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WLAY (AM)
WLAY is a radio station serving the Florence/Muscle Shoals, Alabama, market and was heard at 1450 AM and on a translator at 104.7 on the FM band; it is licensed to the city of Muscle Shoals, Alabama. WLAY is owned by Mike Self, through licensee Singing River Media Group, LLC. WLAY is one of the oldest broadcast radio stations in Alabama and the Southern United States. It presently airs only music written and recorded in Muscle Shoals. In addition, the station broadcasts live concerts in the area and highlights area charitable events. Its program/music director and curator is Brian Rickman. WLAY ceased transmitting in December 2014. History The station signed on in 1933 as WNRA, and has since secured its place in American music history thanks to its contribution to what is now commonly referred to as " The Muscle Shoals Sound". Originating its broadcast as a "variety format", WLAY was significant in its early years as a rare frequency that would broadcast both Southern Gospel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Muscle Shoals, Alabama
Muscle Shoals is the largest city in Colbert County, Alabama, Colbert County, Alabama, United States. It is located along the Tennessee River in the northern part of the state and, as of the 2010 United States Census, 2010 census, the population of Muscle Shoals was 13,146. The estimated population in 2019 was 14,575. Both the city and the Florence-Muscle Shoals Metropolitan Area (including four cities in Colbert and Lauderdale County, Alabama, Lauderdale counties) are commonly called "the Shoals". Northwest Alabama Regional Airport serves the Shoals region, located in the northwest section of the state. Due to its strategic location along the Tennessee River, Muscle Shoals had long been territory of Native American tribes. In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, as Europeans entered the area in greater number, it became a center of historic land disputes. The new state of Georgia had ambitions to anchor its western claims (to the Mississippi River) by encouraging European- ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Delta Blues
Delta blues is one of the earliest-known styles of blues. It originated in the Mississippi Delta, and is regarded as a regional variant of country blues. Guitar and harmonica are its dominant instruments; slide guitar is a hallmark of the style. Vocal styles in Delta blues range from introspective and soulful to passionate and fiery. Origin Although Delta blues certainly existed in some form or another at the turn of the twentieth century, it was first recorded in the late 1920s, when record companies realized the potential African-American market for "race records". The major labels produced the earliest recordings, consisting mostly of one person singing and playing an instrument. Live performances, however, more commonly involved a group of musicians. Current belief is that Freddie Spruell is the first Delta blues artist to have been recorded; his "Milk Cow Blues" was recorded in Chicago in June 1926. Record company talent scouts made some of the early recordings on f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Paul Kelley (Broadcast Engineer)
Paul Xavier Kelley (November 11, 1928December 29, 2019) was a United States Marine Corps four-star general who served as the 28th Commandant of the United States Marine Corps from July 1, 1983, to June 30, 1987. Kelley served 37 years active duty in the Marine Corps. Commissioned through Villanova College's Naval Reserve Officer Training Corps program in 1950, his first posting was with Aircraft Engineering Squadron 12 (AES-12) at Marine Corps Air Station Quantico, Virginia. He then served as an exchange officer with the Royal Marines, and later joined the Marine Force Reconnaissance community and served with distinction during the Vietnam War. Kelley's final assignments were as Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps and then Commandant of the Marine Corps until his retirement in 1987. Following his retirement from the Marine Corps, Kelley served on a number of corporate boards. Early life Kelley was born on November 11, 1928, in Boston, Massachusetts, to Albert and Josephine ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quin Ivy
Quin Ivy (born 1937) is an American former disc jockey turned songwriter and record producer, crucial to the Muscle Shoals scene in the 1960s. Early life Ivy was born in Oxford, Mississippi, the son of a sharecropper.Biography by Ed Hogan at Allmusic Retrieved 12 April 2013 He started his career as a DJ in Oxford, followed by spells at in , WKDA in and [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
When A Man Loves A Woman (song)
"When a Man Loves a Woman" is a song written by Calvin Lewis and Andrew Wright and first recorded by Percy Sledge in 1966 at Norala Sound Studio in Sheffield, Alabama. It made number one on both the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 and R&B singles charts. Country singer John Wesley Ryles had a minor hit with his version of the song in 1976 while singer and actress Bette Midler recorded the song 14 years later and had a Top 40 hit with her version in 1980. In 1991, Michael Bolton recorded the song and his version peaked at number one on both the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 chart and the ''Billboard'' Adult Contemporary Singles chart. Percy Sledge original version Background According to Dan Penn the song was initially recorded by Percy Sledge at Rick Hall's FAME Studios at Muscle Shoals, before being re-recorded at the nearby Norala Studios owned by Quin Ivy.''Muscle Shoals, The Muscle Shoals Sound: 3614 Jackson Highway'', CD, Rhino Records Inc., © 1993, liner notes by Randy Poe According to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Percy Sledge
Percy Tyrone Sledge (November 25, 1940 – April 14, 2015) was an American R&B, soul and gospel singer. He is best known for the song " When a Man Loves a Woman", a No. 1 hit on both the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 and R&B singles charts in 1966. It was awarded a million-selling, Gold-certified disc from the RIAA. Having previously worked as a hospital orderly in the early 1960s, Sledge achieved his strongest success in the late 1960s and early 1970s with a series of emotional soul songs. In later years, Sledge received the Rhythm and Blues Foundation's Career Achievement Award. He was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2005. Biography Early career Sledge was born on November 25, 1940, in Leighton, Alabama. He worked in a series of agricultural jobs in the fields in Leighton, before taking a job as an orderly at Colbert County Hospital in Sheffield, Alabama. Through the mid-1960s, he toured the Southeast with the ''Esquires Combo'' on weekends, while working at ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones are an English Rock music, rock band formed in London in 1962. Active for six decades, they are one of the most popular and enduring bands of the album era, rock era. In the early 1960s, the Rolling Stones pioneered the gritty, rhythmically driven sound that came to define hard rock. Their first stable line-up consisted of vocalist Mick Jagger, multi-instrumentalist Brian Jones, guitarist Keith Richards, bassist Bill Wyman, and drummer Charlie Watts. During their formative years, Jones was the primary leader: he assembled the band, named it, and drove their sound and image. After Andrew Loog Oldham became the group's manager in 1963, he encouraged them to write their own songs. Jagger–Richards, Jagger and Richards became the primary creative force behind the band, alienating Jones, who had developed a drug addiction that interfered with his ability to contribute meaningfully. Rooted in blues and early rock and roll, the Rolling Stones started out playing ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arthur Alexander
Arthur Alexander (May 10, 1940 – June 9, 1993) was an American country soul songwriter and singer. Jason Ankeny, music critic for AllMusic, said Alexander was a "country-soul pioneer" and that, though largely unknown, "his music is the stuff of genius, a poignant and deeply intimate body of work on par with the best of his contemporaries." Alexander's songs were covered by such stars as the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Gerry and the Pacemakers, Otis Redding, Tina Turner, Pearl Jam, and Jerry Lee Lewis. Life Alexander was born in Sheffield, Alabama, United States. Working with Spar Music in Florence, Alabama, Alexander recorded his first single, "Sally Sue Brown", under the name of June Alexander (short for Junior), which was released in 1960 on Jud Phillips' Judd Records. (Phillips is the brother of music pioneer Sam Phillips). A year later, Alexander cut " You Better Move On", at the fledgling FAME Studios, which at that point was located above the City Drug St ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Memphis, Tennessee
Memphis is a city in the U.S. state of Tennessee. It is the seat of Shelby County in the southwest part of the state; it is situated along the Mississippi River. With a population of 633,104 at the 2020 U.S. census, Memphis is the second-most populous city in Tennessee, after Nashville. Memphis is the fifth-most populous city in the Southeast, the nation's 28th-largest overall, as well as the largest city bordering the Mississippi River. The Memphis metropolitan area includes West Tennessee and the greater Mid-South region, which includes portions of neighboring Arkansas, Mississippi and the Missouri Bootheel. One of the more historic and culturally significant cities of the Southern United States, Memphis has a wide variety of landscapes and distinct neighborhoods. The first European explorer to visit the area of present-day Memphis was Spanish conquistador Hernando de Soto in 1541. The high Chickasaw Bluffs protecting the location from the waters of the Mississipp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sun Records
Sun Records is an American independent record label founded by producer Sam Phillips in Memphis, Tennessee in February 1952. Sun was the first label to record Elvis Presley, Charlie Rich, Roy Orbison, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, and Johnny Cash. Prior to that, Sun had concentrated mainly on African-American musicians because Phillips loved rhythm and blues and wanted to bring it to a white audience. On January 28, 2021, Sun Records was acquired by Primary Wave for $30 million. History Sam Phillips opened his Memphis Recording Service studio on January 3, 1950 at 706 Union Avenue in Memphis. It was founded with the financial aid of Jim Bulliet, one of many record executives for whom Phillips had scouted artists before 1952. In March 1951, Phillips produced "Rocket 88" by Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats, who were actually Ike Turner and his Kings of Rhythm. Because of Turner's Delta blues connections, he was contracted by Phillips as a talent scout and he was effectivel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sam Phillips
Samuel Cornelius Phillips (January 5, 1923 – July 30, 2003) was an American record producer. He was the founder of Sun Records and Sun Studio in Memphis, Tennessee, where he produced recordings by Elvis Presley, Roy Orbison, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, Johnny Cash, and Howlin' Wolf. Phillips played a major role in the development of rock and roll during the 1950s, launching the career of Presley. In 1969, he sold Sun to Shelby Singleton. Phillips was the owner and operator of radio stations in Memphis; Florence, Alabama; and Lake Worth Beach, Florida. He was also an early investor in the Holiday Inn chain of hotels and an advocate for racial equality, helping to break down racial barriers in the music industry. Early life Phillips was the youngest of eight children, born on a 200-acre farm near Florence, Alabama to Madge Ella ( Lovelace) and Charles Tucker Phillips. Sam's parents owned their farm, though it was mortgaged. As a child, he picked cotton in the fields with h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Son House
Edward James "Son" House Jr. (March 21, 1902His date of birth is a matter of some debate. House alleged that he was middle-aged during World War I and that he was 79 in 1965, which would make his date of birth around 1886. However, all legal records give his date of birth as March 21, 1902. – October 19, 1988) was an American Delta blues singer and guitarist, noted for his highly emotional style of singing and slide guitar playing. After years of hostility to secular music, as a preacher and for a few years also working as a church pastor, he turned to blues performance at the age of 25. He quickly developed a unique style by applying the rhythmic drive, vocal power and emotional intensity of his preaching to the newly learned idiom. In a short career interrupted by a spell in Parchman Farm penitentiary, he developed his musicianship to the point that Charley Patton, the foremost blues artist of the Mississippi Delta region, invited him to share engagements and to accomp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
