at the University of Mississippi. Yes, I am in that category. And so are [...]
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The world didn’t owe him nothing
As you may have heard, blues artist David Honeyboy Edwards died recently at age 96, a few months after he finally retired from touring. I am happy that there was so much news coverage of his passing. But the reports described him as “the last of the Delta bluesmen,” “the last of the first generation [...]
Toothbrushing and guitar playing
I got my teeth cleaned the other day. And the hygienist praised me for taking such good care of my teeth between cleanings — except for one thing: she noticed a little bit of plaque on the right side of my mouth, where I hadn’t done quite as good a job of brushing as I [...]
Hula hoops for fun, exercise, Xmas gifts
After you spend a lot of hours sitting crouched over your guitar, or over your desk, get up and hoop for awhile! Feels great, it’s lots of fun, great thing to bring to a party. And it trims your middle and strengthens your back. But if you are an adult or a big kid, don’t [...]
Flying with your guitar
No, I don’t mean riding it like a broom. I mean taking it on the plane. If you’re traveling to a gig, you have to bring the guitar. But if you’re just flying on a vacation or business trip, should you take the guitar along? And if so, how? First of all, yes, you should [...]
Talent Is Overrated notes
This is my summary of, and notes on, Talent Is Overrated, a fascinating book by Geoff Colvin. Innate abilities pretty much don’t exist. Colvin gives the examples of Mozart and Tiger Woods, two people often thought of as blessed with superhuman abilities. Yet when you examine their lives you see that both had fathers who [...]
Review of Fetch It! from Il Blues, the Italian blues magazine
Quando si va nel profundo Sud degli Stati Uniti a percorrere i luoghi del blues, non ci si può improvvisare “turisti per caso,” perchè il rischio di perdre pezzi di storia è molto alto. Bisogna allora affidarsi ad “un compagno di viaggio”, meticoloso e dettagliatissimo, come l’ottimo libro/guida “Blues Traveling/The Holy Sites of Delta Blues” [...]
Levi-Strauss on music
these facts make the creator of music a being like the gods and make music itself the supreme mystery of human knowledge.
Oprah’s Aunt Katherine loves my book
Oprah Winfrey’s Aunt Katherine is a huge fan of Blues Traveling, and carries it around with her in her car, I learned recently. Katherine Carr Esters of Kosciusko, Miss., actually is Oprah’s cousin, although Oprah addresses her older relative as “Aunt Katherine.” Ted Ownby, director of the Center for the Study of Southern Culture at [...]
Mother’s Best Music Festival
Mother’s Best Music Festival — it’s named after another brand of flour that once sponsored a radio show in Helena, Ark. (King Biscuit Flour was the sponsor of King Biscuit Time, which lent its name to the town’s much bigger and longer-running festival, the King Biscuit Blues Festival, until an unfortunate legal challenge took that [...]
