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On the Cover

Kristian Bush: Rediscovers His Voice Through Southern Gravity


Kristian Bush has been a successful professional union musician since the 1990s, but it’s only recently that the Local 257 (Nashville, TN) member launched his first solo album, Southern Gravity. After spending his most recent 10 years as the silent but creative voice behind the duo Sugarland, the singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist says some people are surprised to hear him sing.

“When I started Sugarland it was pretty clear that my voice was not going to fit on country radio. At the time, the singers signed had rich baritone voices, but now my voice feels like a good fit for current commercial country music. So this first record, my third first record, weirdly enough, is right on time,” says Bush.

Long before Sugarland, Bush had already achieved commercial singing success in the folk rock duo Billy Pilgrim with
Andrew Hyra more than 20 years ago. That’s when he first joined Local 148-462 (Atlanta, GA). “I’m a very proud union member,” he says. “It always feels like there’s another person in the conversation every time I get paid, which I am grateful for because this business is complicated and has changed dramatically since I signed up
in 1994.”

Kristian-BushBush later transferred to Local 257 with Sugarland. “The Nashville union is very thorough on their approach to protecting musicians,” he says, “really making sure everybody gets the most they can get paid out of every session.”

Bush founded Sugarland in 2002 with his friend Kristen Hall. Jennifer Nettles, also a member of Local 257, was the fifth singer to audition for lead vocalist and co-songwriter with the group. “She blew it out of the water,” says Bush.

“The second song we wrote together was ‘Baby Girl,’” he says, recalling their quick success after Nettles joined. As Sugarland’s debut single, the song eventually went to number two on the Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks charts, and stayed on the chart for a record-setting 46 weeks. Sugarland became a duo when Hall dropped out after the first album.

Between 2004 and 2012 Sugarland released eight successful albums and racked up dozens of music industry honors, including the 2005 American Music Awards Favorite Breakthrough New Artist, the 2006 ACM award for Top New Duo or Vocal Group, two Academy of Country Music (ACM) awards for Top Vocal Duo and one for Single of the Year, five Country Music Association (CMA) Vocal Duo of the Year awards, four Country Music Television (CMT) Duo Video of the Year awards, and two Grammy awards.

Check out the gear Bush prefers using.

Tragedy Follows Success

Kristian-Bush-stairsSugarland’s success was suddenly and tragically tempered by pain on August 13, 2011. The stage collapsed above them as they waited underneath to begin a show at the Indiana State Fair. Seven people were killed and 100 others were injured, among them stagehands, security personnel, and fans. Though he and Nettles were uninjured, Bush says the event changed him forever in ways that he hasn’t even totally understood.

“Music should be a safe place, no matter what. I certainly look up now every time I walk on stage,” he says. Some of the stage crew led a charge for better stage safety following the tragedy, which has resulted in new regulations for safer outdoor stage rigging techniques.

In 2012, Nettles decided she wanted to take a break from Sugarland to start a family and make a solo album. When the pair put Sugarland on hold, Bush says an independent career wasn’t something he’d even considered. However, fueled by a particularly emotional time in his life, he suddenly found himself flooded by songs.

Not only was he dealing with the aftermath of the stage collapse, but also the breakup of his 12-year marriage. He didn’t speak publicly about either until earlier this year. Instead, he poured his emotions into songs. “There was a lot of sadness and mourning, but every once in a while an incredibly bright song would pop out. They are like hot air balloons; you just kind of want to hold onto them and see if they lift you up,” he says.

But, with his sudden productivity, came self-doubt. “I usually write about a song a month—12 to 15 a year; suddenly, kind of as soon as we parked the bus off the last tour, I was writing one almost every other day,” he says. “I was a little worried that the songs weren’t any good because they were coming too fast. It was unsettling and it started to make me question what I should do for a living. What if, at this level of success, people aren’t telling me the truth?”

To counter his doubts Bush sought collaborators. “I thought the only way I could figure out an honest answer was to write with the best people I could find. I went all over the world,” he explains. “I went to see Will Jennings in LA, and I said, ‘Teach me how to write for film’; I went to Stockholm and Jøgen Olsen and said, ‘Teach me how to write a pop song’; and I went to Nashville, to Paul Overstreet and Bob DiPiero [of Local 257], and said, ‘Teach me how to write the best country music’; and I went to London to Sacha Scarbeck and James Blunt.” These influences and co-writers can be heard on Southern Gravity.

Right Time for Radio

kristian-bush-featureBush says that, even when he knew he had the songs, he was still reluctant to take focus away from Sugarland. “Then, I figured out that my voice, Jennifer’s voice, and the band can be on the radio at the same time; it was not going to affect my band for me to have a solo record,” he continues. “I now have two careers. Sugarland is still together; we have a couple records left with our label and it’s going to be super exciting when we get to do it.”

The final hurdle was figuring out, from all the songs he’d written and recorded, just what he wanted to sound like. “Thinking about what I sound like can be unsettling at first,” he says. “I wrote 300 songs for this record and recorded them all. The process of that almost felt like discovering my voice.”

Bush co-produced the album with executive producer Byron Gallimore and Tom Tapley, whom he also worked with on Sugarland’s studio albums. “I love producing albums,” says Bush, “but it’s weird to produce your own vocals. You have to emotionally detach yourself. So the hardest part is the speed. I would do full takes, cut them together, and then take it home and listen to it for two or three days.”

In the end, they created an album far removed from the emotional turmoil where it began. Instead, Southern Gravity is hopeful, even joyful. “These songs are like Post-it notes that you might put around your house as inspirational reminders,” says Bush. “I listen to them for that reason sometimes—to remind myself that no matter how hard it gets, you can make things out of the pieces that are smashed.”

Once the songs were complete, it was time to begin his first solo tour. Bush admits that, even as a veteran musician, it felt strange to take the stage as a solo act. “I was so nervous my first show. It was strangely at the [huge] O2 Arena in London and I was opening for Little Big Town and Tim McGraw. I walked out on stage and my heart was practically beating out of my chest. I broke into the first song, and suddenly it was like, ‘Wait a minute, I totally know how to do this!’” he recalls.

Bush recently had the opportunity to look back on his career through a new documentary to air this month called Walk Tall (also the name of one of the tunes on his album). “It’s about Southern Gravity, but it’s also a journey, and what it’s like to make music after terrible things happen,” he says of the film. “As Americans, as people, the idea of never giving up is really important. When you have a passion, a belief, a joy, whatever life throws at you, the only choice you really have is how you deal with it. I’ve started to realize that there’s a resiliency in loving what you do and you go back to it as a way to ground yourself.”

Two tips for upcoming singer songwriters from Kristian Bush:

1) “Don’t give up; don’t judge yourself until about 100 songs because it’s going to suck for a while. They are going to be emotionally very much like your babies; write them as exercises.”

2) “There is so much technology out there to give you rhythms to write against. Whether it’s an app on your phone, a piece of software, or a drum machine, write against a beat.  I love the way lyrics bounce against a rhythm.”

On the Cover

Jane Little Traces the Steps of Her 70-Year Career

Growing up in Atlanta, Georgia, Jane Little was drawn to music from the time she was a small child, and did everything she could to seek out musical opportunities. “I so wanted to play the piano,” she says in her Southern drawl. “But my family struggled during the Depression and we had no piano. I would go to the neighbors’ house to use theirs. I would try to pick out tunes and taught myself to play a little bit.”

Little tuned in to the Metropolitan Opera radio broadcasts every Saturday afternoon, joined the glee club in junior high, and decided that she would become an opera singer. “I was delusional at that time!” she laughs. There was no doubt, though, that music was her passion. Atlanta didn’t yet have its own symphony, but when an orchestra toured to the city, Little was eager to attend. “It was the first time I heard a symphony orchestra perform live,” she recalls. “And I was just carried away.”
Assistant Principal Bass Jane Little was a 1945 charter member of the original Atlanta Youth Symphony Orchestra, the forerunner of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra. Little will begin her 71st season with the ASO this fall.

Facing the Bass

Little continued to sing and planned to join the high school glee club when she entered her freshman year. But the orchestra director had different plans once she saw the results of Little’s music aptitude test, which every incoming student was required to take.

“I was called to the music room, and the orchestra director asked what instrument I played,” remembers Little, who answered that she didn’t play an instrument, but liked to sing. The director was shocked and explained that Little had scored tremendously high on the test. “I was 14 at the time, which is a little late to start an instrument, but she asked how I would like to be an orchestra musician. I said that I would like it more than anything!”

The orchestra was in short supply of bass players. At five feet and three inches, and weighing less than 100 pounds, Little seemed an unlikely match for the massive instrument, but she wanted to try. She struggled at first to hear the lowest pitches and could barely press down the thick E string—not to mention, even just carrying the bass around was no easy task.

“I thought, ‘Oh my gosh, this is going to be a challenge!’” she says. “But I was back for the next lesson, and the next, and the next.” After just a couple months of private lessons, Little was ready to join the orchestra—and not only did she join, but she was quickly appointed principal bass.

The next year, the Atlanta Youth Symphony Orchestra was formed under the direction of Henry Sopkin, a well-known youth orchestra conductor in Chicago. Little became a member of the symphony, which performed its first concert on February 4, 1945. In retrospect, that was the beginning of her 70-plus-year career with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra (ASO); within three years, Sopkin transformed the youth symphony into the orchestra now known as the ASO.

Eventually, Little met someone who happened to be able to give her a hand carrying her bass. Warren, who would become her husband, joined the orchestra’s flute section in 1948. The two had first met at the University of Georgia, but Little was engaged to a naval officer at the time. She returned to ASO after spending a summer in Chicago studying with a great bass teacher from the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and Warren noticed that Little was no longer wearing her engagement ring; she had broken her engagement in order to stay in Atlanta and continue playing with the orchestra. Warren asked her out right away. Their first date was a performance by the legendary violinist David Oistrakh.

“I must say that when I met Warren, I was very impressed that he played a small instrument, so he could carry my bass around!” jokes Little. The couple made music together in the ASO until Warren’s retirement in 1992.

Acing the Audition

Henry Sopkin led ASO for 21 years, increasing the budget, adding concerts, and introducing education initiatives. When he stepped down in 1966, it was announced that Robert Shaw—an exceptional choral conductor who had been working with George Szell in Cleveland—would become the next ASO music director. Little knew that even more changes would be ahead for the orchestra. She was excited, but nervous.

Shaw asked to hear every member of the orchestra play individually. Little had two weeks’ notice about the audition, and she didn’t waste a minute getting to work; she knew how crucial this could be. “I told my family that Christmas would have to be on hold that year,” she says. “I was practicing seven or eight hours a day, going through all the literature, doing everything I could.”

When she walked into the audition, Little felt immediately at ease with Shaw. She aced her audition: “I never played better in my life!” she exclaims. “When I got my contract, I was overwhelmed. Robert Shaw had appointed me co-principal of the bass section.” Little was later named assistant principal bass, and now holds emeritus status for that position.

Under Shaw’s watch, the ASO continued to build its reputation. Little can list off an impressive roster of guest soloists and conductors she has performed with—Nathan Milstein, Isaac Stern, Benny Goodman, Igor Stravinsky, Aaron Copland, and many more.

One of her favorite memories is of a sold-out concert with pianist Arthur Rubinstein, who was playing the Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto. “He plays the first big chords of the concerto, and all of a sudden, the piano starts rolling toward the end of the stage,” she recalls. “The people in the first rows were scattering. Everyone was just in horror!” Thankfully, the piano caught in the footlights, which kept it from crashing off the stage, and Rubenstein took it all in stride. Once the piano had been secured, the show went on.

The show went on for Little, too, as ASO became a full-time orchestra and gained international renown. She played under Yoel Levi, who became music director in 1988 and “brought the orchestra to new heights,” Little says. He was followed by Robert Spano of Local 148-462 (Atlanta, GA), who took over in 2000. “Through two major lockouts in the last four years, Spano has remained a friend and supporter to the musicians,” she says. “He was determined to maintain the orchestra’s status as a major symphony.”

Earlier in her career, piecing together a living was a bit more unpredictable. “Back then, when the orchestra was still part-time, you would go and beat the bushes for work,” she says. For 15 years, Little played with Theater of the Stars, where she was the only woman in the band. She taught private bass lessons and even saw one of her students grow up to join the ASO.

She’s played for opera companies, and remembers times when she was the only bass player in the pit, and had her instrument amped. She also played with the Savannah Philharmonic Orchestra, often making the four-hour drive with a group of fellow ASO musicians late at night after an ASO concert or rehearsal, in order to be ready for a rehearsal in Savannah the next morning. “You did what you had to do,” she states matter-of-factly.

Chasing the Record

Little, who belongs to Local 148-462, is grateful to the AFM, as well as the International Conference of Symphony Orchestra Musicians (ICSOM), formed in 1962, for improving working conditions for orchestra musicians. She has witnessed the positive changes to audition procedures, tenure, and the musicians’ ability to weather strikes and lockouts.

Little has done her share of walking the picket lines and remembers her husband’s determination to negotiate fair contracts—even if it meant late-night phone calls and meetings—when he served as president of the local. “It’s great protection to be a member of the AFM—the union is your friend!” she says. “It brings greater stability to our careers.”

Little has now completed her 70th season with ASO, setting the record as the orchestral musician with the longest-running career, despite enduring several injuries and challenges over the years. At a certain point, she explains, she knew that she had to keep playing because she was so close to that goal. “To be absolutely sure [that I break the record], I’m going to play into my 71st season,” she says, adding that she might consider retirement at some point during the season.

Of course, more important than any record is the unique dedication that she shows for her instrument and for symphonic music. Even over a seven-decade career, she continues to give her all at every concert, never resting on her laurels. She was recently preparing for an ASO concert that included Mendelssohn’s “Italian” Symphony and noted that it was one of the first pieces she played with her high school orchestra. “It’s still difficult!” she says, a testament to the fact that she always reaches to grow in her artistry.

“Suppose I had been absent the day that we took that music test?” Little wonders. “I probably wouldn’t have this career. I must say I’ve had a charmed life.”

john williams im cover
On the Cover

John Williams: Back Again to a Galaxy

John WilliamsThe scene opens on a black screen. From the depths of inaudibility, a single eerie string chord rises to underpin the image of a windswept desert landscape.

Instantly, we know where we are: a desert planet much like the homeworld of Luke Skywalker. And, equally importantly, we know who wrote that unmistakable chord: John Williams, the legendary composer of the soundtracks for all six (soon to be seven) installments of the Star Wars saga.

It’s probably fair to say that a significant portion of the American public was waiting impatiently for the debut of this first of two trailers advertising the Christmas release of The Force Awakens, the latest Star Wars chapter. It’s an equally fair bet that Williams’ music played a big role in that anticipation. Every bit as important as the characters and scenes they portray, Williams’ soundtracks have tended to take on a life of their own in every film he has scored in a career spanning more than six decades, and incorporating a filmography fast approaching the century mark.

With the film’s premiere still months away, recording sessions for The Force Awakens are just getting started, with the initial sessions slated for the first week of June. Williams tackled earlier recordings for both trailers, with the second trailer being released several weeks ago to add to the mounting excitement around Star Wars VII. Williams says sessions will continue through August, possibly into September. “Then it’s back and forth with editing,” he says. The music will be recorded over several months while working in tandem with the film’s editorial and special effects teams on the West Coast. “At the moment I’m working on composing the music, which I started at the beginning of the year. I’ve been through most of the film reels, working on a daily basis.”

Old School Approach

John Williams, a life member of Locals 9-535 (Boston, MA) and 47 (Los Angeles), is the winner of five Academy Awards, four Golden Globes, and 22 Grammys, and has composed many of the most popular and recognizable film scores in cinematic history. He meticulously crafts themes that virtually become living, breathing characters in their own right. But it may come as a surprise that the man who writes music for space pirates and evil galactic empires prefers a fairly old-fashioned method of composition. “I work very much in what some would consider old school,” he says, “in front of the keyboard with pencil and paper. The piano is my favorite tool. Over the decades there has been so much amazing technological change in the music business, but I’ve been so busy that I never really retooled.”

Williams explains that it used to be standard practice for a film composer to write music that was then passed off to assistants to flesh out for full orchestra. By contrast, he typically composes fully orchestrated sketches, eight to 10 lines indicating winds, brass, strings, and percussion. “The music library then transfers these directly to a computerized score from which instrumental parts are made,” he says. “We can reprint parts, edit as needed, change the bowings, etc.” He admits the irony is not lost on him that his work quickly becomes state of the art despite its more traditional beginnings.

Somewhat surprisingly, Williams prefers not to read scripts before he tackles writing his first ideas on a score. “I’ve always preferred to write only to footage,” he says. A little like a set designer, he writes music according to a story’s mood and setting, and the feeling that a particular scene might be trying to convey. The process starts with a “spotting” session, deciding in meetings with the director which scenes will feature music and which will not. For four decades, Williams has enjoyed a fruitful (to say the least) collaboration with director Steven Spielberg, and—for most of the previous Star Wars films—George Lucas as director and/or screenwriter. For The Force Awakens, Star Wars newcomer J.J. Abrams is in the director’s chair.

“J.J. Abrams has been a joy,” says Williams, expressing his delight with the working relationship so far. “He’s a very genial, warm person. We had a few preliminary meetings and I played themes on the piano to which he responded very positively. By and large he has allowed me to do my thing, and our minds have been together on our approach to the scoring.”

Once Abrams has the music in hand, the film will be edited. “Neither of us will see the final version with the special effects until much later,” Williams continues. “Any music changes that need to be done are made later in the editing process, which sometimes involves some rerecording.” Every shot requires thousands of adjustments. “It’s a two-hour-plus journey of complex details that all interrelate, with music being only one of them,” he adds. Tempo, dynamics, instrumental effects—all need to be married to what is happening in the screen images. Williams feels that when the desired effect is achieved, all those long hours of work should be unseen and unnoticed. “The final product, the finished film, has to feel seamless and natural, as with everything we do. Time is just one of the necessary ingredients in the process.”

Music as Character

john-william-recordingFilm music’s traditional role has been to set a mood, but remain subservient to the screen action. In many cases, this role also included the subtle underpinning of a particular character to reinforce personality traits—or quirks. In the case of the Star Wars films, Williams has aimed to raise the music to the level of a story character in its own right. As with his approach to composing, the technique used to achieve this goal looks back to an earlier time: that of 19th century opera composer Richard Wagner and his concept of the leitmotif, a recurring theme throughout the opera that becomes associated with a particular person, idea, or situation.

Wagner’s four Ring operas, not unlike the Star Wars saga, are massive in scope and reach, with literally dozens of characters that need to be remembered and differentiated. Each character (and sometimes a nonliving story element) is given its own particular identifying theme, the leitmotif. In four operas lasting up to six hours each, Wagner utilized more than 90 of these themes to tie together story and characters. Thus it is with the galaxy-spanning Star Wars films, where from the outset Williams linked Darth Vader inexorably to a dark, unstoppable march, while Princess Leia’s regal beauty is given voice by solo flute and horn. Even the Force, the unseen mystical power binding together the Star Wars galaxy, is given its own special snippet of music. Over the course of the next five films, most of the regular Star Wars characters come to be immediately identified by the particular themes that Williams has created for them.

Williams says he plans to continue the use of leitmotifs in the new film. “While the majority of the music is also new, there are necessary references to early story lines, which helps create association with the previous films,” he explains. “So the music will look back in spots to the earlier films, but there are also new themes that will be applied in a similar way.”

So it would seem that even though film composition has changed radically in the last half-century, there are some techniques that will always find a use. This blending of old and new is something of a recurring theme with Williams, and that includes where he sees film music heading in succeeding generations. In the ’40s and ’50s, serious composers routinely wrote film music. While this isn’t the case so much these days, he sees the next generation of composers returning to it. “Philip Glass, for example, has been quite involved in writing film music, and this has helped get other composers more interested in the possibilities in writing for film,” he points out. “In the future, I think serious composers will become even more interested. Changes in technology also help change aesthetic approaches. More connections between the audio and visual world also open up possibilities that young composers find increasingly intriguing.”

First Class Musicians

John-williams-composerA living, breathing score takes talented musicians to bring it to life. After six previous film soundtracks being recorded in the UK with the London Symphony Orchestra, The Force Awakens marks the first Star Wars soundtrack to be recorded on American shores, utilizing musicians from AFM Local 47. “With this new film, the schedule has evolved to the point that I’ll need to be working with the orchestra continuously for several months, and that’s obviously easier for me to do here in Los Angeles, than it would be in London.”

“We are thrilled that this is the first Star Wars soundtrack to be recorded in the US,” says Sandy DeCrescent, who has contracted Local 47 musicians for Williams’ film scores for many decades. “So much music before this was disappearing overseas, and John has been a moving force in bringing the work back to American musicians.”

Williams says he feels very privileged to be working with the freelance orchestra in Los Angeles, an ensemble he knows well. “This group is made up of a pool of freelancers in Southern California. I’ve worked with them for decades now on a variety of films, and I am friends with most of them. They consistently come together to form a fabulous orchestra, and I’m always happy and proud to be reunited with them for these projects.”

Trumpet player Jon Lewis is a member of the freelance orchestra, and he says the experience is off to an incredible start with the recording of the two trailers. “The first trailer was the first time any of this music was recorded in LA,” says Lewis. “We had the pleasure of running the original Star Wars main titles for a ‘warm-up,’ as John called it. What a thrill that was, and it was such an amazing sound to hear coming out of the Sony scoring stage that day—as near perfection as I’ve ever heard.”

Stephen Erdody, Williams’ principal cellist for the last 16 years, agrees, adding that the working process with Wiliams is always efficient and rewarding. “John is an outstanding musician, an amazing orchestrator, and he has the best ears in the business,” Erdody enthuses. “The two trailer sessions were each three hours long, and all of us take great pride in our speed of recording and our ability to adjust and make changes to improve the final product as quickly as possible.”

“The pressure to get things right is always there in any recording session, and I think the Los Angeles musicians meet that challenge better than anywhere else in the world,” explains Lewis. Aside from small changes or balancing adjustments, each and every take is as presentable as the next.”

“When that red light goes on, it’s 100% focus and attention to producing an amazing performance,” adds horn player Andrew Bain.

For flutist Heather Clark, the experience of working with Williams has an added element of pressure. “The amazing flutist Louise DiTullio has played principal flute for John Williams the past 40 years, and it’s an honor and a great responsibility to fill such big shoes on a huge movie playing for a legendary composer who continues to raise the bar on film music. It will be the experience of a lifetime.”

All four musicians agree that the thrill of being part of an American cultural icon far outweighs any pressures and stresses of recording sessions. Says Erdody, “A few days after I graduated from Juilliard in 1977, I saw Star Wars and it changed the way I watched and listened to movies from that day forward. That score had an enormous impact on me, and I can’t believe some 38 years later I will be a part of the next installment.”

“I’m still so in love with this business, and to be the first American orchestra to play for a Star Wars movie is beyond exciting for all of us,” says Lewis. “I think the entire movie industry underwent a major shift due to the grand score that John Williams composed for the original movie. The trend of movie music shifted back to full orchestras, and for several decades since, the role of music in film has been far more important than ever before.”

As Williams loves his LA musicians, he has similar high praise for orchestra musicians elsewhere across the US. Over the past two decades since his 13 years at the helm of the Boston Pops, he says he has conducted as many American orchestras as he could possibly manage with his schedule. In particular, Williams feels a responsibility to be involved in benefits for AFM musicians’ pension funds and also for educational outreach programs. “We have so many orchestras in this country that are truly world class,” he says. “All of them are fabulous. It makes me realize that, although our country is geographically larger than most, we really do have more amazing orchestras than any other place.” He believes this speaks to the success of American music education. “We can all take great pride as a nation in the number of fabulously high-level arts institutions in this country, and we don’t praise them nearly enough,” he says.

“There are obviously great orchestras and schools all around the world, but we can be so very proud of what American schools produce here every single year. We don’t celebrate this enough, and we absolutely need to be more vocal about it.”

loretta lynn cover image
On the Cover

Loretta Lynn: Music Keeps Her Young

Loretta LynnLoretta Lynn’s career has inspired musicians for 50 years, and her personal story of persistence and success paved the way for many strong female country singers who followed in her footsteps, living out their country music dreams. A completely self-taught singer songwriter and guitarist, Lynn wrote her first song, “I’m a Honky Tonk Woman,” on a $17 guitar that her husband, Oliver Doolittle “Doo” Lynn, purchased as an anniversary present.

“The neck soon warped and I couldn’t keep it in tune, but that’s how I learned to play,” she says. The then-24-year-old mother launched her career while caring for four children and cooking and cleaning for 36 ranch hands in Washington State. She was shy, but Doo saw her talent. When he landed her a gig in a local bar they both hoped for an easier life.

“I didn’t know I was talented. Everybody in Butcher Hollow sang, it seemed like,” says Loretta of the Kentucky coal mine town where she grew up.

Lynn’s upbringing as the second of eight children born to a union coal miner can partially be credited for her frank and open outlook, and willingness to address causes she cares about. She recalls John L. Lewis as the leader of the United Mine Workers who brought much needed help to people like her father. “Anybody who worked in the coal mines at that time had to be in the union,” she recalls.

Lynn has been a union musician her whole career. She initially joined the AFM when she worked her first gigs in Washington, and she’s now been a member of Local 257 (Nashville, TN) for 53 years. “The musicians union helps the artists,” she says. “Where would we be if not for their help?”

Back in early 1960, when Lynn made her first recordings on Zero Records, radio stations were still small, local operations. Loretta and Doo drove station to station with copies of her record in the trunk of their Pontiac, imploring the DJs to play it.

“We would drive to a radio station and I would go in with my record. Some of them would say they couldn’t play it, or they wouldn’t play it, and some of them played it while I was there,” she recalls. “I just sat there until they played it. I imagine they thought to themselves, ‘This girl is going to stay here all night if we don’t play her record.’”

Loretta Lynn“The disc jockey would say, ‘I don’t think the program director will let me play this,’ and I would say, ‘Why don’t you try?’” recalls Lynn.

By the time the pair arrived in Nashville, “I’m a Honky Tonk Girl” was already a minor hit, eventually reaching number 14 on the country charts. She took the stage of the Grand Ole Opry for the first time in 1960 as a star-struck 28-year-old who knew very little about the music industry. Looking back, she says, “I’m glad I didn’t have sense enough to take no for an answer.”

After the Lynn family relocated to Nashville, she met the Wilburn Brothers, Teddy and Doyle, and became part of their show. Through the brothers, she was introduced to Decca Records and began cutting demos with producer Owen Bradley. She says Bradley helped her enormously, recalling how he  gently coached her about how to be a better performer and about the music business. “He told me things about other artists that he had recorded. We would talk and I would get the message,” she says.

Today, one of the most awarded performers in all of country music and a 52-year member of the Grand Ole Opry, Lynn was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame 1988 and the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2008, and received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2010. In 2003 the Kennedy Center Honored her for her lifetime contributions to the arts, and in 2013, in one of her proudest moments, President Barack Obama awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

At 83 years old, Lynn still performs regularly and continues to win awards. In the past year alone she was honored with a 2014 Americana Music Lifetime Achievement Award for Songwriter (September 2014), the Tennessee Governor’s Arts Award (March 2015), and the Country Music Awards (CMA) Crystal Milestone (April 2015).

The country music pioneer was the first woman to get a gold record in 1970 and the first woman to be awarded CMA’s Entertainer of the year in 1973. Though she never set out to be a feminist, she was never afraid to tackle issues important to working-class women, both in interviews and in her music.

Songs like: “You Ain’t Woman Enough (to Take My Man)” (1966), “Don’t Come Home a Drinkin’ (with Lovin’ on Your Mind)” (1967), “Fist City” (1968), and “The Pill” (1975) bravely pushed boundaries. Her 1966 song “Dear Uncle Sam” expressed the country’s frustration with the human cost of the Vietnam War, while the 1972 “Rated X” told the story of the stigma that divorced women in the country faced at the time.

During the early 1970s, Lynn began a collaboration with Conway Twitty that lasted almost 20 years and made the pair the most successful duo in the history of country music. Twitty became a close friend of both Loretta and Doo. “We had 12 albums together,” she says. “Conway Twitty was one of the nicest people I’ve ever known.”

Loretta Lynn“Doo loved Conway,” she adds, recalling how Doo actually gave the pair their biggest hit. “We’d been out on tour a couple weeks and we’d come home. We walked in and my husband was sitting at the desk. He didn’t usually come into the office. He says, ‘I’ve got a hit for you.’ And Conway says, ‘Oh, my god, he’s got a song for us?!’ It was called ‘Louisiana Woman, Mississippi Man’ and it was a number one hit. We kind of listened to Doo from then on.” The pair remained close until Twitty passed away in 1993.

Lynn has released 54 studio albums, plus 15 compilation albums in her career. Her most recent album, Van Lear Rose (2004), was produced by then-28-year-old Jack White. White had been a long-time fan, ever since he saw the 1980 film of Lynn’s life, Coal Miner’s Daughter, as a child. He met Lynn when she was working in Detroit. When he suggested he would like to produce her next album she replied, “Why not?”

The album won critical acclaim, peaking at number two on Billboard’s country album chart. It was nominated for five Grammy Awards in 2005, winning two—Best Country Album and Best Country Collaboration with Vocals for its song “Portland, Oregon,” a duet Lynn sang with White.

Her property in Nashville, Hurricane Hills, has long been open to visitors who can tour her mansion and museum and stay in her on-site campgrounds. She regularly holds festivals, concerts, and other events on the property.

Lynn has a new album coming out in the next year. She says it will be a combination of new songs and old-time ones. “I’ve got some old songs that Mommy taught me when I was growing up and some new stuff that I wrote,” Lynn says.

Meanwhile, Lynn keeps busy touring and performing. She’s pleased with how her career has stood the test of time, a reward due in large part to her non-stop work ethic. She says she prefers to work only on the weekends these days. “We’ve been turning them away. I think that’s pretty exciting,” she says, agreeing that music is what keeps her young.

allen toussaint cover
On the Cover

Allen Toussaint Reveals Why He’d Never Leave the Big Easy

Allen ToussaintThere’s something magical about New Orleans and its connection to music and musicians. Through the good times and the bad times the music plays on and the city retains its charm. Musician elders pass down their traditions to the next generation, much like their parents and grandparents did before them.

Pianist, producer, and songwriter Allen Toussaint, longtime member of Local 174-496 (New Orleans, LA), is one such musician. “I love everything about New Orleans,” he says. “I was born and raised here and I will always be here. I still walk around New Orleans and enjoy what I see; I enjoy what I feel. It’s just a charming place to be and I’m glad I haven’t outgrown the charm.”

The street musicians still go in front of Jackson Square and check out a bench, pull out their horns, and start playing. It’s not traveling musicians; its musicians that came up here, just like Louie Armstrong did, and a whole lot of other greats from the past,” he says. “And that music that you thought you would like to hear if you got to New Orleans? When you get here, you can really hear it.”

Studying Up and Signing Up

As a child, Toussaint, was inspired by the music all around him. He began teaching himself to play the family piano at about age six. When he first showed interest and ability his mom enrolled him in a classic junior school of music, but she had to give up on the idea after six or seven lessons. “The boogie woogie already had me,” he laughs.

Toussaint knew from a young age that he wanted to have a career in music. He taught himself to play whatever he heard, both on the streets and in recordings. Among his early influences were Local 174-496 members Fats Domino and producer/arranger Dave Bartholomew, Ray Charles, and boogie woogie players like Albert Ammons and Pinetop Perkins.

However, his biggest influence was Professor Longhair, or simply Fess. Toussaint was drawn to his music. “So many things were like so many other things, but Professor Longhair was totally unique,” explains Toussaint. “He played with such demand—his voice and his whole vernacular. Plus, there was a strong element of New Orleans. He mixed with junka and he had rumbas in his left hand. It was really hip to bring those worlds together. Every new record he came out with I got it and studied it. It was very, very important.”

Toussaint took learning music very seriously. He wanted to be ready when it came his time to play. To prepare, he learned all of the popular songs of the day and he joined the AFM. “I joined the musicians union when I was about 15 because I didn’t want anything to be in the way of me performing anywhere I’d ever be called,” he says.

Subbing for Huey

Allen_Toussaint-pose Toussaint’s first big break came when he was just 17. “Earl King had a performance in Pritchard, Alabama, and Huey Smith had taken ill and couldn’t make it,” recalls Toussaint. King’s saxophonist knew Toussaint “as a young pianist around town who knew all the songs of the day on the radio” and they called him to sub.

He met the band at the Dew Drop Inn and they went straight to Pritchard for the gig, no rehearsal. “I knew Earl King’s repertoire very well and I had a very good time,” says Toussaint. “That was my rite of passage from the teenage world to the adult world, even though I was too young to be in that kind of club.”

“That introduced me to the Dew Drop set,” continues Toussaint, explaining that the Dew Drop Inn was New Orlean’s answer to the Cotton Club. It was where all the musicians congregated before they went out to perform. From there, other gigs happened, and a couple years later he replaced Smith in the same band, which was now backing the duet Shirley and Lee. “That was my first time touring,” he says.

Toussaint recalls the special feeling of camaraderie among New Orleans musicians. “It wasn’t a competition; we shared licks with each other; we shared ideas. There was what we called ‘turn-backs’ in music. You might see someone you hadn’t seen in awhile and you would say, ‘Hey, share a turn-back with me.’ We were very glad to know that others were on the scene and what they were doing.”

“I think it’s still pretty much like that,” he explains. “We certainly feel a heritage within each of us. New Orleans has a certain pace and all, an innate thing that is felt without saying words. I’ve always felt that and I still feel that, even with very young musicians.”

Songs from Behind the Scenes

Toussaint’s first recording was for RCA in 1958, and featured his composition “Java,” later a hit for trumpeter Al Hirt. Toussaint most enjoyed the behind the scenes work of  songwriting, arranging, and producing. By the early ’60s he was session supervisor for Minit and Instant Records, writing and producing singles for local artists.

But just as his career started to pick up steam, he was drafted into the military for two years. At the time, he worried it would affect his blossoming career. “I thought everyone who was doing what I do was way around the track because they’d been on the case and I’d been on hiatus,” he says. “That was the only time in my life that I tried to write a hit song. I wrote the song ‘Ride Your Pony’ because I thought all the other horses were all the way around the track.”

In the end, his talents for producing and songwriting allowed him to resume his career pretty quickly. “Ride Your Pony” became a hit for Lee Dorsey in 1965, and Toussaint has since racked up hits for artists ranging in genre from pop to R&B to country.

Toussaint partnered with promoter Marshall Sehorn and launched Sea-Saint recording studio. There he produced and wrote for artists like Lee Dorsey, the Meters, Dr. John, and others who drew heavily on New Orleans traditions.

Over the years, Toussaint’s timeless songs have been recorded and rerecorded. For example, his tune “A Certain Girl” written for and released by Ernie K-Doe (1961), was later covered by the Yardbirds (1964), as well as Warren Zevon (1980). “Fortune Teller,” first recorded by Benny Spellman (1962), was later covered by The Rolling Stones (1966), The Who (1970), The Hollies (1972), and Robert Plant and Alison Krauss (2007). Songs like “Get Out of My Life, Woman” and “Play Something Sweet (Backyard Blues)” have been performance favorites for bands from around the globe.

As a producer and songwriter Toussaint is particularly skilled at bringing out the best in whatever artist he works with. “My habit has always been to write for particular artists. I listen to them a bit to hear what I think could be highlights in their voice, how they feel about themselves, how expressive they would like to be. It’s for that particular person, as if I was making a gown or suit,” he explains.

Among Toussaint’s favorite covers of his songs are Herb Alpert’s “Whipped Cream” (1965), Al Hirt’s “Java” (1964), and Glen Campbell’s “Southern Nights” (1977). “I do love all the versions of every song of mine I ever heard, whether they are removed from where I may have had them originally, or if they are almost verbatim,” he says. “I just feel so grateful that someone cared enough about a song that I wrote to take it to their own heart, live with it, learn it, and then have it come out of them. That’s a wonderful miracle collaboration to me.”

“I never thought of myself as a stage performer,” continues Toussaint. “I’ve always thought of myself as the one behind the scenes. If there was a band, I would be the one to listen to the recordings of songs we are going to do and arrange the music.”

Over the years Toussaint has been involved in numerous hometown productions, performances, and projects, serving as arranger and musical director. In 1996, he launched NYNO Records with New York radio syndicator Joshua Feigenbaum to record and distribute the roots and R&B music of New Orleans and “paint a musical portrait of the city.”

Emerging from the Storm

Allen_Toussaint-pianoFifty years into his career, Hurricane Katrina abruptly changed everything for Toussaint. He rode out the storm at the French Quarter’s Crown Hotel and then evacuated the city four days later, having lost his home, studio, and all of his possessions except what he’d brought with him—the clothes on his back and his irreplaceable personally recorded videos. On Feingenbaum’s suggestion Toussaint fled to New York City. He had no real plan.

“I did several benefit concerts to survivors of our area and that exposed me to more performances than I had ever done in my life on my own,” he says. “I must say that it’s been quite rewarding, but that’s not how my life was going before Katrina.”

Despite having to live outside the city he loved for two years, and losing his home, today Toussaint focuses on the positive outcome. “I perform quite a bit now in comparison with before Katrina, and I must say it’s been quite gratifying,” he says. “It’s really wonderful because all my time was spent in the studio, and though I was very comfortable there, the final analysis is that we are trying to reach people when we record, write, and arrange. When we are on stage, there the people are, right there. It feels so much more like music was intended to be. It gives you such a more human aspect to the whole process.”

Throughout his career, Toussaint says his decision to join the union has served him well. “There are some places that the pay and all was very secure because the union was definitely on the case,” he says. “One of the best unions in the world is Local 802 (New York City). They really take care of business and see that things are intact and benefiting musicians as much as possible.”

After 60 years in the industry, Toussaint thoughtfully looks back at how the business has changed in recent years due to digital technology, and how those changes impact the culture of music in the Big Easy. “New Orleans is affected by musical changes, as well. Nowadays you can turn on one button and the whole world hears the same thing, at the same time,” he says. “New Orleans has held onto its own traditions as well as it could in the midst of so much technology. Even though they can hear the world playing back at them on television, radio, and the Internet, musicians here are playing the New Orleans traditional music that they got from someone a bit older than them, in New Orleans.”

“They hold past members who have gone on as deities, which is very important,” he continues. “It preserves the richness of the music and the intent of it in the earlier days. You could not know that the early music existed unless you take it to your heart and live in an environment where others are playing it just

ron carter
On the Cover

Ron Carter: Jazz’s Elder Statesman

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Ron Carter

“I’m a reluctant star,” says Ron Carter, humbly. “I’m always surprised when projects are offered to me by strangers, even pop singers, whom I don’t know. I’m taken aback that they’ve heard of me and know enough about my integrity and professionalism to approach me.”

Then, somewhat surprisingly for a musician of Carter’s stature, he adds, “I always blush a little when I get those phone calls.”

One reason that so many young musicians, in and out of the jazz world, know Carter, a member of Local 802 (New York City), is that he is incredibly prolific. To date, he has recorded on more than 2,500 albums.

The Sideman

Another reason is that the roll call of front men and women Carter has played for includes some of jazz’s greatest legends: Miles Davis, Lena Horne, Wes Montgomery, McCoy Tyner, Stanley Turrentine, Stan Getz, and Milt Jackson, to name a few. A good website helps, too: at www.roncarter.net, fans young and old can listen to his work directly.

Then there is the fact that over the years Carter has built a reputation for lending his wisdom to projects outside of the jazz genre. He has played blues with BB King of Local 71 (Memphis, TN), funk with James Brown, soul with Aretha Franklin and Roberta Flack of Local 161-710 (Washington, DC), and even modern classical with the Kronos Quartet. “I’m always happy to broaden my horizons,” he says, “and people call me because they seem to trust my judgment.”

“I’ve played as a sideman all the way,” explains Carter, looking back on his 50-year career. “My job has always been to make the musicians around me sound much better. I have not minded subjugating my ego eight bars back if I know that I can contribute to a successful project.”

As an example of how he fulfills the role of sideman, Carter recalls one project with Stanley Turrentine when the group was searching for numbers to fill out an album. “At that point, someone had to step forward and make suggestions about tunes and arrangements, and I’ve been known to do that.” Carter then puts his role in military terms: “The frontman is like a general sitting at the desk, while I’m an officer in the field.”

Stepping Out

But everyone at some point wants to be a band leader, admits Carter, and in this latest stage of his storied career, he has decided to see if some of his own ideas about how to lead a band, learned by watching jazz’s greatest leaders at work, can come to fruition. Carter has recorded several albums recently as a bandleader, including The Golden Striker for Blue Note Records.

“I’m absolutely pleased with what I’ve done as a leader,” he says, adding that it’s still frustrating when club managers want to book bands that have a trumpet player or singer out front. “But I’m comfortable that my approach is the correct one,” Carter asserts.

In a way, fronting his own jazz combos–either a trio, quartet, or nonet–is a return to Carter’s earliest days as a jazz bassist, when he started up a quartet with like-minded musicians in his neighborhood, having left behind the cello as an 18-year-old in Ferndale, Michigan.

New Skills

After high school Carter attended Wayne State University, near Detroit, and soon heard about an audition for the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York. “I auditioned in 1955 while the recruiters were in my area,” recalls Carter.

Carter remembers his time at Eastman as a fabulous experience that gave him many chances to perform and gain valuable experience as a sideman. Eastman also gave the jazz player a classical music education (he played in the Eastman Philharmonic Orchestra), which extended his range. “Eastman’s classical music education gave me new skills and helped me become a more diverse musician,” Carter explains.

After earning his bachelor’s degree in music at Eastman, Carter went on to earn a masters degree in double bass at the Manhattan School of Music. Today, those two diplomas are joined by honorary doctorates from the New England Conservatory and the Manhattan School of Music, and in 2002 his alma mater recognized him with its prestigious Hutchinson Award.

Miles of Smiles

In 1960 Carter joined the all-union Randy Weston Quartet and began his professional career. After leaving Weston, he freelanced in New York City, where his reputation grew enough for Miles Davis to take notice. “In those day, Miles’ concerts were one night gigs for me,” Carter remembers. “Whenever Miles had gigs though, I’d be performing.”

The call from Davis proved fortuitous when Carter’s became one element of the latest sound the great trumpet player was experimenting with. “When I played with Miles, it was like having five men in a laboratory with the same goal,” he explains. Those five men came to be known as one of most legendary groups in jazz history: along with Davis and Carter, it featured George Coleman on tenor sax and Herbie Hancock on piano, both of Local 802, and Tony Williams on drums.

When asked what it was like when these musicians got together to rehearse, Carter replies, remarkably, that “we only had two rehearsals during my five years with the group.” What made it work, he says, is that there was absolute trust between the musicians. “It was a collective,” Carter continues. “The sidemen were all equal and Miles allowed us to be equal with him.”

While Carter was working at the Half Note in March 1963, Davis was reorganizing his road band and asked Carter if he’d like to join full-time. He agreed and began a new chapter of his life as a traveling musician, playing with Davis all over the country, as well as on the classic albums Four & More, Miles Smiles, Sorcerer, and others.

Life on the road proved challenging, though, especially when Carter became a father. “I truly enjoyed working with Miles, but I had two sons born in 1962 and 1965, and playing in the band made me feel as if they were growing up without me,” he admits, “so I left the band.”

Sonic Presence

Today, Carter is recognized as a legend in his own right, a status measured to some degree by awards bestowed on him. He has been named Outstanding Bassist of the Decade by the Detroit News, Jazz Bassist of the Year by Downbeat magazine, Most Valuable Player by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, and he received Grammys in 1993 for Best Jazz Instrumental Group and in 1998 for the Best Instrumental Composition.

The elder statesman is well-positioned to comment on the contemporary jazz scene. “There’s more of a responsibility put on vocalists and the media these days,” Carter observes. “In the past, when I was growing up, there were more clubs, radio stations, and more jazz in movies as well.” In other words, says Carter, jazz was more accessible in the ’50s and ’60s.

But that doesn’t mean jazz is a dying art. In fact, Carter is still busy mentoring the next generation of jazz bassists, previously as the Artistic Director of the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Studies and these days as Distinguished Professor Emeritus of The City College of New York.

“Be prepared for anything that may come your way,” is Carter’s advice to his students, “then you can always find work playing music.” At the same time, Carter warns young musicians that the industry is a different game then when he got his start. Today, for instance, the need to make your name visible is crucial in a world flooded with new artists and new forms of media.

Talking about the technical side of his art, Carter explains that the situation for a bass player has changed in the past few decades. “One reason for this that is overlooked is the influence of electric basses and amplifiers,” says Carter, who experimented with the electric bass in the ’60s and ’70s before concentrating on the upright. “Now, a bass player has the same what I call “sonic presence’ as other members of a group. They can be heard equally, and with that a bass player can become more comfortable with the idea that his or her intent will get attention.” Through this, a modern bass player is given the courage to try new things, he adds.

As if to lead the way for his students, Carter is still trying new things, and dismissing any talk of retirement. “I’m continually performing,” he concludes, “I played both at Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center recently. I’m getting better everyday, and I’m still growing in my career.”

On the Cover

B.B. King: Travels with Lucille

Local 71 (Memphis, TN) member B.B. King and his guitar Lucille have traveled to 90 different countries together.

It’s a freezing winter night in the1950s in Twist, Arkansas. In a little club, people are dancing to a young blues guitarist. The warmth of their moving bodies heats up the place, as does a small kerosene stove in the corner. Two fans begin pushing one another over a woman named Lucille who works in the nightclub. They knock over the stove, and a river of flames engulfs the place.

People scramble for the doors. Once outside, the guitarist realizes that he has forgotten his $30 acoustic guitar inside the building. He rushes back into the searing heat. “It was hard to get instruments and I thought only of getting my guitar out of there,” says the guitarist, who goes by the name B.B. King these days. King, a member of Local 71 (Memphis, TN), named his guitar after the woman to remind himself never to do something so foolish as rushing into a burning building to save an instrument. These days, a wiser King, who is currently touring with Lucille XVI, would only commit a similar act of bravery to save a human life.

King’s 51 years as a recording musician and tour stops in 90 countries have ensured that Lucille is a name familiar to blues fans worldwide. Lucille has become a signature model guitar manufactured by Gibson to King’s specifications, and she’s taken the musician from the juke joints of the South to Carnegie Hall.

Money In the Hat

Today, King, who once made 35 cents a day picking cotton, is a multimillionaire as a result of his music. His most successful album, “Riding with the King,” in collaboration with Eric Clapton, came out when King was almost 75. It sold 4.5 million copies worldwide, and it’s estimated that, over the course of his career, King has sold over 40 million records. Mere financial gain, though, is not all that King has earned from his particular version of the blues. He has also been awarded five honorary doctorates from institutions as prestigious as Yale University and the Berklee School of Music.

These accomplishments are nothing short of amazing, considering that King started out on the street corners of his hometown of Indianola, Mississippi. In those days, King aspired to be a gospel musician, idolizing a local preacher who played guitar in church. Experience on the corners, however, sent him down a different path.

“When people would ask me to play a tune, if I played a gospel tune, they would always praise me highly, but hardly put anything in the hat,” he recalls. “People that asked me to play blues would always put something in the hat. That’s why I’m a blues singer.”

It didn’t take long for King to outgrow street corners. At 20, he traveled on the back of a grocery truck to Memphis, carrying only his guitar and $2.50 in his pocket. A few years later, King landed his own 10-minute radio show on WDIA, called the “King Spot.” On every show, he sang the sponsor’s jingle, “Pepticon, Pepticon, sure is good/ You can get it anywhere in your neighborhood.” Thus, the Pepticon Boy, as he was known, took the first step on his path toward musical legend.

New Opportunities, New Name

The “chairman of the board” belts out the blues in concert for dedicated fans.

King’s show was so popular that he was soon offered a job as a DJ. He played records by artists such as Sarah Vaughan and Frank Sinatra, who would one day invite him to share “booze and broads” in Las Vegas. Before he could achieve the level of success that allowed him to hang out with Sinatra, he was told to change his name from Riley King to something catchy. For a while, he performed as Beale Street Blues Boy, then just Blues Boy King, until he finally shortened it to B.B. King.

To many black teenagers in the 1960s, blues was their parents’ music, largely a thing of the past. One of King’s hardest moments was at the Royal Theater in Baltimore, Maryland where he was booed by a young crowd that wanted to see the hot young acts on the bill, Sam Cooke and The Drifters. It stung King to be treated poorly, but as a sharecropper’s son from the South, he learned how to achieve his goals in spite of people’s cruelty.

“You knew it was something you had to do,” he says, likening that moment in Baltimore to racial difficulties from his childhood. “You’d go ahead and do the best you could, thinking you’re by yourself, that nobody cares. Life goes on.”

That same determination characterized King’s early career. He first recorded in 1949, including a song named after the first of the two wives he has had, “Miss Martha King.” It wasn’t until 1952, when he released “Three O’Clock Blues,” that King’s music caught on. The song, which was recorded in the back room of a Memphis YMCA, put places like Harlem’s Apollo Theater on his touring itinerary. King developed a distinct musical style in the ’50s through constant touring. In 1956 he played 342 shows, taking the sounds of influences such as T-Bone Walker and Blind Lemon Jefferson and combining them with other musicians he loved, such as jazz guitarists Django Reinhardt and Charlie Christian.

Growing Reputationand Rapport

This extended period of success culminated in the 1965 album, “Live at the Regal.” The album is still a favorite with fans and critics alike, partly because of the precision of the guitar work, but also because of King’s rapport with the crowd. Some of King’s most important fans at the time were the white rock musicians who borrowed heavily from the blues to develop their sounds. In a 1966 Crawdaddy interview Mike Bloomfield, guitarist for the Butterfield Blues Band, said, “B.B. King is one of the greatest guitarists who ever lived and more people should listen to B.B. King’s records.”

Legendary rock promoter Bill Graham took Bloomfield’s advice and booked King to play at the Fillmore West in San Francisco. When King pulled up to the club, he thought he was in the wrong place because of all the long-haired white kids milling around outside. He worried that he might get booed. King didn’t usually drink before shows, but was so nervous that he asked Graham to get him a drink. Graham got a whole bottle of whiskey for the anxious artist.

After a short introduction by Graham, who called him “the chairman of the board,” the crowd went wild. They gave King his first standing ovation that night. The 43-year-old blues giant was so touched, he cried on stage. In a recent PBS documentary on the blues, King still got choked up recalling the moment.

It was a turning point for King that signaled the direction his career has headed in to this day. King says that, in his early days, 90% of his audience was black and his age or older. Today, King says his audience is much younger than he is and 95% white. This is partly a result of musicians who have incorporated King’s blues into their own music.

King is thankful for the help he received from devoted fans such as Eric Clapton and Eric Burdon.

“People didn’t value what we did as anything special until the British groups started playing what I call Real Important Blues, and white people started to pay attention to it,” he recently told The New York Times. “These groups played it, supported it, and opened alot of doors for B.B. King and a lot of people like him,” the article’s author commented.

Strength in Numbers

B.B. King released his most popular and succesful album at the young age of 75.

A lot of doors were opened for King by the AFM as well. The blues chairman joined the union in 1949 because it promised “better wages.” He is most grateful, however, for the protection the union offered him.

“It’s an old and true saying, ‘there’s strength in numbers,'” says King. “Sometimes you’d go places and people wouldn’t pay you. The union was good then, because they’d put them on the unfair list and nobody would go and play for them.”

While the AFM helped King deal with the less pleasant aspects of the music business, the MP3 player that travels everywhere with him helps remind him why he chose to be a professional musician early in life. He keeps the music of his influencesWalker and Jefferson, as well as Lonnie Johnson and Muddy Watersclose at hand so that he can revitalize his passion for the blues at the push of a button. King says that listening frequently to his idols ensures that his music does not depart from what he cares most about.

King’s performances today give no indication that his success has taken away his feeling for the blues. Just like he did long ago that night in Twist, Arkansas, he makes people want to dance. When he’s up on stage, he plays for the crowd, not for himself. That’s why, from a sitting position, he and Lucille still have the power to bring people to their feet.

King says he performs every song as if he hasn’t played it before. This simple yet highly effective philosophy, shared with his band to prevent songs he has played for decades from becoming stale, underlines why he has continued to nurture an avid international following.

“Play it like you feel it,” he says, repeating what he tells his band. “Don’t try to play it like you recorded it 10 years ago. Play it today, like you feel it now.”

Visit the official B.B. King Web site at www.bbking.com.