News & Updates — interview

One of the most-called session men of his day, the Comanche/Kiowa tribal guitarist/pianist Jesse Ed Davis was born on this day in 1944. His father Jesse was a well-known "True Indian" painter. The younger Davis got his musical career started in his native Oklahoma in a band in the late '50s with future Blood Sweat & Tears vocalist Jerry Fisher. In the mid-'60s he went on the road as a member of Conway Twitty's band before settling in California. Through friends Leon Russell and Levon Helm he got acquainted with the studio scene and started working as a session man/secret...

Cosimo Matassa's J&M Recording studio in New Orleans was the home of some of the biggest hits of the early rock & roll era and he helped shape the NOLA sound. A Sicilian-American who was born and raised in NOLA, he was a funky grocer, record & appliance shop owner and a jukebox servicer before he opened the studio in '45, a time when there were few studios in that musical city. Teenaged Allen Toussaint used to hang out there and practice piano, later on often working directly with Matassa. In the '60s he started his label Dover Records to...

(Photo, Paul Teeling) Well here's a wonderful treat! Peace & Rhythm and Klezperanto team up to bring you the official world premiere of the brand new Klezperanto video for "Arroz Con Coco", a tribute to the great Lucho Bermúdez of Colombia. Clarinetist Ilene Stahl is a veteran of the Klezmer Conservatory Band (often with violinist Itzhak Perlman) and she formed the Boston-based six-piece ensemble Klezperanto in 1999 to stretch into other styles of dance music. "We formed Klezperanto to play everything BUT traditional klezmer music!” she says. Indeed, the mix includes Balkan & Mediterranean styles, Eastern European, cumbia, danzas, ballads,...

The Voice of the Galaxies, June Tyson was the cosmic lead vocalist in Sun Ra's band from '68 until her death. She was also a dancer and helped design costumes for the Arkestra members, as well as played some violin in later years. I highly recommend the classic low-budget blaxploitation sci-fi flick Space Is The Place. Check out June and the Arkestra in this clip: And here's a bonus interview with June:

Check out the latest on the Bongohead blog, a piece about Bay Area based electro-cumbia party man Roger Más. Check the link here.