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Frank Stokes (musician)
Frank Stokes (January 1, 1877 or 1888 – September 12, 1955) was an American blues musician, songster, and blackface minstrel, who is considered by many musicologists to be the father of the Memphis blues guitar style. Biography Stokes was born in Shelby County, Tennessee, in the vicinity of Whitehaven, located two miles north of the Mississippi state line. There is uncertainty over his year of birth; his daughter and later sources reported 1888, but the researchers Bob Eagle and Eric LeBlanc give 1877, the date on his World War I draft card. His parents died when he was a child, and he was raised by his stepfather in Tutwiler, Mississippi. He learned to play the guitar as a youth in Tutwiler and, after 1895, in Hernando, Mississippi, which was the home of the guitarists Jim Jackson, Dan Sane, Elijah Avery (of Cannon's Jug Stompers), and Robert Wilkins. By the turn of the century, Stokes was working as a blacksmith, traveling 25 miles to Memphis on weekends to sing and play ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shelby County, Tennessee
Shelby County is the westernmost county in the U.S. state of Tennessee. As of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the population was 929,744. It is the largest of the state's List of counties in Tennessee, 95 counties, both in terms of population and geographic area. Its county seat is Memphis, Tennessee, Memphis, a port on the Mississippi River and the second most populous city in Tennessee. The county was named for Governor Isaac Shelby (1750–1826) of Kentucky. It is one of only two remaining counties in Tennessee with a majority African Americans, African American population, along with Haywood County, Tennessee , Haywood County. Shelby County is part of the Memphis, TN-Mississippi, MS-Arkansas, AR Memphis metropolitan area, Metropolitan Statistical Area. It is bordered on the west by the Mississippi River. Located within the Mississippi Delta, the county was developed as a center of cotton plantations in the antebellum era, and cotton continued as an important commo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dan Sane
Dan Sane (possibly September 22, 1896 – February 18, 1956) was an American Memphis blues and country blues guitarist and songwriter. He was an associate of Frank Stokes. According to the Music journalist Jason Ankeny, "they had emerged among the most complementary duos in all of the blues, with Sane's flatpicking ideally embellished by Stokes' fluid rhythms." The best-known of the songs written by Sane are "Downtown Blues" and "Mr. Crump Don't Like It." His surname was sometimes spelled "Sain". Biography Sane was born Daniel Sains, in Hernando, Mississippi. There is uncertainty over his date of birth; most sources state September 22, 1896, but the researchers Bob Eagle and Eric LeBlanc suggest October 23, 1892, or perhaps 1890. Some sources cite 1904 as his birth year and Michigan, Mississippi, as his birthplace. He moved to Memphis, Tennessee, and played in Will Batts's string band, before meeting the guitar player Frank Stokes. Sane and Stokes busked together around B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kansas Joe McCoy
Wilbur "Kansas Joe" McCoy (May 11, 1905 – January 28, 1950) was an American Delta blues singer, musician and songwriter. Career McCoy performed under various stage names but is best known as Kansas Joe McCoy. Born in Raymond, Mississippi, he was the older brother of the blues accompanist Papa Charlie McCoy. As a young man, McCoy was drawn to the music scene in Memphis, Tennessee, where he played guitar and sang during the 1920s. He teamed up his with future wife, Lizzie Douglas, a guitarist better known as Memphis Minnie, and their 1930 recording of the song "Bumble Bee" for Columbia Records was a hit. In 1930, the couple moved to Chicago, where they were an important part of the burgeoning blues scene there. After they were divorced, McCoy teamed up with his brother to form the Harlem Hamfats, a band that performed and recorded during the second half of the 1930s. In 1936, the Harlem Hamfats released their recording of the song "The Weed Smoker's Dream". McCoy later refined ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Memphis Minnie
Lizzie Douglas (June 3, 1897 – August 6, 1973), better known as Memphis Minnie, was a blues guitarist, vocalist, and songwriter whose recording career lasted for over three decades. She recorded around 200 songs, some of the best known being "When the Levee Breaks", "Me and My Chauffeur Blues", "Bumble Bee" and "Nothing in Rambling". Childhood Douglas was born on June 3, 1897, probably in Tunica County, Mississippi, although she claimed to have been born in New Orleans, Louisiana and raised in the Algiers, New Orleans, Algiers neighborhood.Harris, Sheldon (1989). ''Blues Who's Who: A Biographical Dictionary of Blues SIngers''. pp. 161–162. She was the eldest of 13 siblings. Her parents, Abe and Gertrude Douglas, nicknamed her Kid when she was young, and her family called her that throughout her childhood. It is reported that she disliked the name Lizzie. When she first began performing, she played under the name Kid Douglas. When she was seven years old, she and her family ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Duet (music)
A duet is a musical composition for two performers in which the performers have equal importance to the piece, often a composition involving two singers or two pianists. It differs from a harmony, as the performers take turns performing a solo section rather than performing simultaneously. A piece performed by two pianists performing together on the same piano is a "piano duet" or " piano four hands". A piece for two pianists performing together on separate pianos is a " piano duo". The term ''duet'' is also used as a verb for the act of performing a musical duet, or colloquially as a noun to refer to the performers of a duet. A musical ensemble with more than two solo instruments or voices is called trio, quartet, quintet, sextet, septet, octet, etc. History When Mozart was young, he and his sister Marianne played a duet of his composition at a London concert in 1765. The four-hand, described as a duet, was in many of his compositions which included five sonatas; a set of va ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sound Recording And Reproduction
Sound recording and reproduction is the electrical, mechanical, electronic, or digital inscription and re-creation of sound waves, such as spoken voice, singing, instrumental music, or sound effects. The two main classes of sound recording technology are analog recording and digital recording. Sound recording is the transcription of invisible vibrations in air onto a storage medium such as a phonograph disc. The process is reversed in sound reproduction, and the variations stored on the medium are transformed back into sound waves. Acoustic analog recording is achieved by a microphone diaphragm that senses changes in atmospheric pressure caused by acoustic sound waves and records them as a mechanical representation of the sound waves on a medium such as a phonograph record (in which a stylus cuts grooves on a record). In magnetic tape recording, the sound waves vibrate the microphone diaphragm and are converted into a varying electric current, which is then converted to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jimmie Rodgers (country Singer)
James Charles Rodgers (September 8, 1897 – May 26, 1933) was an American singer-songwriter and musician who rose to popularity in the late 1920s. Widely regarded as "the Father of Country Music", he is best known for his distinctive rhythmic yodeling, unusual for a music star of his era. Rodgers rose to prominence based upon his recordings, among country music's earliest, rather than concert performances. He has been cited as an inspiration by many artists and inductees into various halls of fame across both country music and the blues, in which he was also a pioneer. Among his other popular nicknames are "The Singing Brakeman" and "The Blue Yodeler". Early life According to tradition, Rodgers' birthplace is usually listed as Meridian, Mississippi; however, in documents Rodgers signed later in life, his birthplace was listed as Geiger, Alabama, the home of his paternal grandparents. Yet historians who have researched the circumstances of that document, including Nolan P ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Medicine Show
Medicine shows were touring acts (traveling by truck, horse, or wagon teams) that peddled "miracle cure" patent medicines and other products between various entertainments. They developed from European Charlatan, mountebank shows and were common in the United States in the nineteenth century, especially in the American Old West, Old West (though some continued until World War II). They usually promoted "miracle elixirs" (sometimes referred to as snake oil), which, it was claimed, had the ability to cure disease, smooth wrinkles, remove stains, prolong life or cure any number of common ailments. Most shows had their own patent medicine (these medicines were for the most part unpatented but took the name to sound official). Entertainments often included a freak show, a flea circus, musical ensemble, musical acts, magic (illusion), magic tricks, jokes, or storytelling. Each show was run by a man posing as a doctor who drew the crowd with a monologue. The entertainers, such as acrobats, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clogging
Clogging is a type of folk dance practiced in the United States, in which the dancer's footwear is used percussively by striking the heel, the toe, or both against a floor or each other to create audible rhythms, usually to the downbeat with the heel keeping the rhythm. Clogging is the official state dance of Kentucky and North Carolina. Description In later periods, it was not always called "clogging", being known variously as foot-stomping, buck dancing, clog dancing, jigging, or other local terms. What all these had in common was emphasizing the downbeat of the music by enthusiastic footwork. As for the shoes, many old clogging shoes had no taps and some were made of leather and velvet, while the soles of the shoes were either wooden or hard leather. Clogging can be divided into five major categories: 1) shuffle clogging, 2) cadence clogging, 3) rhythm clogging, 4) stomp clogging, and 5) buck-dancing. The shuffle clogging style is said to be the most popular style for blu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Garfield Akers
Garfield Akers (possibly born James Garfield Echols, probably 1908 – c. 1959) was an American blues singer and guitarist. He had sometimes performed under the pseudonym "Garfield Partee." Info on him is uncertain, and knowledge of his life is based almost entirely on reports of a few contemporary witnesses. Akers' extant recordings consist of four sides, which are nonetheless historically significant. His most well-known song was his debut single "Cottonfield Blues", a duet with friend and longtime collaborator Joe Callicott on second guitar, based on a song performed by Texas blues musician Henry Thomas a few years earlier. Biography Early life Akers came to Hernando, Mississippi, a small town near Memphis, Tennessee, from Brights as a young teenager, already playing guitar at the time. In Hernando he met Frank Stokes, who is now often considered the "father of Memphis blues"; together with him he performed as a songster (a form of itinerant musician), comedian and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Beale Street
Beale Street is a street in Downtown Memphis, Tennessee, which runs from the Mississippi River to East Street, a distance of approximately . It is a significant location in the city's history, as well as in the history of blues music. Today, the blues clubs and restaurants that line Beale Street are major tourist attractions in Memphis. Festivals and outdoor concerts frequently bring large crowds to the street and its surrounding areas. History Beale Street was created in 1841 by entrepreneur and developer Robertson Topp (1807–1876), who named it for a forgotten military hero of the Mexican–American War. (The original name was Beale Avenue.) Its western end primarily housed shops of trade merchants, who traded goods with ships along the Mississippi River, while the eastern part developed as an affluent suburb. In the 1860s, many black traveling musicians began performing on Beale. The first of these to call Beale Street home were the Young Men's Brass Band, who were fo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Busking
Street performance or busking is the act of performing in public places for gratuities. In many countries, the rewards are generally in the form of money but other gratuities such as food, drink or gifts may be given. Street performance is practiced all over the world and dates back to antiquity. People engaging in this practice are called street performers or buskers in the United Kingdom. Outside of New York, ''buskers'' is not a term generally used in American English. Performances are anything that people find entertaining, including acrobatics, animal tricks, balloon twisting, caricatures, clowning, comedy, contortions, escapology, dance, singing, fire skills, flea circus, fortune-telling, juggling, magic, mime, living statue, musical performance, one man band, puppeteering, snake charming, storytelling or reciting poetry or prose, street art such as sketching and painting, street theatre, sword swallowing, ventriloquism and washboarding. Buskers may be solo perf ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
