For Clarence Fountain-the 70-something years-young leader of The Blind Boys of Alabama-his earliest memories of Christmas are among the most vivid.
“I must’ve been about three or four years old, living with my family in Tyler, Alabama, in Dallas County. We were out in the country and didn’t get to town but once in a […]
MY FRIEND CHARLIE CHRISTIAN
By LES PAUL as told to ANDY SCHWARTZ
The year was 1938. I was living in New York and playing on the NBC radio network, five nights a week. It was the coast-to-coast broadcast of “The Chesterfield Hour” with Fred Waring & His Pennsylvanians, featuring the Les Paul Trio. So three times a […]
I never knew him. I never saw him play. Only within the past few years did I become aware of his existence. But James Black has cast a spell on me.
I am haunted by the unexpected shifts in his compositions and arrangements, the restless creativity of his unquiet spirit, the unfinished business of hit-and-run sessions […]