Ok, I volunteer at KASU and part of the deal is all the actual employees get a long vacation over Christmas Break. Which means I have to get all my Something Blue shows produced and turned in at the station early. Which is nice in a way because now I've got everything done and I don't have to worry about producing shows during the holidays. But it's naughty in a way because I missed Protest Tuesday.
Then last night I got to record Sonny Burgess and The Legendary Pacers at the KASU Bluesday Tuesday show in Newport, Arkansas. This is actually the second time I've seen The Pacers in a week. I also saw them when I took Joe Lee to Scotty Moore's 80th birthday party in Memphis Saturday night. Now Newport is a dancing crowd and by the end of the show they had everyone on the floor. The music was great and I hope I have good recordings for a future Something Blue show.
Mike Doyle, station manager at KASU, went to Newport early so he could talk about Dealing With The Media at an economic development seminar. After that we visited with Henry Boyce and spent a little bit of time talking about music at his Rockabilly Museum that heavily features Newport native, Sonny Burgess. Henry Boyce puts on the Depot Days Rockabilly festival in Newport and since Mike and I are both heavily involved with promoting Northeast Arkansas and other Delta musicians that's where the conversation went.
Arkansas Highway 67 has just been dubbed the Rock and Roll Highway and towns up and down the highway are promoting a variety of events and permanent exhibits. Also the ASU Museum is adding a rockabilly exhibit with a center exhibit being a recreation of Joe Lee's Alley Records studio.
So you can see there is a major push from all quarters to promote and preserve the music of Northeast Arkansas and to bring music tourism into the area. After all the closest big city is Memphis, Tennessee, the music tourism capital of the world, so we already have people visiting the area from all over the world. And our state capital, Little Rock, also has a rich musical history and a thriving current music scene.
The takeaway from this is no one person can make this happen. We need people invested in their own communities putting on events and establishing permanent exhibits and we all have to cooperate and support each other. We need NPR personnel, museum curators, volunteers, and most of all musicians all on board. We share a dream and we are working to make it come true.
more ...
Part of what I do to promote Delta music is the Delta Boogie website.
http://deltaboogie.com
I also run the Delta Boogie Network, a social network for musicians and fans.
http://deltaboogie.net
I have been running the Delta Boogie Network on web services. Over this last month I have moved it to the Elgg social network, an open source platform that I run on a virtual server. This gives me a lot more freedom to customize the network and removes limitations that necessarily come with any web service.
Since the Delta Boogie Network is about music it is important to me that members can post their videos and songs. Embed Extender is an Elgg plugin that makes this possible. I have been working with Ray J, who wrote the plugin, to add more widgets. So I can add widgets and test them on the Delta Boogie Network and then Ray J can integrate these new embeds into the code and anyone running Elgg can make these embedded widgets available to their members.
Open Source software was designed like this, to be a community effort where individual enthusiasts can scratch their itch and then provide their new solutions to the community at large with everyone benefitting. Sound familiar? Yes indeedy.
Now to the Protest Music part of the diary.
Billy Jones is a Little Rock musician. He's all about internet promotion so he really dressed up his page on the Delta Boogie Network.
http://deltaboogie.net/...
I recorded his band, Billy Jones Bluez, earlier this year at Bluesday Tuesday.
http://www.archive.org/...
I also had a really good night taking pictures.
http://deltaboogie.com/...
Now Billy writes a lot of Protest Music displaying a depth to his social consciousness. Check out his work and you will see what I'm talking about. But I want to make you a Billy Jones fan right now so I'm including this funny song that I guarantee you will like.
Marry My Mother-in-law
Now ain't that the shiznit?
Hairy Larry and The Flying Hungarians is my family band and one of the first bands I added to the Delta Boogie Network.
http://deltaboogie.net/...
You all know that I write Protest Music. Here's a couple of song's from the Hungarian's Blues For Peace CD that you can listen to on the Delta Boogie Network.
First the title track done live in my front yard.
Blues For Peace
And I also want to include a funny song of my own recorded at the Craighead Forest Bandshell.
Think I'll Lay Around The House Today
I hope you enjoy those. Of course, there's a lot more on the Delta Boogie Network.
Now for my Call To Action.
Please link on over to the Delta Boogie Network and sign up.
http://deltaboogie.net
If you're a musician promote your act. If you're not enjoy the music and the conversation. Like I say at the end of my Jazz Thursday spots, I hope to see you there.
Thanks,
Hairy Larry