Pioneering acoustic guitarist and delta blues folklorist, creator of the Takoma record label John Fahey was born in Washington DC in 1939. His family moved to Takoma Park, a Washington suburb when he was six years old. Fahey grew up listening to the...
Topics: folk, guitar, guitar instrumental, John Fahey, red pony, Takoma

Frederick Russell Jones was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on July 2, 1930. When he was four years old his uncle challenged him to repeat what he, the uncle, was playing on the family’s piano. Young Fritz was able to reproduce by ear everything...
Topics: Ahmad Jamal, jazz, Miles Davis, piano

I’m going to interrupt the normal flow of thing to bring you a clip from last year’s Philadelphia Folk Festival. I just returned from the 2008 festival, where I worked on the production crew. Last year the Lovell sisters played some of the...
Topics: bluegrass, folk, Philadelphia Folk Festival

Soul star, composer, film star and South Park character actor Isaak Hayes died today of an apparent heart attack. He was found lying next to a still running treadmill in his Memphis Tennessee home. Hayes was 65 years old.Here is a clip of a performance...
Topics: funk, Isaak Hayes, movies, pop, rock, soul

Ethel Ennis has lived in Baltimore, Maryland all her life. She has been criticized for staying there, but by staying in her home town Ennis has built a strong local base of support for her career. Ennis often went for several years without making an...
Topics: Ethel Ennis, jazz, vocalist, vocalists