(Trombone, arranger, composer, 1924–2001) J.J. (James Louis) Johnson was the premier bebop trombonist. His speed of execution and fluent, highly inventive approach to both melody and rhythm essentially devised a new language for an instrument that was not obviously made to suit the wide intervals and rapid articulation of the style. He took up trombone in ...
(Guitar, vocals, 1929–67) J.B. Lenoir was born in Monticello, Mississippi; his parents were farmers as well as musicians. He learned to play the guitar at the age of eight and left home in the early 1940s to work with Rice Miller and Elmore James, before settling in Chicago in 1949 and making his recording debut in ...
(Guitar, vocals, b. 1938) Cale gigged around his native Tulsa, Oklahoma before moving to LA in 1964. He issued his first record in 1971, after Eric Clapton’s hit with Cale’s ‘After Midnight’. Cale is still known to many only through covers of his songs and has always preferred to stay in the background of the blues scene; ...
(Guitar, vocals, 1926–83) The highly theatrical Joseph Benjamin ‘J.B.’ Hutto sang in the Golden Crowns Gospel Singers as a child and made his first records with his backup band, the Hawks, in 1954. Hutto then left the music business but returned, rejuvenated, 10 years later. He toured with various incarnations of the Hawks ...
(Radio showman, 1895–1968) Best known as the emcee of the Grand Ole Opry from its start until the late 1940s, Hay had an earlier career as a newspaper columnist and radio announcer in Memphis, followed by a spell on WLS in Chicago, where he presented the ancestor of the National Barn Dance. Joining WSM in Nashville in ...
(Vocal/instrumental group, 1930s) In 1934 Joseph E. Mainer (1898–1971) and his brother Wade (b. 1907), playing fiddle and banjo respectively, secured a slot on WBT in Charlotte, North Carolina. The group they assembled – adding singer-guitarists Daddy John Love and Zeke Morris – was an immediate hit, not only on radio but also on Bluebird Records with ...
(Banjo, guitar, vocals, b. 1937) James Dee Crowe was just a 19-year-old kid from Kentucky when he was hired by Jimmy Martin in 1956. By 1966 he had developed a banjo style that combined Earl Scruggs’ tumbling roll with Martin’s bouncy pulse. The line-up of Crowe, Bobby Slone, Tony Rice, Ricky Skaggs and Jerry Douglas ...
(Vocalist, b. 1948) Pennsylvania-born Dalton (real name Jill Byrem) worked as a folk singer, recorded under the name of Jill Corston, and was part of the rock group Office before emerging in 1979 after producer Billy Sherrill heard a demo tape. Recording gritty, real-life songs, she won respect and a string of Top 20 country hits ...
(Vocals, songwriter, b. 1950) A member of The Hot Band from 1975–77 as Emmylou Harris’s duet partner, Crowell wrote contemporary classics for her, including ‘’Til I Gain Control Again’ and ‘I Ain’t Living Long Like This’. After a modest start in chart terms with Warner Bros. in the late 1970s, his second Columbia album, Diamonds ...
(Vocals, songwriter, b. 1964) Norway’s O. J. Hanssen is one of Europe’s country-music success stories, having made three albums in Nashville. For 11 years, he divided his time between performing and serving as deputy sheriff in his home town of Mosjøen. With numerous nominations from the European CMA to his credit, his first Nashville album What’s ...
(Vocals, songwriter, b. 1961) Canadian lang’s first international album, the Dave Edmunds-produced Angel With A Lariat (1987), was critically acclaimed. A duet with Roy Orbison on a remake of his 1961 hit, ‘Crying’, for the movie Hiding Out, was her first country hit. She then teamed up with veteran producer Owen Bradley for Shadowlands (1988), which ...
(Vocals, b. 1938) Born James Smith, Proby’s career began on a Houston radio station in 1949, but by the early 1960s, he was an also-ran, taping demos for the similar-sounding Elvis Presley. However, on uprooting to Britain, a mannered vocal style, picaresque image and scandalous trouser-splitting publicity assisted the passages of ‘Hold Me’, ...
(Vocal/instrumental group, 1989–2002, 2005–present) Musically, The Black Crowes were a throwback to the classic rock swagger of The Rolling Stones. Formed in Atlanta, Chris Robinson (vocals), Richard Robinson (guitar), Jeff Cease (guitar), Johnny Colt (bass) and Steve Gorman (drums) combined hard touring and compelling albums such as Shake Your Money Maker (1990) and The Southern Harmony And ...
(Guitar, singer-songwriter, b. 1969) Hailing from the UK’s ‘West Country’, P.J. Harvey is now eight albums into her career. Trading in a primeval, highly feminine strain of blues rock, Polly Jean Harvey has moved from stripped-down rock to sophisticated acoustic ballads before a stomping brand of indie that is incendiary when caught live. She has influenced ...
In 1995, Alison Krauss (vocals, fiddle, b. 1971) achieved a level of success no other bluegrass act had ever matched. Her 1995 retrospective album, Now That I’ve Found You: A Collection, went double platinum, and she won the CMA Awards for Single, Female Vocalist, Vocal Event and Emerging Artist as well as the ...
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An extensive music information resource, bringing together the talents and expertise of a wide range of editors and musicologists, including Stanley Sadie, Charles Wilson, Paul Du Noyer, Tony Byworth, Bob Allen, Howard Mandel, Cliff Douse, William Schafer, John Wilson...
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Classical, Rock, Blues, Jazz, Country and more. Flame Tree has been making encyclopaedias and guides about music for over 20 years. Now Flame Tree Pro brings together a huge canon of carefully curated information on genres, styles, artists and instruments. It's a perfect tool for study, and entertaining too, a great companion to our music books.
David Bowie
Fantastic new, unofficial biography covers
his life, music, art and movies, with a
sweep of incredible photographs.