Stax Songwriters, the Black Music Archive & more
The last few weeks have been over-the-top busy, so the newsletter this week is a catch-up about some things I’ve been involved with in that time that I think you’ll find of interest.
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Hello friends!
I hope everyone had a safe and peaceful holiday!
The last few weeks have been over-the-top busy, so the newsletter this week is a catch-up about some things I’ve been involved with in that time that I think you’ll find of interest.
Two weeks ago, I was in Memphis for the release party/event at the Stax Museum of American Soul for the new seven-disc box set Written In Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos, which collects 146 demos, revealing the songwriters’ initial recordings of songs that would later be recorded by artists like The Staple Singers, Carla Thomas, Shirley Brown and others. I wrote an article about the box set and the event, which included a panel comprised of William Bell (composer of “You Don’t Miss Your Water”), Eddie Floyd (“Knock On Wood”), Deanie Parker (“Don’t Mess With Cupid”), Henderson Thigpen (“Woman to Woman”), Bobby Manuel (“All Day Preachin’”) and box set producer Cheryl Pawelski. Written In Their Soul is available for purchase on all online music stores and is available to stream from all of the platforms.
To read my article about the release event for SoulMusic.com, click here!
If you don’t subscribe to my friend Craig Seymour’s weekly Substack newsletter, make sure you remedy that now! It is always packed with archival materials from his vast collection and, in many cases, rare dance mixes of songs by artists you love that you have probably never heard! This past week, he gave a kind shout-out to the Weather Girls/Martha Wash box set I recently wrote liner notes for, and put together a Martha Wash playlist comprised of his favorite remixes from her discography. He asked me for my thoughts on a few of them, and I was able to share some tidbits gleaned from my research and interviews for the liner notes that I wasn’t able to utilize in my essay! So….I hope you enjoy the music AND the quotes from her collaborators Eric Beall (who wrote and co-produced “Carry On” and “Keep a Light On”) and Eric Robinson (who wrote the bulks of the Two Tons material and collaborated again with Martha on her solo debut).
Read and listen here.
Two weeks ago, I shared about my collaboration with the Black Music Archive, the mini-doc, God, Gays and the Gospel. A week after it went live, an article about the mini-doc by Dr. Alisha Lola Jones, went on the home page of The Grio, pushing our mini-doc to over 110,000 views. The Black Music Archive shared our full-interview/conversation this past week and I wanted to share it here as well. I’m incredibly grateful to Milik Kashad for sharing his platform with me and for making room for this conversation.
OH!
Are you subscribed to the God’s Music Is My Life YouTube channel? There are multiple new adds every week—both vintage gospel clips AND my interviews with many of the artists you read about here. I just shared my video interview with Bob Bailey, one of the most read features here, last week!
There are some exciting things in the upcoming weeks, including a feature on the great Marion Williams and the brand new documentary on her life, so stay tuned!
See you next week,
Tim
LOVE LOVE LOVE!