This month Latin jazz musicians are suing the Recording Academy over a controversial decision to eliminate two dozen Grammy awards categories for ethnic and roots music

 http://www.billboard.biz/bbbiz/industry/record-labels/neil-portnow-on-latin- jazz-grammy-elimination-1005304552.story

  Some observations of Chicago Tribune jazz critic Howard Reich, just before the…

Look around the country at the lineups at so-called “blues festivals.” You’ll often find they’re headlined by a rock star or by one of a handful of famous aging African American blues men or women.  The rest of the lineups…

In addition to the overall American neglect of history and the arts, the natural progression of music being handed down in African American families and neighborhoods has been interrupted. And while some promoters in the majority European-American culture prize Black…

 I.  BLUES IS THE ROOT

 Feeling vulnerable to the Great Recession and at the mercy of illogical governments and corporate bullies, we can all use a little musical relief. The futuristic writer Kurt Vonnegut, shortly before his death in 2007…

Dear Readers,

Like many folks in the uncertain economy these days, I’ve had to focus more clearly on my mission and how I make my living. Because I no longer have energy to live any kind of a double life…

Can blues help us survive the Great Recession?

Larry Hill Taylor, West Side blues singer and drummer, and myself as co-author are out there raising both questions and spirits, playing a few blues tunes while we discuss his autobiography, Stepson…

Senator Robert C Byrd has died at 92, with his boots on, the way he wanted to, a U.S. Senator til the end. In our sparsely populated Mountain State, everyone had a chance to know him. All you had to…