Our KOWS weekend show airs live every 2nd and 4th Saturday of the month, direct from the KOWS studios in Occidental. In this episode we feature the usual blend of roots music including the country sounds of Joe Maphis, The South Georgia Highballers, Lead Belly, The Levon Helm Band, and we’re going to be entertained by Emmy Oro and her 1950 piece “A Fish House Function (For a Cross Eyed Cat Named Sam)”. And, as usual, it’s so much about the personalities, the stories that the songs tell, as well as the stories behind the music itself. Join Dave Stroud for all of this and more.
Here’s your morning coffee and tea! Join Dave Stroud for a helping of ukulele, blues, gospel, and outlaw meta-modern country sounds. If you haven’t had a chance to find us on a West County Saturday morning, your chance is every second and fourth Saturday morning at 9 PST on TuneIn radio http://tunein.com/radio/KOWS-LP-1073-…. This eclectic blend of music from the past century is also played out on Sundays at 10 PM This week’s show will feature a Langston Hughes reading, some Maria Muldaur, some early century pop from The Boswell Sisters, some cold hard country facts from Sturgill Simpson and Porter Wagoner, and blues from Dave Alvin and Big Bill Broonzy.
We open our Deeper Roots show with some gospel from George and Tammy, The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, and Frank Jenkins and then move onto some R&B, bluegrass and country. The first hour celebrates the sound of roots music from the West Sonoma County studio of KOWS, 107.3 FM while in the second hour, we talk to Josh Windmiller of the North Bay Hootenanny about a show coming up this Sunday at Petaluma’s Mystic Theater featuring David Luning, The Sam Chase, and John Craigie. Josh performs and provides some back stories to the upcoming show.
Released in 1970, Bob Dylan’s double album “Self Portrait” was lambasted by the critics and by most of his fans. Although it was a seemingly natural progression between “Nashville Skyline” and “New Morning”, it lacked original material and seemed to be propping itself against traditional and popular country covers sung in the affected crooning voice that Dylan had introduced in Nashville Skyline. It has been re-released this past year by Columbia in a package called “Another Self Portrait” and features studio tracks not heard before offering unembellished productions that help to uncover what might have been a wholly different album…in the hands of another producer. Even Greil Marcus, the critic who originally wrote in his review of the album “What is this s***?” entertains another look.
In this installment of Deeper Roots, a special edition dedicated to the music of Sister Rosetta Tharpe. Born Rosetta Nubin in Cotton Plant, Arkansas, she began her career at age four performing with her evangelical mother in shows that were part sermon, part gospel concert, and energetic events that got the audience moving. She influenced a great number of performers who would go on to take her secular message into a realm that, for all intents and purposes, she had created: rock and roll. Her electrifying guitar work complimented her voice and she left us with a legacy of recordings that has no peer. Join Dave Stroud Friday night at 9PM as he explores her influences, those she influenced, and music from Sister Tharpe herself.
This episode will be posted to Mixcloud in the near future.
He had become a fixture of the Delta juke joints and small clubs of the South so that when Sam Phillips first recorded him for the Chess Brothers, the change from local legend to urban blues star was a very short journey. He was a giant of a performer in both the figurative sense as well as in real life.
We’ll hear Wolf’s reflections in his own voice as well as the songs that, over the years, were honed into American roots classics. Smokestack Lightnin’, Three Hundred Pounds of Joy, Little Red Rooster, and other pieces of Howlin’ Wolf are a part of this week’s show…performed by both Wolf as well as other artists. Join Dave Stroud for an enlightening journey into the sounds of Howlin Wolf…with its twists of evil, penitence, and fiery passion.
