Records by ‘Mr. Music of Memphis’ back in circulation
Berl Olswanger died in 1981, and now his daughter is working with Big Round Records to bring out digital releases of three of his records from the 1950s and ’60s.
Berl Olswanger died in 1981, and now his daughter is working with Big Round Records to bring out digital releases of three of his records from the 1950s and ’60s.
An exhibit that opened recently marks the half-century anniversary of one of American culture’s more colorful and peculiar moments.
The music nonprofit is expanding performance opportunities for musicians. The new space is a vacant half-acre lot behind the site of the renowned blues musician’s family home.
We can pledge not to go “back to normal.” Normal, in the best of times, found us donating to GoFundMe campaigns to cover emergency medical bills of folks in our music community. Normal was $100 a gig for musicians. Normal is the system that’s broken.
Taking opera from the concert halls to the streets was not a new notion for Opera Memphis. Their annual “30 Days of Opera” features small pop-up performances in unlikely places, from playgrounds and dog parks to libraries and groceries.
Beale Street Music Festival is out again for 2021 because of COVID-19, but the World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest will return to the river.
While the impact of COVID makes this a particularly urgent moment for the survival of the city’s creative community, ArtsMemphis also plans to make Arts Week an annual event.
This week’s lineup includes Savannah Brister, a former contestant on “The Voice”; Jeremy Stanfill, who writes and plays soulful roots rock; and The PRVLG, a brother duo who play modern soul.
‘Your friends and family may be familiar with Memphis music past, but how much do they know about Memphis music present? This playlist includes a selection of the freshest tracks I’ve played on my WYXR show “Straight from the Source.”’
Earnestine & Hazel’s, a literal cornerstone of South Main history, culture and nightlife through good times and bad, is now for sale, as Caitlin Chittom announced on Facebook on Monday.
The film stands as both a great Memphis story and a showcase for the city as a filmmaking location that can do more than play itself.
In a career that spans nearly three decades, Marlon “MJG” Goodwin and Premro “8Ball” Smith, are known for their reality raps about the seedy underbelly of society in the Mid-South, but rarely given credit for their ability to pair those observations with a heavy dose of imagination and sobering social commentary.
After a $500,000 restoration, the Orpheum’s organ is “better than it was in 1928.” The theater will offer a free concert by organists Tony Thomas and Vincent Astor on Nov. 19.
For Ramzi Abdoch and Allan Yongo, DJs on WYXR, “pop music” is filtered through their world views and inspired by their lineages.
This fall, three classical musicians moved to Memphis to take part in a new fellowship between the Memphis Symphony Orchestra and the University of Memphis’ Rudi E. Scheidt School of Music.
While the rest of the world bobs for apples, fans of hardcore Memphis rap bob their heads to a collection of artists in the 1990s who built a repertoire around slasher film samples, cartoonish descriptions of grotesque violence and occult imagery.
Elizabeth Cawein’s lifelong love affair with radio informs her new WYXR show, “Straight from the Source,” and the October Playlist.
The federal lawsuit claimed the city interfered with Graceland’s plans for a Whitehaven arena.
Hi-Tone stages have hosted innumerable local record-release shows and been at least a partial home for signature Memphis events.
Recorded at Midtown’s Ardent Studios in late 1986 and early 1987, the Replacements’ “Pleased to Meet Me” is a fusion of the Minneapolis’ band’s ramshackle, often poetic post-punk with soul-honed Memphis studio sensibilities.
The vision for the new era of the radio station is to truly, purely and honestly represent Memphis and its surrounding area.
Memphis doesn’t loom quite as large on this list as it does in pop music history writ-large, or larger.
GonerFest, the internationally known purveyor of one of Memphis’ most famous exports, rock music, takes a step beyond livestreaming to replicate the intangibles that make each year’s event feel like a meeting place.
As a fan at a virtual concert, you always have the best seat in the house, the bathrooms are clean and close, and the drinks are strong and really cheap.
Though initially regarded as the second-tier of talent in a stable of gospel acts led by record producer and DJ Juan Shipp, acts of the JCR Records label are enjoying a revival with the help of a new vinyl reissue.