Ted Lehmann's Film, Books, Music & Commentary

Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow - Biography

2026-01-19T11:05:00.005-05:00

During the past couple of years, I’ve been reading a number of biographies of our Founding Fathers. One name seemed to drift through all of them, a busy but not terribly important character who was often at the right place with the right people but was not given much attention. Thus, I approached Ron Chernow’s massive (over 800 pages) biography without knowing quite what I was getting into.

It turns out that as a Patriot, a soldier, a thinker, and a leading politician, he was one of the most important of the Founding Fathers. Born on the island of Nevis in the Caribbean in either 1755 or 1757, he was abandoned by his parents and brought to what became New York, where he flourished as a youth, attended what became Columbia University, and advocated for the U.S. Revolution as a pamphleteer and soldier. Somehow, he became a valued aide to George Washington, as well as a leader of troops in many important battles of the war. He also trained as a lawyer. His work as an attorney as well as his record as a soldier and an advisor to Washington, put him in the right spots and the right time. As I read this fascinating and lively biography, I became increasingly convinced that much of the structure of our Constitution as well as the leadership of this fine soldier was crucial to the founding and growth of the United States.

As a lawyer, a soldier, and a politician Hamilton had the vision to imagine the possibilities of the United States and to help guide it through the earliest and most shaky early years of a country that didn’t know what direction to take nor how to live within the structure which emerged as the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. Hamilton, through his writing, his oratory, and his winning personality helped to design and mold a new country. Often, however, he doesn’t receive the credit he deserves, perhaps because of his reputation as a ladies’ man and his foreign birth. Nevertheless, he was probably the most sought out attorney in New York during the Revolution and following. He served a term as the first Secretary of the Treasury under Washington. He was killed in duel by Aaron Burr, who had been a political rival for many years.

Ron Chernow

Ron Chernow has written biographies of John D. Rockefeller, Mark Twain, George Washington, U.S. Grant. The House of Morgan, and more. He won the Pulitzer Prize for History and the 2011 History Book Prize for his biography of Washington.

Although the book is long, 730 pages of text plus acknowledgments and index, it is highly readable, and often quite gripping. I read Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow in a paperback edition which I bought at @Thriftbooks.com.

2025-05-26T09:05:00.000-04:00

Alan Taylor’s book American Colonies: The Settling of North America, although a quarter of a century old, is as fresh and readable today as it was the day it came off the presses. It covers the history of (mostly) North America from, roughly, 13,000 B.C. until shortly after the American Revolution in 1776. I’ve always thought my education and further reading thereafter provided me with a pretty good picture of our country’s history and development. However, after reading (and enjoying) this lengthy and detailed account, I’ve realized that my prior education in American History was largely focused on Euro-centric colonization, with particular emphasis on those pioneers who originated in England, France, and Spain. The actions, interactions, and reactions of those immigrants who began to populate the Americas about 15,000 years ago receive little or no thoughtful recognition in what we consider to be our history.

The earliest Americans arrived in the Western Hemisphere around 15,000 B.C. by crossing the land bridge between Siberia and Alaska, the only way such people could travel, given the lack of ocean travelling to last another 13,000 or so years. These inhabitants gradually multiplied and spread across both Americas, living off the land in small, nomadic bands. Over the next millenia, they spread across North and South America in small bands who lived off the land, cultivated the forests, and made war with other such bands. They lived in what was, until quite recently, considered to be a completely “primitive” existence. Actually, these “Indian” groups lived in harmony with nature and their environment. They hunted for food, learned to plant edible plants, and fought battles against other bands of their near relatives, who spread across North and South America. Taylor estimates that the population of North America at the time Europe discovered it to have been about 8.4 million, but this estimate is considered low by some scholars.

Meanwhile, colonizers from Spain “discovered” what are now known as the Caribbean Islands, establishing sugar plantations on the many islands, while enslaving the native populations to the deathly work as slaves. They brought with them western weapons and diseases as well as seeing the indigenous populations to be primitive and even non-human.

As ship building and navigational tools became increasingly sophisticated. Europeans from Spain, France, and England explored along the Eastern coasts. They slowly advanced west across what became the fourteen original European colonies, encountering various tribes of what have now become known as “Indians,” although the various bands differed in organization, diet, and a variety of languages.

The western migration of European interests grew as Western Europe began to lust after the furs and mineral riches to be found in North and South America. During this period they battled the indigenous population, winning most encounters because of the advantages metal weapons and gunpowder gave them. Meanwhile, distinctive cultural differences emerged, largely because of the different opportunities to grow plants and the availability of local game for food. Small farms were established and independent villages slowly emerged. Opportunities for independence emerged as Europeneons started small villages and learned to live off the land.

Tribal Map of North America c. 1500

As I read this book, I came to realize how eurocentric and narrow my education in American history had been, and the way my attitudes toward the primacy of European immigrants to America destructive the growing supremacy of European culture into the Americas had been to the native population.. My own learning, emphasizing the importance of the development from Pennsylvania north to New England, truly represented a small bit of the understanding that a larger and lengthier telling would have offered.

Filled with deep and thoughtful approaches to the important contributions and tragedies of African slavery and Indian destruction, both by the Europeans skill with metal weapons and their spreading of diseases which neither indigenous group had acquired added both depth and understanding to the country we were at our birth at the end of the 18th century and have become during the nearly 300 years since.

I highly recommend Alan Taylor’s exploration of American Colonies: The Settling of North America to anyone interested in widening and deepening their vision and understanding about the beginning of who we are and who we have become.

I read American Colonies in a paperbound edition I bought through https://www.thriftbooks.com/ a used book outlet that I highly recommend.

Old-Time Conversations by Craig R. Evans - Book Review

2024-06-21T10:25:00.001-04:00

Craig R. Evans grew up in a solidly mid-western family surrounded by a striving father and a musical mother. Still a teenager, he had belonged to bands while, at the same time going off to attend college and begin a "career" in business. His great awakening came, when, at the age of 50, he was fortunate enough to be fired. It was then, with the good fortune to be able to choose his next direction, he returned to the old-time music that had sustained his musical and personal development when he was younger.

Since my experience with country music and festivals lies mostly in bluegrass, rather than old-time music, I thought I should listen to and watch some to become more familiar with the genre, not only from its history and personalities, but from the feel and sound of listening to the music. I thank YouTube and Craig Evans’ work of recording and posting a lot of performances. The forward to Old-Time Conversations, by Clare Milliner served as a welcoming invitation to read further and learn more about this early genre of American music serving as a precursor for bluegrass and other forms. The music has stayed alive for those who revel in the roots of American music, played on porches, in living rooms, and at festivals for a large community of those who value traditional, indigenous American music.

Get in Line Brother - Singleton Street

Craig Evans, the author of Old-Time Conversations, rediscovered old-time music and the community that keeps it alive at age of fifty, in a deeply personal experience at a difficult time of his life. He quickly equates this soul-saving experience with the community that keeps old-time alive and thriving. He then takes us into his life more deeply in the opening chapters. Evans locates himself as a son of late nineteenth century farming and small town culture by beginning with his own origin story. He also weaves one of the many strands leading to what has become known as old-time music into musical tradition that provides the base for modern American folk, country, bluegrass and old-time music. This is a neat trick for a musical tradition as deep and widespread as American music. Evans explores the ways in which community affects groups, especially in the case of the music they treasure. At age 50, Evans, rediscovering his instruments at home under his bed, seemingly untouched during his business career, sought out a teacher and found Dwight Diller, to be the first of his many mentors. Writing in a highly personal style, he draws the reader into the old-time community in the way he, years before had also discovered it.

Evans allows himself to be a scholar, a participant, a portrayer (through his videos and documentary films) and a chronicler of his own life as the book continues. A man of almost endless curiosity and energy, he describes the worlds he discovers and the life he enters, while chronicling it in ways that make the old-time world exciting to his readers as well as himself. His writing is filled with energy, enthusiasm, and insight. I found that reading it drove me to explore through the large variety of old-time music to be found on YouTube, which led me towards slower reading and greater insight. “Making the world a better and happier place….” lies as the basis of the builders, performers, and historians introduced in this book. Happily, the book itself accomplishes the same goals, as well as pricking the imagination of readers eager to learn about, and perhaps join, this often discounted world of traditional music. The fact that Evans is an articulate writer as well as an established musician only make for a richer reading experience.

After the lengthy, and necessary, introductory session, during which Evans places himself in time, interests, family, education, and experiences which led him to enter business, and later to decide to become a professional musician, the book is divided into three major sections: Instrument Builders, Performers and Teachers, and Historian and Authors. Using this design, he proposes to develop a route for coming to understand the nature of Old-Time music as well as its enduring influence and the broader country music world. Portions of these conversations are also available in a series of videos available in DVD format or online as “Old Time Conversations.” I found that combining reading the book with watching the conversations was interesting, but time-consuming. The written editions appear to be more comprehensive, while the videos provide a good sense the nature of music, the personalities of the subjects, and the participant/observer posture of the author.

As each interview progresses, Evans delves into themes and approaches that comes to dominate the insight of the particular musician. In a sense, the questions are good enough to force the subject into deep and thoughtful self-discovery. However, each builder has a unique approach to building the instruments, engaging the instrument, the history, and the builder in highly interesting idiosyncratic fashions. The same is true in the "Performers and Teachers." and "Historians and Authors" sections. Many were also people who didn’t easily fit into traditional academic settings, who had to find their way to music and making, playing, or teaching about music and musical instruments. As I read this book, I turned to YouTube to listen to at least one song of each person included in the book. This helped me to add perspective to the written narrative, leading me to greater appreciation of their styles, sounds, and contributions to old-time music. It also turned “reading” a book into a multi-media experience, each portion serving to enrich the other.

Many of the musicians in this book took old time homemade music played around the living room or campfire, organizing it to provide a performance quality music for wider consumption . In a sense, they were transitional people from “folk” music to professional performers, while helping create a readiness for wider circulation among festival goers and record buyers. Scholars, like the author Craig R. Evans, or a performer such as Dom Flemons and David Holt, with formal musical training served to accomplish this transition as well as many others. Meanwhile, collectors and performers rescued early recordings, handing down traditional forms and sounds contributing to wider audiences. The most powerful influence, however, remains the music made in homes and at festivals by those who love, support, and perform the music.

Clifftop Highlights Reel 2023

Clifftop is officially known as The Appalachian String Band Music Festival, and is held annually near the New River Gorge in West Virginia. In a sense, the entire book has been heading to this festival, which brings devotees from around the world to make, share, and enjoy Old-Time Music. Thanks to Craig Evans, you can experience a sense of what goes on there from hitting the link above. The link will get you there, or Google Craig’s name and Clifftop to get the list of highlight films, which are among the many joys he’s shared with fans and others interested in gaining a clearer picture of Old-Time music. Of course, the best way to learn and to become a member of this world-wide community is to find a group near you, pick up an instrument, and join the fun.

Craig R. Evans

Craig R. Evans is a filmmaker, author, and musician documenting today's North American traditional music community. He brings a rare combination of fan, performer, researcher, and writer together to weave this fine book about the community that comes together under the rubric of Old-Time Country. It's available through all the usual sources. I received the book as a complimentary copy for the purposes of writing a review.

Discovering Tony Rice by Bill Amatneek - Book Review

2024-05-07T08:58:00.002-04:00

When you open "Discovering Tony Rice” by Bill Amatneek, don’t expect a detailed account of the man and his life. Rather, you should step into the world Tony inhabited and changed, sit back and enjoy the ride. Written through the experiences of many musicians who played with Tony over the years, elaborately illustrated, and filled with insights, you’ll come away with a more clear understanding of the man who helped enrich and change acoustic string music while providing insights that no other piece I’ve seen has ever done as well. Those of you who were lucky enough to be in the concert hall at IBMA the day Tony, who had not spoken publicly in years, spoke his farewell words, shortly before his death, will never forget that moment. This book is filled with such moments.

Amatneek has relied on interviews from a range of people who played a part in Tony Rice’s life and legend. He manages to create a rational narrative as he moves from one interview to the next, tying together each segment to produce a coherent narrative, while always keeping the narrative clean and clear. Many of the voices (Mark Schatz, Bela Fleck, Sam Bush, Jerry Douglas, and many more) are well known to all acoustic music fans, while others are names that many people won’t recognize. The interviews seem to be transcribed from recording, creating a unique voice for each one. Meanwhile, the transitions are clear, helping to find the roots of a man who remained an enigma to many of his best friends as well as his biggest fans right through to the end.

Jerry Douglas’ interview is particularly interesting and moving because he shows the anger and hurt Tony caused his friends because he was unwilling or unable to face the demons of drugs, depression, and physical limitations that made him unable to continue to play or sing. People tried to get him to find help, but he refused to do so. Tony was, according to Douglas, tortured by mental illness. His account of Tony’s last telephone call to him is simply heartbreaking, no matter how you might have known or heard about Tony Rice.

As I was reading the book, I was driven to YouTube to see and hear Tony Rice in his element. In his index, Amatneek provide QR codes to show Tony Rice performances with a variety of bands. Scanning the QR codes allows the reader (listener) to experience the music, bringing him alive, at least through his music. The QR codes might have been even more powerful if they had been scattered through the text at appropriate places, but the reader can still unearth Rice’s music, and perhaps some elements of his character through these video clips.

Amatneek makes a good argument that much of Tony Rice’s behavioral patterns were those of children of alcoholics. They have difficulty retaining relationships, easily fall under the influence of alcohol and drugs themselves, and have difficulty developing and retaining close relationships. None of the musicians who Bill Amatneek interviewed provide evidence that Tony didn’t fit that pattern. Nevertheless, the interviews themselves provide insight into Tony and, to a certain extent, to the viewpoints the musicians themselves were able to bring to their insight into Tony’s internal issues. They all, however, spoke in volumes about his musicianship, which they agreed was beyond that met by any previous guitar players, or any of those who have followed in Rice’s footsteps.

Tony Rice at IBMA Hall of Fame Award - 2013

Photo by Ted Lehmann

The layout of the book, at first, seems somewhat confusing, but becomes coherent and sensible as a readable and clear narrative. By choosing to allow the interviews to include long direct quotations, Amatneek lets Tony’s friends and band-mates talk for themselves, creating a more informal and personal presentation from a number of viewpoints. Perhaps he sacrifices coherence and accuracy for immediacy, however, the text reflects the aura of the era in which these musicians created their own legends and lives.

Bill Amatneek is widely published in a variety of music oriented outlets. Furthermore, he played with Tony Rice in many different bands through the ages. His writing is both personal and professional, yielding a persuasive portrait of a troubled genius through the many high and low periods of his life. The book has an unusual layout that grew on my as I read it. It reflects many of the challenges and difficulties Tony himself must have grappled with. You can order Discovering Tony Rice as an autographed hardback, hardback, or in a paper back format through Vineyard Press.

The Soul of America by Jon Meacham

2024-02-22T16:35:00.001-05:00

The painting, Rainy Day on Fifth Avenue, 1916 by Childe Hassam captures the faith, risk, hope for the future, and the challenges which have faced our country ever since its foundation. There has almost never been a time when the delicate balance of interests represented by our diversity of populations, size of our land-mass, degree of independence, and the challenge of our founding as a democratic, representative republic has not existed.

We're living through an era of division along social, ethnic, racial, age, and technological, and more lines than most of us can imagine. And we find it scary! We imagine that we're in worse shape than our country has ever before seen, filled with complex issues most of us cannot see our way through. Into this era of fear and sense of lost direction, comes Jon Meacham's 2018 book, The Soul of America: The Battle For Our Better Angels, available from all your favorite outlets.

Meacham's narrative focuses on the leadership of often flawed but effective terms of U.S. Presidents, faced with seemingly intractable problems that threaten the continued effectiveness of our system. He presents both Democratic and Republican presidents who respond with both inspiration and, sometimes, subtle political maneuvering and at others blunt exercises of Presidential power. He looks at presidents whose behavior does not deal easily with their reputations (the intractable racism of Woodrow Wilson, who was once seen as one of the four great presidents, but is now nearly forgotten, for instance.) He also points out how history often is made by having the right person in the right place at the right time Abraham Lincoln provides a great example. In each era he describes, the future of our Republic often is questioned, yet we survived, adjusted, and often triumphed. As I read this highly readable book, I found that I gained increased insight into the strengths, weaknesses, and difficulties encountered by the great, and not-so-great, as they navigated the issues raised and the difficulties involved in building and maintaining a democracy.

People accustomed to Meacham's television guest appearances will recognize his upbeat personality and positive viewpoints expressed about individuals and situations. He radiates confidence in positive outcomes, as does this book, without ever sounding heedless of the real challenges these men face. Despite my own gloominess about our current level of anger, division, and violence, reading Meacham increased my confidence that we will emerge a stronger and better nation.

Jon Meacham

John Meacham is a visiting professor of History at Vanderbilt University, in Nashville, TN. He graduated with honors from The University of the South, after which he embarked on a long and successful career as a newspaper and magazine writer as will as a prolific writer of historical works. He has won the Pulitzer Prize as well as numerous other awards and recognitions. He is also a frequent guest on television programs, interpreting history in context delivered with warm good humor. I highly recommend this book to history and politics buffs. It's highly readable and filled with insight and wisdom. I bought John Meacham's The Soul of America in a trade paperback edition from ThriftBooks.com. As usual, the book arrived in a timely fashion and in very good condition.

June - A Documentary Life of June Carter Cash

2024-02-12T09:47:00.000-05:00

June Carter Cash

June, a documentary film now available for streaming on Paramount+, strikes all the right notes. It allows fans who only knew June Carter Cash as Johnny Cash's wife, to understand and revel in the career she built in country music before she married him. June provided him with an anchor and a fully committed love, helping him build his career as became one of the most recognized and successful artists in country music history.

The Carter Family at Bristol Sessions

June Carter was country music royalty. The Carter Family lived in the rolling hills of southern Virginia, where their father, A.P. Carter farmed while spending most of his time trekking off to collect songs in the nearby mountains. The Carter Family, A.P, his wife Sara, and his sister-in-law Maybelle travelled south to Bristol TN/VA to participate in the first recordings of country music, made by Ralph Peer in 1929. The next generations of Carters emerged as Sara, along with her daughters Anita, June, and Helen emerged and continued to perform and record, while staying anchored in Mace's Springs, VA. (We visited the Carter Fold fifteen years ago, finding Carter descendants continuing the Carter Family legacy of acoustic music and country dancing. It felt like a genuine pilgrimage.)

The Carter Sisters - It's My Lazy Day

When June Carter met Johnny Cash, she already had two daughters, was currently married, and a Grand Ol' Opry star in her own right. They fell in love (or perhaps "exploded into" would be a better term), and were soon inseparable. The rest is still more music history. Fortunately, there seem to have been movie cameras around both June and Johnny from early in their careers, and the Opry kept excellent records of its performers. Thus, the film is also visually stunning and moves along quite quickly. Lots of interviews with big and lesser known people along with their children permit a well-balanced and nuanced view.

June Carter Cash & Johnny Cash - Jackson

We didn't realize how much of Johnny Cash's musical life had impacted us during our musical journey, or how important June Carter Cash was to both the history of country music and the success of Johnny Cash. June subordinated her own ambitions and talents to care for Cash, even deep in his years of drug addiction. When he joined The Highwaymen, she practically disappeared, sidelined while keeping him propped up and able to perform, creating a whole new career. We laughed, cried, and thoroughly enjoyed this marvelous documentary film.

June is currently streaming on Paramount+. It runs for an hour and thirty-eight minutes, and seems too short, leaving the viewer wishing to see more about the family and their surroundings. It's well worth your time!

Sing Me Back Home: Southern Roots and Country Music by Bill C. Malone

2024-02-02T15:36:00.000-05:00

Bill C. Malone, a name unknown to many people who are performers or fans of country music is the man who virtually invented a body of research and experience which has helped to define and broaden various kinds of music referred to as Country. Without his thoughtful scholarship informed by his rural roots in East Texas, country music would be less widely distributed and understood. His book, Sing Me Back Home: Southern Roots and Country Music, published in 2017, contains sixteen meticulously annotated essays exploring the roots, spread, influences, and importance of Country Music, not only in music, but in the wider American musical culture.

Born in East Texas near Tyler (where we lived for three years while I taught at what was then Texas Eastern University and is now The University of Texas at Tyler) Malone grew up on a hard-scrabble cotton farm, where his first interest in music was sparked by his father’s bring a battery operated radio into the home in the mid-1930’s. Soon, his inexpensive first guitar was given to him as a gift. Malone, showed an interest in the music he heard, and later, as a student at the University of Texas at Austin, widened his interest into his studies and his research. Encouraged by his faculty advisor, he wrote his doctoral dissertation at UT on country music. It was published as the still-in-print book Country Music U.S.A.

Sing Me Back Home: Southern Roots and Country Music, published in 2017, is a collection of serious, well documented essays previously published in scholarly journals or delivered as speeches to university audiences. Despite his academic excellence, Malone’s country roots and essential decency shine through on every page. Examined in its overall focus, lies Malone’s highly knowledgeable awareness of the deep variety and wide-reaching roots of what has become known as country music. He looks carefully at the roots from which much of the music sprang, discovering more complexity and nuance than most fans attribute to their own version of the sources and nature of their preferred version of country.

In his chapter on Bill Monroe, for instance, he looks at the lonely boy who picked up a mandolin, as well as the young man who followed his brother to the industrial Midwest. He was influenced by all the musical strands he encountered as well as bringing his own personality and strength towards developing the basis of what others came to call bluegrass music. He finds the same diversity in early country music, discusses the influences of going to war, the wide dispersal growing from radio and, later television, on the development of country music. He examines how jazz, pop, the movement of rural people to the cities, and other factors make country music and bluegrass variants on the same tree trunk. He particularly examines how various ethnic and cultural communities in America have contributed to the music. Purity is not what you find, but, perhaps, a greater understanding of much of what makes America great emerges.

If you’re interested in a book that helps you solidify your personal conception of what country music really is, this book may not be your best choice. If, on the other hand, you think you can benefit from getting a more eclectic understanding of how common people from America’s rural roots became one of the most powerful and influential musical formats in contemporary life around the world, this book will thrill you.

I bought Sing Me Back Home: Southern Roots and Country Music as a used book from ThriftBooks.com in a hardback edition. The book is published by the University of Oklahoma Press and is widely available

Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders & the Birth of the FBI by David Grann

2023-12-15T20:40:00.000-05:00

The plight and treatment of Native Americans in this country cannot be overemphasized as we become more aware and sensitive to the way they have been treated throughout our history. Killers of the Flower Moon stands out, at least partly because it has provided both the title and the source for a hugely popular movie, just released for streaming on Apple+. However, the book was a best-seller, listed as one of the top ten nonfiction books of 2017. Author David Grann, spent a number of years digging into the story of exploitation, murder, government disinterest, and simple graft which allowed this too typical rape of a people and the land during the first quarter of the twentieth century.

The Osage people were settled on a barren piece of unwanted territory in Osage County, Oklahoma, the largest county in the state, with Tulsa anchoring it at the southeast corner. It was sandy, dry, and unwanted until oil was discovered underneath it in 1897. The Osage people owned the mineral rights underneath land, making them, for a while, some of the richest people in the world. Soon, a number of white entrepreneurs and politicians realized the could gain control of the oil money only by marrying some of the women on the reservation. This led to a period, between 1917 and 1925 of local and imported men marrying Native people. Soon, a strange increase in the death rate of these Indian wives and the increased riches of the men, who gained control of much of the oil, began to occur.

When called upon to investigate what was happening in Osage County, J. Edgar Hoover, the Director of the FBI was just at the point of organizing his agents as a national police force and creating the FBI myth for integrity and efficiency that lasted for nearly eighty years. He had little time and less inclination to seriously investigate the situation. Moreover, there were numerous investigation of the deaths and trials, all featuring extensive corruption, the the increasing exploitation of these not well educated or sophisticated people.

The story, told by David Grann, brings the characters and the setting to life. Furthermore, his deep dives into archives long gathering dust in the State Library and other depositories lay waiting to be carefully collated, read, and interpreted. While the Osage people knew much of the history, they were not able to become good advocates in their own interests. As he digs through the various archives he uncovered, the horror of the treatment the Osage people received becomes increasingly horrifying to Grann and to his reader. This is a story you should read to shed additional light on the story before seeing the film.

David Grann

David Grann is an award winning writer whose works have received best-selling status. Several of his books have been New York Times best-sellers, and he was a longtime staff writer for The New Yorker magazine. I bought the book and read it on my Kindle reader.

The Innovators by Walter Isaacson

2023-12-04T08:58:00.001-05:00

The seemingly ubiquitous biographer, scholar, university president, think-tank director, CNN chief, and editor of Time Magazine, Walter Isaacson, wrote The Innovators way back in 2014, which looks like a lifetime in the history of the development of computers. Nevertheless, with the exception of scanty attention paid to the development of artificial intelligence, this volume presents a lively and comprehensive picture of the development of calculating machines that have become indispensable in the modern world. Author of at least twenty volumes during the last thirty years, Isaacson has focused on the "great man (or woman)" theory of human progress, always writing about the people behind the ideas while making the ideas cogent for the thoughtful reader.

The story begins with Ada Byron (Lord Byron's only legitimate child) who became Ada Lovelace, and whose reputation remains bright in the world of applied mathematics, who saw the possibilities of Babbage's counting machine for more advanced applications. She is so important in the development of the idea of computers, that at least one major modern computer system was named after her. From mechanical devices, the computer industry developed as a variety of mechanical and then electronic devices made their appearance. Each idea, from learning to program machines to produce answers, electric wires to transistors, to microchips, and more required reliance on past advances and the imagination to advance to the next step, as well as applications for those advances. Neither the microchip, the computer, the Internet, software, nor the World Wide Web itself was inevitable without the foregoing work or forward looking visionaries.

Isaacson is a master of making links between advances that don't always easily emerge as inevitable advances growing in an ever widening universe of possibilities and making them coherent. Thus, the works of industrial giants like Bill Gates or Steve Jobs become necessary, but not sufficient, cogs in an ever-widening electronic universe. This is all presented in an approachable, almost friendly, writing style which makes the ideas we can't quite grasp into concepts the reader can see an appreciate without ever having any of the necessary skills to contribute to the ever expanding world of computers.

Isaacson takes a great person approach to the development of the ideas needed to culminate with the cyber world in which we're currently living, while also emphasizing the fact that great advances in nearly all areas of advance rely upon cooperation and collaboration between innovators, organizers, and entrepreneurs. Often great ideas in seeing the implications of an advance or in doing the math require someone to make the connections. It takes a different sort of personality to turn the resultant innovation into a salable product, making it possible for consumers to understand that they have a need it might fulfill. Thus, he emphasizes conjunction of brilliant ideas, useful applications, and finished products.

Radio Shack TRS-80

I have one, perhaps, personal quibble with the account of innovators who made computers available to the masses. Isaacson left out the role of Radio Shack and their TRS-80 home computer. Released in 1977, this home computer was the first computer I owned and where I began my learning curve. I got it from my mother and, later, sold it to a friend, so it did mighty work, back when so many of us were learning to function in the cyber world...I never did learn to be a programmer, but I sure have worked any number of computers to the death over the years.

Walter Isaacson

Walter Isaacson is a widely known and widely read writer/administrator/television personality, and political advisor who has published numerous fine biographies. He's always readable!

I bought my copy of The Innovators in a bookstore as a remaindered book.

The Pioneers - David McCoullough

2023-09-27T10:51:00.000-04:00

Pulitzer Prize winning writer David McCullough could always be relied upon to tell a terrific story while presenting the reader with a good read. With eleven major titles to his credit, he managed to pick up a couple of Pultizer Prizes, a National Book Award, and was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom. He also narrated some of Ken Burns' PBS historical series, and kept busy with freelance writing. McCullough was a great writer who kept his readers' attention with lively prose that keeps the reader with him to the end. The Pioneers, published in 2019, two years before his death at age 89, showed he had lost none of his narrative skill.

The Pioneers opens in Massachusetts around the end of the Revolutionary War, in June of 1787. The book focuses on the lives of Manasseh Cutler pastor of the First Congregational Church in Ipswich and Rufus Putnam, who fought with Washington during the Revolution, who began to look westward. They helped lead the move westward from New England at a time when, having won The Revolution, the United States suddenly found itself as a country hugging its Atlantic coastline and having won control of millions of acres west of the original states, most of which was unexplored wilderness as far as they were concerned. He managed to commit Congress and President Washington to support a trip West with Revolutionary War General Rufus Putnam. The land they were headed for was the vast Ohio valley, west of Pennsylvania and across the Muskingum River, hundreds of thousands of acres of vast, mature woodlands inhabited only by a variety of Indian tribes. Forty-eight men set off for the Ohio River in the Winter of 1788.

Along the way, the first company encountered rough or nonexistent roads, cold winter hardships, and dense wilderness that none of them had ever encountered before. They had to break a trail across western Pennsylvania, cutting their way through deep forests and building rafts to cross rivers or to use them for transportation. Overcoming great hardships, the men reached the Marietta River separating western Pennsylvania from the Ohio Territory, built rafts to travel down-river, and chose to settle near what became Marietta, OH. They found the land filled with huge trees that had never heard the sound of an axe, as well as plenty of game for food. These men were determined to maintain Ohio as a non-slave territory, as the issues leading to the Civil War were already lively concerns. On their next trip West, they were joined by family members and more people seeking land and riches.

Soon they were able to establish a ship-building center based on the availability of large timber. Women came to join their spouses, and both shipping and trade on the rivers flourished. The rest of the book contains lively descriptions of the development of communities, the building of churches, and, possibly the most important, the establishment of schools and colleges in an area previously devoid of any formal education. As the Ohio territory grew in population and wealth, many of the heroes of the American Revolution came there to visit, and newer political figures came to marvel at the areas progress and promise.

David McCullough

The Pioneers by David McCollough is top of the shelf history reading for anyone interested in American History, the opening of the West, the resistance to the spread of slavery, or simply a good story-teller bringing American History to life. I bought the book as a used book from ThriftBooks.com, which is one of my go-to sources for good reading at a reasonable price.

A Voyage Long and Strange: Rediscovering the New World by Tony Horowitz - Book Review

2023-08-12T11:57:00.000-04:00

We all grow up in America with an image of who we are and how we got here based on visions of how America was populated and where our belief systems developed. These understandings suggest that English Protestants seeking to escape the Church of England, who came to be known as Pilgrims, first stepped onto the rocky shores of what is now Massachusetts in 1603, establishing a strong community which grew into and spread a new nation. Little in our understandings of who we are and how this country evolved from in indigenous native populations. For instance, the Miamisburg Mound in Ohio may date from 800 BC - 100 AD. The remains of thriving Indian cultures have been discovered in almost every part of what is now North America. These people, perhaps, millions of what are now called Indians farmed, grew crops, herded animals, and fought wars between themselves.

We also have been taught little about the other, earlier explorations of North America from Scandinavia, Spain, and Portugal which took place for several centuries before the Pilgrims arrived. In A Voyage Long And Strange (Henry Holt & Co., 2008) Tony Horowitz sets his readers straight in his own unique and often amusing explorations of places Europeans visited, the peoples they met when they got here, the hardships they endured within the context of how those experiences have been ignored by school history. Written in the context of his own journey in the early 21st century, Horowitz presents the history and reality as well as a strong sense of place in this enlightening and insightful book about whom we are and how we "discovered" America.

Horowitz takes the guise of an interested amateur as he follows the routes taken by Vikings arriving before the year 1000. Columbus, may have sailed the ocean blue in 1492, but he never found the North American continent during his explorations, Evidence suggests that Spanish explorers not only explored what are now the Caribbean Islands, but also crossed what is now the southern United States from Florida to the Midwest as well as Mexico and Texas, as well as sailing up the West coast of California and Oregon. At every placed they explored they found complex cultures which we grouped together as what are now known as Indians. These people lived in complex societies, practiced effective, abundant farming, and fought wars against their enemies. All this happened before explorers landed at what is now Virginia beginning in 1540, where they sought to establish permanent livelihood before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock in 1620.

Horowitz plays the role of an innocent traveler looking for evidence of about the alien (that is: European) explorers to sites in North America and Mexico, as well as the Caribbean Islands. At each site he visits, he plays the role of a naïve visitor with little or no information about the European incursions on local places. In seeking to explore the cultures of an indigenous population and the effects of the exploration and exploitation of this continent the explorers thought of as a large land-mass separating them from the Far East. What they encountered were organized societies from hunter-gatherers to sophisticated kingdoms.

Since most of the explorers were there to chase riches, rumored towers of gold and silver, to return to their native country and gain fame and fortune back home, they were mostly unprepared for the natives they met. Depending on the nature of the lands they found, the explorers discovered a variety of indigenous peoples that, for at least a few centuries of European exploration were lumped together as Indians who lived in tribes. Depending on the climate and resources available in various places, these people were grouped into everything from rather rich kingdoms to highly organized agricultural societies, less organized groups of people able to live off the land. They had not discovered gun powder, so were much to the mercy of their invaders. Worse still, they had never been introduced to the various diseases these explorers brought with them from Europe. They had developed no resistance to the variety of disease common in Europe. Disease, rather than military prowess, probably tipped the odds to the favor of the invaders from the east.

As Horowitz travels, which range from Nova Scotia and Labrador to the Caribbean Islands, Mexico, and much of the The American Southwest, Jamestown, and finally to where we think our history begins, New England. In every location he visits, he finds sites destroyed by time, development, and ignorance of the cultural riches which had once dominated the continent only to be destroyed by visitors who cared not at all for these people they "discovered." Horowitz discovers places that are still preserved, descendants of the local tribes as well as people dedicated to preserving the few remaining sites as well as some serious archeology. He maintains a good humor about the contrasts between contemporary tourists and the genuine wars of conquest fought over a period of two or three hundred years in North America.

Tony Horowitz

Tony Horowitz (1960-2019) published a number of books in which he created a sub-genre of the explorer social observer. "His journalism was always participatory, and he took readers along for the ride,” Joel Achenbach, a reporter for The Washington Post, said by email on Tuesday. “He climbed masts on sailing ships, rode mules, marched with Confederate re-enactors, and ventured into dive bars in the remote crossroads of America.” (NY Times Obituary, May 28, 2019)

I purchased A Voyage Long and Strange: Rediscovering the New World from ThriftBooks.com, a site I highly recommend to people wishing to purchased used books which are usually in very good condition.

Image

Oh, Didn't They Ramble: Rounder Records and the Transformation of American Roots Music by David Menconi - Book Review

2023-07-29T19:46:00.213-04:00

While I was busy going to a local state college, getting married, and beginning a career as a teacher during much of the period in which the cultural revolution of the 1960's into which Rounder Records was created, I wasn't unaware of the musical revolution going on at the time. I played a guitar, badly, and sang folk songs, listened to many of the bands that emerged in this time, without either dropping out or really tuning in. Nevertheless, David Menconi's history of Rounder Records and the Rounder Founders (Ken Irwin, Marian Leighton Levy and Bill Nowlin) brings back a wonderful, dangerous, and scary time dominated by the "drop out and tune in" musical and cultural vibe of the time. The book is simply a joy to read! The fact that it's written by a career newspaper writer who trod the musical beat, rather than an academician, brings an immediacy and liveliness to the book that many university press works often lack, lifting its creditability and enjoyment quotient.

Attendees at bluegrass festivals, concerts, and conferences are well aware of at least two of the Rounder Founders, as they are known. Ken Irwin and Marian Leighton Levy can often be spotted sitting in seats, plying the hallways, joining in meetings, or talking quietly with members of both well known and not easily recognized bands. The third member of the triad, Bill Nowlin, is less often recognized, but equally responsible for the development of one of the most important labels from its earliest nascent beginning selling albums to fans at southern festivals to its sale to the Concord Music Group in 2010.

Two relatively short set-pieces provide deep insight into the context of Rounder's development and the adventuresome qualities of Ken Irwin and Marian Leighton. During a summer between college semesters, two of the Rounder founders took a risky, dangerous cross-country trip, hitch-hiking to the West Coast. This is followed up by a quite useful chapter on the development of the recording industry from the late nineteenth century wax cylinders to the growth of compact discs, with an emphasis on the development of what are now known as niche recordings. The two pieces emphasize the counter-culture roots, the risk-taking spirit, and the technological savvy that characterized the life of Rounder Records.

Obviously written with the strong backing of the Rounder Founders, the narrative describes in detail the growth and development of the three founders in the midst of the counter-culture years of the late 1960’s into the’70’s with both admiration and a strong sense of the era. Three smart, educated hippies who lived the communal ethic of the time while creating a very much capitalist record company. The combination leads to humorous as well as nostalgic responses. Meanwhile, through years of growth, changing relationships, and unimaginable, at the time, success, Rounder Records continued to grow and thrive, hitting its first employees while increasing the size of its catalog beyond what the founders had originally imagined.

The Rounder Founders

Ken Irwin, Marian Leighton Levy & Bill Nowlin

There’s not enough space in a review to catalog the older traditional artists as well as the new and innovative ones Rounder then proceeded to record. Suffice it to say that much of the charm of this exciting and enjoyable book lies in the commitment and drive to expand while always seeking to keep their eyes on their original mission. The chapter on what became known by its album number, 0044, the first album by J.D. Crowe Crow and the New South, that altered bluegrass in serious ways as well as placing Rounder in an increasingly powerful position in the recording industry is typical of the risks the company took as well as its luck in being at the right place at the right time.

Through the years, Rounder matured as a business and a leader in finding new artists across a broad range of genres and sub-genres while the Rounder Founders kept their original leftish perspective and collective approach to running their business. None of the above seemed to have stopped them from making ground breaking recordings, growing as an organization, signing new artists, and out-working many of their competitors. The crucial breakthrough growth point came when a warehouse worker discovered George Thorogood and the Destroyers playing an especially exciting form of rock & roll music, a genre into which Rounder had never ventured before. Other major artists signed included Alison Kraus, providing them with the leeway to continue taking risks with unknown and small niche performers. Most of the book details, with deep understanding and enough humor to keep it approachable, the journey of a small, niche record company into an industry giant. Meanwhile, the Rounder founders remained true to their values while learning to operate in a much broader universe.

Rounder Founders (more or less) Today

Ken Irwin, Marian Leighton Levy, Bill Nowlin

Other artists found or were found by the three Rounder founders as well as staff members. Because they remained true to their founding precepts while open to music that simply didn't appeal to larger, more commercial recording companies, they discovered artists who later left for seemingly greener pastures. Some came back and others continued to sell on Rounder as well as their new label. The company grew beyond anything they had imagined when they came together to record their first album. The story shows the value that people of principle bring to developing a thriving company, while keeping a close eye on the values that led them to found Rounder Records.

David Menconi

David Menconi has put together an extensive Spotify playlist to accompany this book. For those interested in listening along to some of the featured artists and tunes, here's a link: Rounder Playlist. He worked as a reporter for the Raleigh News & Observer for 28 years. His most recent book before this, titled Step It Up and Go: The Story of North Carolina Popular Music.., published in 2020 was also reviewed in this blog. He has also written for Rolling Stone, Billboard, Spin, and the New York Times.

I received a copy of Oh, Didn't They Ramble from the University of North Carolina Press in return for a review.

The Gibson Brothers at Silver Bay

2023-07-10T09:44:00.000-04:00

On Saturday, we drove to Silver Bay YMCA Camp on Lake George, NY. This gem of early twentieth century architecture serves as a summer getaway for a number of long-time summer visitors as well lectures, shows, conferences, and much more. On Saturday, we drove down for a Gibson Brothers concert in this wonderful old concert hall, built in 1909. Built entirely of wood, the auditorium proved itself to be a perfect place to hear the band with a special sound we seldom find in many other venues.

Silver Bay Auditorium

The Gibson Brothers were in fine voice and good humor as they welcomed the Silver Bay crowd and a few people from outside that community. Darren Nicholson on mandolin makes a terrific addition to the band, when he stands in on mandolin, bringing first rate mandolin work along with, when needed, an additional harmony voice.

The Gibson Brothers

Eric & Leigh Gibson

With their brotherly duets, high quality instrumentality, and unique humor, Eric & Leigh Gibson have now graced bluegrass stages, recordings, and song writing for well over thirty years. Maintaining their performance and always adding something new and/or surprising.

Leigh Gibson & Mike Barber

Eric Gibson

Leigh Gibson

Mike Barber

Often underestimated, the role of bass players in bands represents both a major percussive sound and provides timing for the band. Mike has been with the band since their early days as a regional New England band through two IBMA Entertainer of the Year awards and more. Softspoken and quiet, Mike represents a crucial voice within the band.

Eric O'Hara

Eric O'Hara has been a regular member of the band for several years on Dobro and/or electric steel. Eric was also their first teacher as a teacher at Dick's Country Store and Music Oasis in nearby Churubosco, NY.

Darrin Nicholson

Darren Nicholson, a fine musician from western North Carolina, has been a frequent stand-in with the Gibson Brothers for several years. He brings subtle, often virtuoso mandolin play to augment the bands already fine sound, as well as some subtle good humor. On the rare occasions when they require a third vocal contribution, he adds a unique voice and well-blended voice.

Eric & Kelly Gibson

Kelly Gibson

Kelly Gibson performed one of his own songs with competence and good stage presence. He's a welcome addition when he joins the band for a song.

All told, it was a delightful evening of Gibson Brothers music. Ask for your local or national festival to book this first rate band.

Stringbean: The Life and Murder of a Country Legend by Taylor Hagood - Book Review

2023-07-01T15:47:00.000-04:00

Almost as soon as I picked up Taylor Hagood's biography of David Akeman (Stringbean: The Life and Murder of a Country Legend) I knew I could put aside my instinct to find fault in order to luxuriate in a well-documented, carefully constructed, combination of biography and true crime story that would introduce me to a musician I had only heard about, who along with his wife Estelle, was murdered in a gruesome plot to steal the money that was supposed to hidden away in his modest farmhouse.

The first several chapters use the few early available published resources and public records to locate David Akeman without ever overstepping what he can actually document. Then Hagood artfully and accurately portrays the environment in Eastern Kentucky, the rise of country and bluegrass music on the radio, and the increasing visibility of Stringbean as he worked with ever more prominent bands, appearing with them on the radio and travelling with them on the southern country music trail. He writes about the influences of Uncle Dave Macon and Grandpa Jones on Akeman's approach to the banjo. By creating an environment and maintaining scholarly demands for citing details, Hagood, a writer of imagination and agility, builds a fully believable environment without ever making leaps of credibility.

As the late fifties and sixties arrived, the influence of folk and rock music showed in Akeman's approach while he was always true to old-time traditions in his music and life, Hagood draws interesting and important distinctions between the emerging folk music craze, changes in country music, and the emergence of rock & roll. He focuses on the seemingly great difference between folk music's rising star, Pete Seegar and Stringbean, pointing out that their approaches to traditional music were quite different, while marveling that, apparently they never met. (pp. 86 - 91)

David Akeman

Stringbean's career, as Hagood clearly points out, spans the period between the late nineteenth century and the mid-twentieth, with his musical background on the banjo reaching back almost to the days of blackface, while lasting long enough for him to have travelled with Bill Monroe, and to be featured on both the Grand Ol' Opry and HeeHaw on television. Hagood is able to draw on television film archives through the sixties, when Stringbean emerged as a national figure as well as later, even more modern material, yet remains respectful of the traditional world of country music.

As Stringbean matures into middle age, he becomes recognized as a transitional figure from old-time string band music reaching back into the late nineteenth century, while still keeping the respect and love of a new generation of musicians in country music, reflecting a more modern face through television. Just as Akeman had received extensive national attention because of the larger platform he enjoyed, his life was ended at the age of fifty-eight, largely because he had a reputation for storing large amounts of money in his home, because of his distrust of banks, growing out of his experiences during the Depression. The final chapters focus on the search for Akeman's killers and their trial, showing how difficult ferreting out the truth can be.

Taylor Hagood

Taylor Hagood is a professor of English at Florida Atlantic University with a wide variety of interests in literature, music, and history. He has a busy career as an internationally known, in demand speaker, humorist, and musical performer.

Stringbean: The Life and Music of a Country Music Legend by Taylor Hagood supplied to me by the University of Illinois Press and available from Amazon as well as other major vendors. I read a review copy sent to me by the publisher. I highly recommend this well-researched and highly readable (the two don't always go together) book.

The Aftermath by Philip Bump - Book Review

2023-06-02T10:47:00.000-04:00

Philip Bump has written an interesting and important book for anyone living in contemporary America who wonders why and how we got to the state we're in, as well as what the long-term future might look like. Most of us living in 2023 are aware, more or less, of what's going on in politics, lifestyle, entertainment, and every other element of contemporary society. We look at today's children, young marrieds, middle-aged people, and the elderly, trying to figure out how they have come to be the kind of people they are. If you're young, you might wonder how those middle aged people you know seem to have accumulated so much, or you might think their taste in music, television, and activities are somehow out of step with what you grew up hearing, watching and doing. If you're a member of my generation, labeled The Silent Generation, those of us born between 1928 and 1945, you might see us as completely out of touch with reality, while we might see you as rude, self-indulgent, and irresponsible. But the greatest influence during the past century and long into the future, according to Bump, is the group born between 1946 and 1964, the largest, and seemingly most influential, generation in American history.

Whether you perceive the Baby Boomers as young upstarts who pushed aside as they became the most powerful group in the country, or, if you're younger than they are, the group that's keeping you from reaching your full potential or continues to insist on all the attention you think you're ready to assume, the Boomers simply cannot be ignored. Bump details their influences in a usually highly readable text accompanied by way too many charts and graphs demonstrating their influence and standing in relationship to the other age cohorts in America.

Bump's data comes largely from research studies he makes clear and understandable and a large number of interviews of academics and other writers who have written about economic, social, and cultural aspects affecting life in America. His narrative particularly focuses on issues of race, social class, education, and culture as our country slowly, but inevitably, changes through time and each succeeding generation's reaction to the ones that came before influencing their lives.

While not a scholarly work, The Aftermath relies on the work of many scholars and serious data collectors. This is both a strength and a flaw in this book. While the narrative is clear and explains much of the data presented, at times the amount of data is hard to digest into concepts making real sense. Another issue, for me, was the sparse coverage of the roll of labor unions and organized labor in the rise and fall of the economy, as well as the welfare of middle-class non-college educated men and women in the labor force. Nevertheless, the decline in college enrollments, as well as the increase in elderly reliance on social programs and generous retirement plans to clearly meet the needs of age cohorts following the Boomers. This book seeks to answer many of these kinds of issues and, for the most part, succeeds in pointing the way towards greater understanding.

Philip Bump

Philip Bump is a columnist for The Washington Post based in New York. He writes the weekly newsletter How To Read This Chart.

I read The Aftermath: The Last Days of the Baby Boom and the Future of America in a hardback edition published by Random House, it is also available from Amazon.com in Hardback, paperback or Kindle editions.

Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson

2023-03-25T11:38:00.009-04:00

In this comprehensive biography of Apple Computer’s founding member and longtime chief executive, no matter what his title was at any time, Steve Jobs emerges as both a genius and the most innovative creator of a computer which combined utility and style to become the most cherished brand name in technology. In compiling this compelling, highly readable account of a man who many saw not possible to fully describe, Isaacson has interviewed over 100 people who worked for or with Jobs as well as any number of his family and competitors. Having been chosen to write the biography by Jobs, it never becomes a hagiography, showing the man with all his flaws, many of which contributed to his success.

Steve Jobs was abandoned by his birth parents and adopted by a couple in northern California, his adoptive father was a tinkerer with cars and a lover of automotive design. Nevertheless, despite warm and loving adoptive parents, one of Jobs’ many devils remained throughout his life a sense of abandonment, perhaps leading to his own flaws as both a husband and a parent. Nevertheless, he was born at exactly the right time and adopted at the right place to be well-positioned for the emergence of the technological revolution that became Apple.

Walter Isaacson may have been the best choice Jobs could have made to write his biography. The book details Jobs’ strengths and flaws in detail without ever seeming to lose contact with the volcanic personality he was exploring. Chosen by Jobs to write the book, he also was able to maintain his independence in order to create a full picture of a genius who was neither a saint nor a villain. Neither was a great computer designer or software architect. He emerges as a person who stood for great design and the highest possible software along with a vision for how such could be achieved and how it could be accomplished and the ability to interpret that to his employees while building a great and lasting corporation. Isaakson maintains that Steve Jobs will live in history as one of the great tech creators of all time. As an industrialist, Isaacson places Jobs in a pantheon with Edison and Ford…pretty high praise.

Walter Isaacson

Walter Isaacson, a professor of history at Tulane, has been CEO of the Aspen Institute, chair of CNN, and editor of Time. He is the author of Leonardo da Vinci; The Innovators; Steve Jobs; Einstein: His Life and Universe; Benjamin Franklin: An American Life; and Kissinger: A Biography, and the coauthor of The Wise Men: Six Friends and the World They Made. Visit him at Isaacson.Tulane.edu. (Simon & Schuster)

I read Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson (Simon & Schuster, 675pp) in a hardback edition I purchased from Thriftbooks.com . It can also be bought for Kindle at Amazon.com. I found the book to be highly readable for both general readers and those more interested in sharp, thoughtful analysis of a complex, difficult and important American industrialist. Enjoy!

The Gibson Brothers - Darkest Hour

2023-02-28T11:19:00.006-05:00

The first time we saw the Gibson Brothers perform, as best we can ascertain, was at the 2005 or 2006 Jenny Brook Bluegrass Festival, then held at the small municipal park in Weston, VT. For this show, they had a six member band, with Junior Barber coming out of retirement for a guest appearance. We were struck by their wonderful melodies, close harmony, sometimes edgy brotherly byplay, and far ranging repertoire, which had always contained many of their own songs. We became instant fans, and their being in the lineup became one of the criteria we applied for choosing which festivals to attend.

Gibson Brothers at Jenny Brook - 2006

As we grew in our understanding and appreciation of bluegrass music, we also became aware that they fit into some special niches. Coming from northernmost New York State, they had grown up on a hardscrabble farm in an almost desolate area quite close to the Canadian border. Yet they had become, at quite young ages, masters of the banjo and guitar, and knowledgeable about the southern rural roots where the music emerged. To it, they brought their own fine song writing and wonderful brother harmonies. As they’ve grown as musicians and individuals, they’ve followed their own unique musical skills into places where many bluegrass musicians never venture, while continuing to develop their own unique sound.

We’ve been listening to the new Gibson Brothers recording “Darkest Hour” for over a month in concert, on CD, and now on an excellent podcast presented by Bluegrass Unlimited and the Bluegrass Hall of Fame & Museum, as well as individual songs used in a variety of interviews. The recording as well as the Gibson Brothers themselves only grow on us with each hearing, whether live or recorded. Always thought provoking, the two brothers have, in this marvelous album, become mature, seasoned performers, The longing for and glorification of two boys growing up on a marginal farm has been replaced by new perspectives showing their maturity as men and as performers as they move into middle age, It’s filled with reflective songs accompanied by their always heart-grabbing harmonies and musical excellence,

Grounded in reflection and based on the rich Gibson Brothers harmonies, The Darkest Hour is built upon their long-time well-recognized musical excellence, and honed clean and pure by Jerry Douglass’ excellent production, featuring some of Nashville’s brightest lights (Euen McGlocklin, Barry Bales, Alison Krauss), the recording shines like a diamond!

Leigh’s song “One Minute of You: A Song for Annie Gray” is a love song from a father to his daughter, filled with the desire a parent feels to cling to every minute of a child’s growth, knowing the letting go is, in the end, necessary. Eric wrote “I Go Driving” to capture the power of driving alone in the country to regain perspective and recapture the lost beauty of the farmland he grew up in, from the perspective of a lost era. The song is simply heart-rending. The Gibson Brothers manage to capture the richness of a lost past without the maudlin sentimentality found in many other contemporary bluegrass songs. Meanwhile, their music continues to be forward looking and optimistic.

Simultaneously a bit darker than their earlier work, their natural effervescence and optimism still shines through - courageous and confident. It’s like reading a novel instead of a book of short stories. The Adirondack songs, written over a period of twenty-five or so years and never collected in a single album, remain grounded in reflection (The Barn Song, Song of Yesterday, Iron and Diamonds, Safe Passage, Railroad Line), yearning for a lost world. The Darkest Hour, chosen from previously never released songs and several of brand new ones, provides a sense of structure as well reflections on living a meaningful life. This newest recording by The Gibson Brothers continues their record of releasing exciting meaningful bluegrass collections.

Lady Justice: Women, The Law, and The Battle to Save America by Dahlia Lithwick

2023-01-12T09:54:00.003-05:00

Lady Justice: Women, The Law, and the Battle to Save America by Dahlia Lithwick tells the stories of ten women who, through years of developing their legal practices, emerged, mostly, during the Trump administration as heroines for the rights of women and minorities, as well as helping to advance the awareness of men about the dangers of any profession being dominated by them. The book shows these advances through Lithwick’s clear understanding that effective legal practice requires not only tough-minded legal argument, but a strong emphasis on sharp storytelling. Through Lithwick’s clear thinking and penetrating narrative, each of the subjects emerges not only as a game changing attorney, but a woman of courage and persistence.

The book opens with a profile of Pauli Murray, one of the most important and least known pioneers in combining the law and women’s experience in high levels of energy, intelligence, perseverance, and effectiveness. A civil rights activist who earned her law degree at Yale, along with other degrees from first-rate graduate schools across the country, she influenced an entire generation of Black and civil rights attorneys as well as helping mold arguments for the Supreme Court. She later became an Episcopal Priest, influencing that once stodgy denomination.

Other chapters look at a series of attorneys who wove their influence through persistent effort against social reluctance for change in, often, male-dominated law firms where they experienced professional blockages and sexual harassment. They knew, however, they often could not openly resist without possibly (almost certainly) risking their personal advancement in an historically male-dominated profession.

Lithwick tells her own story in a chapter called “#MeToo,” in which she describes when, early in her legal career, she became a clerk for a Federal judge who was, among insiders, notorious for his sexual harassment of woman clerks, all of whom felt constrained from outing the judge because of the negative effect it might have upon their own careers. Most, torn between fighting back and fearing the loss of their own legal careers, chose silence. Lithwick eventually left legal practice to become a legal writer covering the Supreme Court and other issues, as well as hosting an informative and entertaining weekly podcast called “Amicus,” available on many platforms.

Dahlia Lithwick

“Dahlia Lithwick is the senior legal correspondent at Slate and host of Amicus, Slate’s award-winning biweekly podcast about the law. Her work has also appeared in The New York Times, Harper’s, The New Yorker, The Washington Post, The New Republic, and Commentary, among other places. Lithwick won a 2013 National Magazine Award for her columns on the Affordable Care Act. She was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in October, 2018.” Penguin, Random House

I found the book to be riveting reading, from a writer who knows that dry academic or legal language doesn’t really do a good job telling stories. Lithwick turns history into the kind of stories that increase understanding while holding onto a reader and simultaneously educting. I purchased the book from Amazon and read it on my Kindle app.

2022-12-28T09:55:00.000-05:00

New York, The Novel by Edward Rutherfurd is a sprawling historical novel, much in the Michener style, following the lives, fortunes, and a good deal of drama focusing on five fictional families, serving as possible examples of the fortunes, trials, troubles, and triumphs as one of the greatest cities in the world develops from a small island village at the end of a great river through the economic, social, and cultural changes brought by each new group of immigrants coming to the New World and deciding to stay in New York. This seductive, interesting, and massive (862 pages) novel offers a fictionalized picture of the growth and development of a great metropolis through the eyes of, primarily, five families who helped populate it through the next three hundred years.

The narrative follows families of Dutch and English early settlers who turned the quiet, agricultural society of the early New York into a bustling city of trade and commerce as English settlers came, and later were joined by other people who had come to Boston, Philadelphia, and the deep South, each bringing changes in attitude as the English lost control of this sprawling piece of ground during the first two hundred or so years. Later immigrants, coming from Ireland, Italy, and Jewish settlements throughout Europe each struggled to survive and ultimately to grow rich and powerful in a city where the real nobility has always been money more than social class. Through the years, each group, represented in the novel by a particular family’s integrates itself into this large, complex city, thrives and rises or falls on its ability to find their own way to success.

Each major chapter of New York represents a time period in the city’s busy history and is headed by a date. Focusing on the development of New Amsterdam, the British dominance, the Revolutionary War, expansion westward and the canals followed by railroads, and the influence of mass immigration beginning in the late nineteenth century, bringing new flavors and cultural experiences to enrich this ever-growing city.

As the child of two separate Jewish immigration waves, first in the mid-nineteenth century and later in the early twentieth century married to the daughter of family composed of a marriage between the descendants of early-post Mayflower father and a mother whose parents were both born in Italy, much in this fascinating book was of interest to me. The fact that much of my early life was centered around the upper west side of Manhatten, where my family and my Dad’s family lived, this book was a natural for me. However, anyone interested in a good origin story, or a rather simplified view of a piece of American history providing insight to most Americans, it proved itself to be attractive across many of my interests and understandings. I thoroughly enjoyed this romp through history which manages to stay grounded in the city’s development while wrapping it in believable prototype characters who add character and humanity to the vast sweep of this novel.

Edward Rutherfurd

Edward Rutherfurd, born in 1948, is a pen name for Francis Edward Wintle who has written nine historical novels using the same strategy of using fictional characters to represent prototypes existing during particular time periods.Rutherford is English, but attended graduate school in the U.S. and has He has received numerous awards for his writing in the U.S., England, and other countries.

I read the book in hardcover, which I bought as a remaindered book, but it’s also available as a Kindle book, and in several paperback editions.

Chasing History: A Kid in the Newsroom by Carl Bernstein

2022-11-11T07:17:00.000-05:00

For those readers seeking to find new and interesting insights in Watergate or juicy disclosures about Carl Bernstein's work with Bob Woodruff, this book is NOT for you. On the other hand, if you're looking for an engaging narrative about the growth and development of an eager, smart, observant kid who became a first-rate newsman in the environment of Washington, DC, this is the book for you.

Raised in an observant Jewish family in Washington, Bernstein early discovered that formal education wasn't for him. However, when he discovered the news room of the (late) Washington Star, he found a school that provided him all he needed: skills, insights, structure, friends, and a lifetime career.

Beginning as a copy boy, a runner who picks up news in progress and moves it from desk to desk, Bernstein moved quickly into taking dictation on the phone from reporters in the field, to filing news himself, to getting bylines for the stories he wrote. In other words, he became a professional newsman while still a teenager. Because he loved prowling Washington neighborhoods, he often found himself on site when interesting things were happening. He was a quick learner and accurate in his descriptions and reporting.

The mentors he found at The Star, as well as the bad examples he was smart enough to identify and avoid, provided him with the education his infrequent attendance at the University of Maryland never accomplished. After five years of what can best be called an apprenticeship, he left the failing Star to join a colleague at a newspaper in Newark, Nj, a far cry from the excitement of Washington. After working for several other papers, he returned to Washington and has spent most of the rest of his distinguished carrer as a reporter for the Washington Post.\

Carl Bernstein

This is a lively, fun-filled book worth your attention. You'll learn a lot about the news business in a most enjoyable presentation. Highly recommended!

Washington Black by Esi Edugyan: Book Review

2022-09-22T10:46:00.000-04:00

Named to The New York Times 10 Best Books of the Year in 2018 as well as short-listed for the prestigious Booker Prize, Washington Black captures the reader quickly dropping onto the island of Barbados on a plantation in 1830. The story is told by Washington Black, a young slave who doesn’t know whether he’s ten or eleven years old. He has no memories he considers worth remembering while he lives on a plantation under the strict and sometimes violent vigil of on older slave woman he knows as Big Kit. Work and frequent beatings in blinding heat are the constants in his life.

One of the sons of the plantation’s owner, Christopher Wilde, known as Titch, plucks young Wash out of his miserable life to assist him in launching a strange lighter than air vehicle…a doomed to failure venture, which leads to Wash’s being burned almost beyond recognition, and to his escape with Titch to America. There follows a strange, often frightening, journey to escape a slave catcher, and learn to live on his own in America and, later, Canada. Throughout his travels, his skills as a draftsman/artist grow along with his interest in marine life, which turns out to be his greatest skill, beyond survival. At first seeming a little strange, the novel turns into a page turner as Wash continues his search for the meaning of his own existence.

Author Esi Edugyan, is a Canadian writer educated who studied at the University of Victoria and Johns Hopkins University. She has published three novels and one work of nonfiction. Her works have earned a number of prizes and mentions for major awards in fiction writing.

Esi Edugyan

Washington Black captures a reader at the start and retains interest as he struggles to learn who he is as well as where he might fit in as he grows in self-awareness through a series of harrowing and then satisfying growth experiences. Edugyan’s writing has narrative drive along with close observation and character development. I bought the book from ThriftBooks and it is available in all the usual outlets. Highly recommended.

My American Journey by Colin L. Powell

2022-07-03T19:36:00.000-04:00

Colin Powell's journey from being the son of immigrant parents from Jamaica and growing up in a working class environment in Queens, New York, New York stands as a shining example of the possibilities for ambitious, upwardly mobile people. A graduate of Queens College and ROTC, he rose to become the highest ranking officer in the American armed forces as well as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Serving under mostly Republican Presidents (Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush) he maintained, in the best manner of an American soldier a neutral political stance while striving go serve each administration in which he worked with the best advice he could, while leading four often competing military services. His story is filled with wit, wisdom, and insight. Until the end of the book, he expresses no political philosophy. At the end, he outlines a moderate governmental viewpoint, which would be a model for us, today, to seek to follow. He turned down an offer from President Bill Clinton to run as his Vice-Presidential running mate, and refused to run for President after retiring from the Army in favor of going home to his wife a family.

Colin Powell emerges as likable yet determined to create change in the armed services where necessary and to effect American foreign policy where action, often wished for by the men he served under, would have cost American lives for no good purpose than to meet political goals.

My American Journey provides exceptionally interesting insights into our problems today while still relevant and meaning, despite having been published a dozen years ago. Highly recommended

Rock of Ages: A Junior Bender Mystery by Timothy Hallinan

2022-03-28T13:32:00.008-04:00

Junior Bender is driving along the street with his teenage daughter Rina, when she pops the question he’s been dreading. She asks what he does for a living. Bender, a career thief, specializing in high value thefts for underworld denizens, gulps, considers his obligations, and decides to answer her questions honestly while spending the weekend engaged in his profession.

One of the delights of any new Tim Hallinan novel is that you don’t need to have read the preceding novels in the series to catch up with the characters. In Rock of Ages (Soho Crime Jun 07, 2022 | 336 Pages | 5-1/2 x 8-1/4 | ISBN 9781641292184) we find protagonist Junior Bender, with his teenage daughter Rina at a legacy rock concert featuring bands that might have been well known fifty years ago. As a brick wall collapses, a musician is killed and the stage is set for Junior to track down the murderer, protect his daughter, continue his storied career as a master thief, and provide plenty of thrills and laughter for his legion of readers.

The plot of Rock of Ages once again takes Junior into the friendly but risky world of uber gangster, the not quite retired, elderly and still dangerous Irwin Dressler, who remains dangerous despite being completely charmed by the ingenuous, smart-as-a-whip Rina. Dressler wants his investment in a dicy legacy rock tour which he has helped finance for four aging fringy rock promoters/gangsters. The final concerts take place in a fifty year old movie palace, no longer the great venue where major Hollywood blockbusters had their world premieres. connoisseurs of aging movie theaters and fading rockers will find this lively novel particularly delightful, as will Hallinan’s fans as well as those not yet familiar with his work.

Two of Tim Hallinan’s series, Junior Bender and Poke Rafferty often mix first rate detective fiction with the problems inherent with fathering teenage girls and being a responsible family member while also engaging in a dangerous occupation. Achieving such a balance in a conventional occupation remains challenging enough. Succeeding within a life of danger and possible death creates tensions and risks that feed the imagination of hungry fiction readers. Doing so with humor and wit turns Rock of Ages into vintage Hallinan. As always, he mixes vivid descriptions, twisted plot-lines, and quirky characters to serve up a delightful frolic through the shady Hollywood underworld.

Timothy Hallinan

Timothy Hallinan lives in Southern California, where has based two of the three protagonists for his quite different series of novels. He has received high critical praise for his three series as well as increasingly widespread recognition for his Poke Rafferty series, set in Bangkok, where he once lived a portion of each year, and his Junior Bender series set in LA and surroundings. He has also served as a consultant to the movie and television industry on a range of issues. For more information, look here.

Rock of Ages (A Junior Bender Mystery) by Timothy Hallinan will be published on June 7th, and is available from all the usual (Amazon, Target, and bookstores everywhere). I found the book to be filled with good laughs, sharp insights, and believable relationships surrounding revealing insights into the sadness of aging rock groups, the decline of once great movie theaters, and the terrors of fatherhood. It does not require prior reading in the series to enjoy, although I recommend all three series as worthy of your attention, if you have not encountered Hallinan’s work before.

A digital copy Rock of Ages was provided to me by the publisher in return for an unbiased reading and possible review.

On the Bus with Bill Monroe by Mark Hembree - Book Review

2022-01-20T15:52:00.019-05:00

It was the late seventies. Mark Hembree was an itinerant musician playing bluegrass with a Denver-based band called Monroe Doctrine. The band broke up, he moved back to Wisconsin, and a few months later happened on a chance to audition for Bill MonroeThe tryout went well, but he was still surprised when Monroe called a few days later and offered him the job. Two weeks later, he joined the band. That was the beginning of five years learning to work with the father of bluegrass music, a lesson that was never completely learned, always evolving and completely unpredictable.

Hembree’s approach to writing On the Bus with Bill Monroe is anecdotal, and incidental, as if it were based upon stops along the way or incidents on the bus. Each brief chapter presents a complete incident illuminating an aspect of life on the road with Bill Monroe, his character, its hardships, quirks, strengths, needs, great vision, ability as a teacher, and sense of the immortality of his music.

Mark Hembree approaches Bill Monroe from a distance of forty years after spending five years in his band, using a macro lens to put a microscope on his experience. He adds nuance to his time with Monroe, putting the man’s life into perspective in ways that nothing else I’ve read about Monroe has succeeded in accomplishing. His writing is fresh, illuminating, open, and delightful.

Hembree’s chapter on legendary fiddler Kenny Baker may define his writing style as well as any. Instead of providing an encyclopedic discussion of one of the defining fiddler's roles within the band, Hembree paints in haiku-like fine strokes, defining the man, his music, and his greatness. If I want to learn more, this provides me with the platform from which I can dive but it’s all I need to know to begin to understand the importance of Baker and his music to Bill Monroe.

Meanwhile, encounters with Monroe himself illustrate all the strengths and flaws that come together to make up his genius. His tight-fistedness alongside his sometime generosity, his flintlike hardness beside his sometimes warmth and understanding, his commitment to his originality and awareness of change. And so many other internal contradictions making up this complex genius.

More than one hundred and sixty musicians came and went during the history of Bill Monroe and the Blue Grass Boys, some became famous in their own right, others are hardly remembered today. Each contributed in some way to the legend of the man and the music. But Bill Monroe assured the purity of his music, retained a constancy uniquely his own, always recognizable, whoever was in the band, no matter where in they were, from the smallest Appalachian village to Jerusalem, to the White House.

Mark Hembree

Mark Hembree joined the Blue Grass Boys in 1979 after a stint playing bass with Monroe Doctrine. He played with the Monroe until 1984, when he joined the Nashville Bluegrass Band as a founding member with Alan O’Bryant, Pat Enright, and Mike Compton. After a bus accident, he retired to a publishing career in Wisconsin and now edits and writes as well as playing bluegrass with the Mark Hembree Band and western swing with the Best Westerns

Bill Monroe & The Blue Grass Boys play Rawhide

The White House - 1980

Many books have sought to capture the quality of the man who created such an enduring legend, planted such vibrant and rich seeds, commanded such fear and respect. There’s almost an industry of scholarly study devoted to discovering the real Bill Monroe. Perhaps the incidents and anecdotes Mark Hembree brings together with his light, mostly humorous touch do as good a job as any of the much heavier pieces of serious scholarship. He presents a complex genius who emerged from poverty, illiteracy, and the Great Depression with a massive chip on his shoulder as well as great, unrecognized ability, fighting for every advantage he could achieve. The details are available in the many books. The core personality emerges in the stories lovingly, humorously, and admiringly told by Mark Hembree. On the Bus with Bill Monroe: My Five Year Ride with the Father of Bluegrass Music by Mark Hembree is published by the University of Illinois Press, a volume in the series Music in American Life. It is available in April of 2022 from all the usual outlets.

Vinyl Ventures: My Fifty Years at Rounder Records by Bill Nowlin

2021-03-29T08:50:00.004-04:00

In many ways the story of Rounder Records (Vinyl Ventures: My Fifty Years at Rounder Records by Bill Nowlin (Equinox Publishing, April, 21, 2021, 320 pp, $29.95) and the story of bluegrass music grew together when three college students from Tufts University began heading to Appalachia during the 1960’s to enjoy, record, and collect this music. Now, Bill Nowlin, one of three Rounder Founders has written the entire story of Rounder Records from close up. The book shows some of the quirks and idiosyncrasies of a writer broadly interested in the world of music and a world beyond, without ever losing its focus on the birth, development, and integrity of its subject, a record label of distinction and longevity.

Rounder Records, founded by Bill Nowlin, Ken Irwin, and Marian Leighton Levy in 1970 was unusual for independent labels in having three founders with different tastes, who sought out music to record from a wider palette than many early independent labels. Rounder emerged just as a yearning to discover the roots of the then popular folk revival was cresting. The three Rounder Founders set out to find, record, and collect the music of those roots, at first in the American South, but soon expanding to a much wider, more comprehensive world.

Rounder Founders

Marian Leighton Levy, Ken Irwin, Bill Nowlin

Reading about the early adventures of the Rounder Founders is a little bit like watching puppies playing in their infant box when one considers the size Rounder grew to, and the speed with which it achieved a level of maturity. They hitch hiked to North Carolina and Virginia, haunted record stores in Greenwich Village in Lower Manhattan, attended live shows at small venues, earned free tickets by promoting those shows, built a cut-and-paste recording business at little or no cost, all as an adventure without thought to making it a career. As many of the other new labels left folk music for rock and roll, the field opened to allow three dedicated young Boston students who hung with what they loved, to begin to prosper. It’s the story of three “counter culture” kids doing what they loved with passion and conviction while discovering a lifelong enterprise that worked out for all of them.

In the early 1970’s, the recording industry was still pretty informal, especially among the multitude of independent, one person operations. Rounder benefitted from having three partners who worked hard while trying to be fair to artists and buyers simultaneously. Over time, and with added success, they remained true to their original ideals while, of necessity, having to become better organized and more businesslike. Nevertheless, for those who know them, the Rounder Founders still give off a whiff of counter culture kids from the late sixties and early seventies. There’s an informal construction to the book, as early friends pop in with memories along the way. Reading the book often feels like a conversation with many people from many eras.

Originally collecting, recording performances, and producing these often rather highly specialized recordings focused on previously obscure performers in Appalachia, expanding to early bluegrass festivals and musical gatherings. Over time, their interests took them to cajun and zydeco in Louisiana, reggae and ska in Jamaica, and to Africa for both traditional and contemporary music. All of this became a part of what turned into an international catalog of over 3000 recordings. Meanwhile, the Founders always took care to represent the interests of the performers in terms of both publication and payment. In order to accomplish these sometimes contradictory goals, they took extra care in choosing partners to collaborate with.

In order to manage this huge collection, Rounder’s business model had to expand as they kept tight control over their expenses. Rounder grew into both a recording company and a distributor, eventually leading them to partner with many other small companies to become a major distributor of niche roots music labels. The Founders learned to be nimble and innovative, while always looking out for the welfare and artistic/economic welfare of the artists they signed. During these periods of expansion, challenges, and opportunities, Nowlin’s narrative describes in detail the corporate interactions and complexities, often with the help of long lists.

Ken Irwin expressed the criteria the company used for selecting music to record, saying, “There are three things we look at when we’re signing artists. One, do we like the music and do we feel that it will hold up over time? Two, do we like the people and their representation? Three, do we think we can make money from it?” Furthermore, if the music doesn’t pass the first test, the next two questions were never even asked. (p.204) As the music recording and distribution environment changed after the introduction of the CD, to digital online distribution through iTunes, Spotify, satellite radio, the role of music publishers and labels became increasingly less prominent. Rounder’s practice of being both a promoter of historic, regional, or local performers became viewed as important but less commercially viable. As such, their business changed as they focused on identifying excellence, publishing materials only available through national archives or private collections.

I read Vinyl Ventures in a print edition with Spotify and YouTube at hand, so I could sample the albums and/or performers Bill Nowlin writes about in his clear, informal, narrative style. The e-version has built in links taking readers directly to Spotify versions of the music. Digital Sources often provided me with a setting for the places where the music was made in addition to providing invaluable insights into the range of music Rounder recorded. I was able to find and hear every artist I looked for on one or the other outlet, but I can’t verify the availability of every one. Nevertheless, since it’s inevitable that many musicians referred to in the book are unfamiliar to many readers, using such sources increases the pure pleasure of this book.

Bill Nowlin

Bill Nowlin is the author or editor of nearly 100 books ranging from this history, through other books about music, more than twenty titles concerning the Boston Red Sox, other baseball titles, political history, fiction, and more. He is a graduate of Tufts University and the University of Chicago, as well as being one of the original three Rounder Founders. He taught Political Science at UMass Lowell from 1970 - 1982. A member of the Society for American Baseball Research, he claims to have traveled to more than 130 countries, but says there’s no place like Fenway Park.

Rounder Founders

One of the many delights of Vinyl Ventures lies in Bill Nowlin’s seemingly idiosyncratic asides into his travels, love of baseball, and other interests. One particularly useful segment describes the decline and fall of both the recording and book publishing industries to the allures and dangers of digital publishing found on pages 249 - 254. These five pages alone, devoted to the world’s digital environment changing before our eyes would make the whole book worthwhile, even if so many other delightful insights, observations, and useful elisions didn’t exist.

For a person whose experience with Rounder Records grew from encountering bluegrass music relatively late in life with limited familiarity with popular folk and country music, encountering a book like Vinyl Ventures is simultaneously a daunting experience and a mind-opening revelation. The range of enthusiasms, deep scholarly exploration, and sometimes daunting physical challenges, even exposures to danger in order to collect and catalog a significant portion of the world’s music, is difficult, at best, to describe. Bill Nowlin with an expansive writing style sometimes losing track of chronology captures the courage, imagination, and capacity for risk taking, both personal and financial, the Rounder Founders exhibited in building their company.

A problem with books like this one is the possibility of becoming mostly a list of artists recorded, trips taken, awards won, problems overcome, and changes made. All those elements lie within this highly readable account, yet it includes the human experiences of the Rounder Founders as they built a recording empire based on their enthusiasms while including the broad range of interests they pursued. Their recorded music and choice of artists reflected and taught the world the broad range of music and cultural experience available, exposing the musical roots of who we are as people and who we can become. Therein lies the thrill and the charm of Vinyl Ventures.