Listen to Folk Alley on XM 15 - The Village this Friday, February 27th from noon to 2 PM (ET)/9-11 AM (PT). Host, Barb Heller, will bring you 2 hours of the great Folk Alley mix you know and love. If you miss it, or you just want to hear it twice, the show will be available again on Monday, March 2 at midnight ET/9 PM PT.
How to attend the Odetta tribute this Tuesday night in NYC
February 23, 2009
In an E-mail from Christine Lavin:
Riverside Church can hold 2400 people -- there's plenty of room for anyone who would like to attend. Below are directions by subway or car. Thanks so much for spreading the word -- Christine Lavin
ODETTA MEMORIAL CELEBRATION
7:00 pm, Tuesday, February 24th
at Riverside Church
490 Riverside Drive
New York, NY 10027
Tel: 212-870-6700
Closest trains are # 1 train to either 116th Street stop or the 125th Street stop. Riverside Church is located between Riverside Drive and Claremont Avenue between 120th and 122nd Streets.
If driving, take the West Side Highway, get off at 125th Street exit. Turn right onto St. Clair Place for .1 mile. Take slight right onto W. 125th Street/Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd for .1 mile. Turn right onto Broadway for .4 mile. Turn right on W. 120th Street for .1 mile. Turn right onto Riverside Drive for .1 mile, end at 490 Riverside Drive.
WHO: David Amram, Maya Angelou, Harry Belafonte, Oscar Brand, Tom Chapin, Guy Davis, Ruby Dee, Steve Earle, Wavy Gravy, Geoffrey Holder, Holmes Bros. w/ Seth Farber, Maria Muldaur & Marie Knight, Emory Joseph, Bernice Reagon, Sonia Sanchez, Pete Seeger, Sweet Honey in the Rock, Josh White, Jr., and Peter Yarrow & the Brooklyn Tech Chorus. More special guests to follow, in addition to video tributes.
WHAT: Celebration of the life and career of ODETTA, "The Voice of the Civil Rights Movement" (December 31, 1930 - December 2, 2008)
WHERE: RIVERSIDE CHURCH, 490 Riverside Drive (at 121st Street), New York, New York 10027. Tele: 212-870-6700
WHEN: Tuesday, February 24th at 7:00 pm. (Doors open at 6:00 pm)
Odetta was a transformational musical artist of the 20th Century, and "The Voice of the Civil Rights Movement." In a career that spanned more than sixty years, she was the first major influence on the careers of Bob Dylan, Joan Baez and Janis Joplin. Free to the public, the Memorial Celebration will include video highlights of Odetta's life, in addition to song performances and words of remembrance presented by celebrated artists who knew and worked with Odetta. "If only one could be sure that every 50 years a voice and a soul like Odetta's would come along, the centuries would pass so quickly and painlessly we would hardly recognize time." (Maya Angelou)
MusicFog Videos from the 2009 Folk Alliance International Conference in Memphis TN
February 22, 2009
Jessie Scott and the MusicFog.com tour bus rolled into Memphis to capture video from this year's Folk Alliance International Conference. Here is a sampler of some of those videos!
Jimmy LaFave with Radoslav Lorkovic perform "Hideaway Girl"
Ray Bonneville performs "I Am the Big Easy" -- Folk Alliance International 2008 'Song of the Year'
The Refugees (Cindy Bullens, Wendy Waldman, and Deborah Holland) perform "January Sky"
The 2009 International Folk Alliance Conference hit the ground running Wednesday night, as friends gathered in the Memphis Marriott Downtown's Heritage Ballroom to honor and award a fine lot of folk institutions and enthusiasts helping to better the cause.
Emceed mostly by Folk Alliance Board of Directors' president Dan Navarro, the ceremony combined touching video tributes with live performances and a collection of speeches, each evoking the spirit of the Folk Alliance and the soul of roots music. The ceremony was broadcast live on Sirius XM Radio's Channel 15, The Village, and will be available for on-demand listening on FolkAlley.com in the near future.
Among the awarded and honored, lifelong folk contributors Guy and Candie Carawan received the most emotional applause. The jam-packed ballroom was brought to their feet at the sight of the married couple that revolutionized the civil rights anthem "We Shall Overcome."
The Carawans shared Lifetime Achievement Award distinctions with the late Phil Ochs, whose brand of "folk journalism" captured the progressive 1960s Greenwich Village scene and changed the way lyrics were written forever. Chicago's Old Town School of Folk Music, the noted institution that helped keynote speaker Roger McGuinn develop his twangy Rickenbacker sound, earned the third Lifetime Achievement Award.
The Folk DJ community honored two artists, Joe Crookston and Ray Bonneville, for their contributions to 2008's folk music canvas. Crookston earned the distinction of being the most played artist among folk DJs this year, and Bonneville's "I Am the Big Easy" was noted for being the most played song of the year.
Folk Alliance Executive Director Louis Meyers introduced the 1st annual Spirit of Folk award to 9 deserving honorees: Rhonda Barton, Val Denn, Renee Bode, Richard Gilman, Kerry Estrin, Dalis Allen, Sandy Andina, Terry Mutchler, and John Stoecker, each of whom were instrumental in running the Folk Alliance's five regional conferences.
The ceremony additionally saw heartfelt tributes to two recently passed friends of the Folk Alliance, lifelong supporter Vic Heyman and the incomparable Odetta. Both passed in the last three months.
NPR Music has teamed up with a number of public radio music stations, including FolkAlley.com, to create a multi-genre playlist for Valentine's Day. The mix offers songs for the romantics, the heartbroken, and the heartbroken romantics, spanning everything from Brahms to Beck. Feel the love, February 9 - 16.
Remember how long the Open Mic home page used to take to load? Well guess what? It now loads at lightening speed. Check it out! Post some songs, comment on the ones you hear, rate songs, participate. Create multiple accounts and cheat so your ratings get higher than they're supposed to be. Remember, the ratings are for your own benefit - to get valuable feedback on your songs. Visit Open Mic and get started. There are thousands of songs to sink your ears into.
John Martyn - UK Folk Singer/Songwriter died last week on Thursday, January 29. John was a leading figure of the 1960's UK folk scene. His first album, London Conversation, was released in 1967. From there, he went onto release a number of recordings that spanned four decades, often venturing outside of the folk realm and into Jazz, reggae, rock and even funk. In 1973, Martyn released one of the defining British albums of the 1970s, Solid Air. On the album, as with the one that preceded it, Bless the Weather, Martyn collaborated with jazz bass player, Danny Thompson, with whom he proceeded to have a fruitful musical partnership. He also developed a new, slurred vocal style, the timbre of which resembled a tenor saxophone. Paying tribute to Martyn, BBC Radio 2's folk presenter Mike Harding said: "John Martyn was a true original, one of the giants of the folk scene. He could write and sing classics like 'May You Never' and 'Fairy Tale Lullaby' like nobody else, and he could sing traditional songs like 'Spencer The Rover' in a way that made them seem new minted."
Folk Alley on XM 15 - The Village
