Deeper Roots heads down the long hot stretch of 99 to California’s Central Valley to visit the country sound that blew in from every direction…starting with the Dust Bowl. Bakersfield was a first step, a way station, for migrant workers coming into California to escape hard times in the Midwest; their treatment by the small minds of fearful communities being little different than those migrants we think of today. “In the years following World War II, Bakersfield had plentiful honky-tonks including the soon-to-be-famous Blackboard Cafe. People drank, danced, and even fought to Western swing music.” The sound of Nashville began to become watered down, losing its appeal to some who thought it had lost a reverence for the heart and soul of working class Country. We’ll hear from Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, Wynn Stewart, Tommy Collins, and Billy Mize and tip our cap to a great book on the subject of the Bakersfield sound and the history of Country Music: Workin’ Man Blues written by local author and Central Valley native, Gerald Haslam.
Category Archives: Featured Music
Songs of the Century – Misses
Join us on our second of two episodes exploring the Top 30 songs of the 20th century as it is so suggested by the Record Industry Association of America (RIAA)…this time, however, Dave Stroud suggests 30 that he believes were worthy of the list but which either a) did not make the list or was b) buried further down the larger list of 365. The fun continues. Last week we discovered that “Over the Rainbow” was #1 and that “Rhapsody in Blue” was nowhere to be found on the larger list. This week we get payback and find songs like “Blue Moon of Kentucky”, “Rocket 88″, and “West End Blues” our own list. Our list too is not without controversy.
San Antone – KOWS August 10, 2015
We’re filling in once more for Mark Hogan and his Bluegrass and Old Time Hour. This week, we’ve put together another two hours of music that spans close to a full century…including Cliff Edwards from 1933, Woody Guthrie, Jimmie Lunceford, and Dave Van Ronk (just to name a few). There will be some themes and schemes built into our sets this evening including the story of Caldonia, the Texas town of San Antone, and heading down a dusty road of a century of America’s music.
Songs of the Century
The Record Industry Association of America (RIAA) produced a list a few years back that they called the “Songs of The Century”. It was concocted based on a questionable set of sampling and was to represent and “promote a better understanding of America’s musical and cultural heritage.” The voting pool was a strange mixture elected officials, school students and teachers, as well as industry professionals. The respondent pool was about 200. The list is woefully inadequate but certainly worth discussing. Deeper Roots will spend this week exploring the top 30 (of 365) and follow up with its own list in a second episode next week. Listen in as we stretch the imagination.
Wake Up! – KOWS August 8, 2015
It’s a joy to queue up a century of America’s music every other Saturday morning in West County…live from the heart and voice of West Sonoma County’s KOWS studios in downtown Occidental. A common theme will run through this morning’s show and it’s all about waking up: gospel’s Mahalia Jackson and When I Wake Up in Glory, Roy Milton and the Wake Up Blues, James Brown’s Get Up Offa That Thing … and more!
Beautiful Dreamer – KOWS August 3, 2015
Mark Hogan’s Bluegrass and Old-Time Hour is on hiatus for two weeks while Mark is back in Galax, Virginia checking out the summer activities including a Fiddler’s Convention. And we’re going to honor his muse this week, the first of two Monday episodes where Deeper Roots fills his spot in the schedule on KOWS. We’ve got plenty of bluegrass in the first hour featuring new music from Trout Steak Revival and classics from Bill Monroe and Mac Martin. Our second hour rolls out a run of Stephen Foster covers done by Jack Clement, Jonathan Edwards, The Sons of the Pioneers, and others.
Songs of Protest
This week’s show on KWTF runs down a century’s worth of protest music. We’ve got some of the familiars, but we’ve also got some of the not-so-familiars. Out playlists will focus on a couple of the major issues of half century ago that we find ourselves embroiled in today. We’ll hear civil rights anthems and performances from some of the more emphatic musical voices of the sixties that were railing against a war. You’ll also hear topics of union organizing and social justice including the sounds of Nina Simone, Bob Dylan, Billie Holiday, Pete Seeger, the SNCC Freedom Singers, Marvin Gaye, and many others.
Connections II
We take another trip down the roots rabbit hole with the usual selections of blues, bluegrass, country, gospel, and tradition in a show that follows a thread that begins with The Del McCoury Band’s bluegrass cover of Mama’s Hungry Eyes and winds its way to conclusion down the endless black ribbon. In between we’ve got kind words and last words, chain gangs and jailers, and songs about bird dogs and mockingbirds. The show is a special ‘stream of musical roots consciousness’ called “Connections”.
Ragged But Right – KOWS July 25, 2015
Hot summer days…cool West County nights. Deeper Roots finds the right balance on Saturday mornings in Occidental this week with music about ramblers and gamblers featuring Ralph Stanley, Tom Russell, and Sturgill Simpson. We’ll also find ourselves in the crosshairs of country, blues, and southern gospel with songs of light and life featuring Hank Williams, Gary Davis, and Marty Stuart. Riley Puckett, The Sons of the Pioneers, and the Selah Jubilee Singers also join in on another Saturday morning filled with roots music on KOWS 107.3-LP FM. Tune in on TuneIn!
Ladies of Gospel
The influence of gospel music on the forms of rock, rhythm and blues, jazz, and soul are fairly well documented. The elements of early black gospel music arose from a tradition of work songs, anthems, spirituals, hollers, and the stylized performance of hymns. The evolution of the form, particularly in the Church of God In Christ (COGIC), reveals a freedom of expression that made its listeners ‘move with the spirit’. We’ll hear from the ladies from the COGIC as well as the traditionalists that could bring in the masses to the church with their uplifting, sometimes roaring voices including Sister Ernestine Washington, Edna Gallmon Cooke, Sister Goldia Haynes, Mahalia Jackson, and Sister Rosetta Tharpe.