There are some artists who are not so well known to mainstream audiences but have a passionate following of fans and collectors ... Blossom Dearie is a perfect example
In these days of super-star vocalists and endless singing contests on TV it's hard to believe that just a few decades ago, many top musical acts never sang at all.
No style of music has been immune to the siren call of swing and improvisation. For example ... traditional fiddle playing - yes even Don Messer
People who collect records also collect books, graphic art, vintage electronics or just bits of tin ... as long as it has something to do with music
Although they never performed on stage, Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller had just as profound an impact on popular music as Lennon & McCartney did a decade or so later.
Records are pretty well useless. On their own I mean. Yes they can be nice to look at, but they're meant to be heard and to hear them you need a device to play them.
The single has been a staple of the music and record business throughout its history, however the B-side made the single much more fun.
Let's boogie. That simple sentence can have many meanings, depending on context in can be an invitation to dance, to travel or to have sex.
Our story begins some time in 1955 in Los Angeles. A singer and songwriter named Richard Berry is backstage between sets hurriedly scrawling something on a napkin. He never imagined the song he wrote that night would become one of the biggest hits in music history.
If there is any one instrument that personifies cool, it's the saxophone. It can be mellow and sexy or brash and exciting.
Collectors will often focus on certain stellar brands - Royal Dolton china or Zippo lighters for instance. For record collectors there are a very few brands - or labels - that warrant building a collection around them but of the ones that do, Sun Records of Memphis Tennessee is the cream of the crop.