Wanda Jackson to play CD release show Jan. 28 at ACM@UCO Performance Lab
The Academy of Contemporary Music at the University of Central Oklahoma will kick off the 2011 spring semester Jan. 28 when Queen of Rockabilly Wanda Jackson comes to the Performance Lab, 323 E Sheridan in Bricktown, for a free, release-week concert celebrating her new album, “The Party Ain’t Over.”
Produced by Jack White, “The Party Ain’t Over” drops Jan. 25, one week from today, on Nonesuch Records and White’s Third Man Records.
Jackson, who was born in Maud and lives in Oklahoma City, shared the bill at the Grand Ole Opry last weekend with fellow Oklahoma native Vince Gill and will play release shows next weekend in New York and Los Angeles. In February, the First Lady of Rock ‘n’ Roll, 73, will embark on a tour of Europe.
The Rock and Roll Hall of Famer also will play “The Late Show with David Letterman” Thursday night and “Conan” Jan. 25 with Jack White and Third Man House Band.
Green Corn Revival, the Weatherford band whose debut album “Say Your a Sinner” made my list of top albums of 2010, will open for and back Jackson during the Jan. 28 ACM@UCO show.
Last year, the ACM@UCO hosted master classes and exclusive mentoring sessions with top artists, including Jackson Browne, the Mountain Goats and Local Natives. Many of the artists also performed concerts at the school’s brand new music venue, The Performance Lab, which offers students hands-on experience in the world of live music booking, promotion, and production. Additionally, this semester’s Industry Link seminar connected students with key industry figures, including high-profile managers and staff from Pitchfork, Sesac, and more.
Since its creation, The Academy of Contemporary Music at the University of Central Oklahoma has generated worldwide buzz with its innovative, groundbreaking approach to music education – the first of its kind in the United States. The school, which grants a two-year associate’s degree in music performance and production, is the U.S. branch of Britain’s groundbreaking Academy of Contemporary Music, based in Guildford, England.
To see Jackson’s new video for “Thunder on the Mountain,” click here.
Check out the track listing for “The Party Ain’t Over” after the break, and look for Gene Triplett’s interview with Wanda Friday on NewsOK.com and in The Oklahoman.
Wanda Jackson embarking on tour Saturday to promote upcoming album “The Party Ain’t Over”
Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Wanda Jackson will embark Saturday on a special tour to promote her new album “The Party Ain’t Over,” due out Jan. 25.
The Oklahoma City resident will play a special shortened set Saturday in Nashville, Tenn., at the Ryman Auditorium for the Grand Ole Opry. It will be part of a show with Del McCoury and fellow Oklahoma native Vince Gill.
The Queen of Rockabilly will play sold-out release shows on Jan. 21 at the Music Hall of Williamsburg in Brooklyn, N.Y., and on Jan. 23 at El Rey Theatre in Los Angeles. A second night at Los Angeles’s El Rey Theatre on Jan. 24 also will include The Third Man House Band featuring alt-rocker Jack White on guitar. Newly announced February tour dates will take Jackson back through New York as well as to Philadelphia, Boston, DC, and Dallas, following her previously announced European tour. while the newly announced February tour dates will take her back through New York as well as to Philadelphia, Boston, Washington, D.C., and Dallas, after she returns her previously announced European tour.
This string of live shows are designed to promote the release of Jackson’s highly anticipated new album “The Party Aint Over,” produced by White and scheduled for release on Third Man and Nonesuch Records on Jan. 25.
The album can be pre-ordered now on vinyl and CD in the Nonesuch Store at www.nonesuch.com/store. The first 250 pre-orders include an exclusive, limited-edition poster autographed by Jackson.
I personally can’t wait to hear “The Party Ain’t Over,” which features the First Lady of Rock ‘n’ Roll covering songs by Amy Winehouse, Bob Dylan and Jimmie Rodgers. See the complete track listing after the break.
When Jackson, the justly crowned Queen of Rockabilly, recorded “Let’s Have A Party,” a tune she made into a hit of her own in 1958 even after one-time boyfriend Elvis Presley had released a version of it, her delivery of the chorus wasn’t so much a suggestion as a command. As the title — and, more importantly, the contents — of her latest album, “The Party Ain’t Over,” indicates, this feisty septuagenarian artist is as galvanizing as ever. Jackson was recently inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, honored with a long-time-coming, early influence accolade for her pivotal role in the evolution of popular music, especially where female artists were concerned. As a teenager in the mid-50s, the diminutive Jackson was the first woman to perform unadulterated rock and roll — and she one-upped the boys defining this new genre, Presley included, with her exhilaratingly forthright approach. The young Jackson, a Maud native, came across as both gritty and glamorous; a playfully suggestive growl to her voice matched the daring, handmade outfits she wore, short skirts and fringed dresses that have inspired would-be bad girls for decades to come. A tireless touring artist for more than 50 years, Jackson continues to win over new, young fans, including guitarist/vocalist/White Stripes founder Jack White.
On this debut for Third Man / Nonesuch Records, produced and arranged by White at his Nashville studio, the spirited Jackson proves that brash rock and roll attitude need not have an age limit. The BBC calls the album “rich, warm, big-hearted and hilarious … a sumptuous, brassy stew of country and blues.” Jackson’s trademark growl remains intact on rockers like “Rip It Up” and “Nervous Breakdown;” she opens the set with an echo-laden sneer on a rollicking version of “Shakin’ All Over” and ends it 10 songs later with a plaintive take on Rodgers’ “Yodel #6,” along the way gamely tackling country, gospel, densely worded Dylan, and a little bit of Tin Pan Alley. Jackson and White are a remarkably simpatico pairing; their collaboration came together quickly, serendipitously. One of Jackson’s colleagues had originally approached White about doing a duet with Jackson for a proposed “Wanda and Friends” disc, but White demurred. Instead, he offered something better, inviting Jackson to cut a single with him for his Third Man label, and that swiftly led this kindred spirits to put together an entire album.
In the press materials, Jackson had this to say about working with White:
I was scared at first because I didn’t know what this young rock star was going to expect of me or ask me to do. I kind of had shaky feet, deciding whether I wanted to do this or not. Of course I knew about him, I have to admit, from the album he did with Loretta Lynn and how successful that was. That certainly got my attention when he said he was interested in doing one with me. So we began sending material to each other; he sent me the things he thought I should do or he wanted me to do, and I sent him some ideas of things I had put aside for recording at a future date. When I finally got to Nashville, he put me at ease immediately. He’s just so laid back and such a cool guy that I found myself wanting to please him, I wanted to do it his way. My husband [Jackson’s manager of 40 years] and I told him, you do this. If you want a suggestion from me, feel free to ask. Otherwise, you make the decisions. That gave him a lot of freedom and I wanted him to have that freedom. And I think that’s what made it so good as an album. As I began singing these songs and listening to the playbacks he made, I realized he wasn’t wanting to change my style of singing at all. He just wanted me to have new, fresher material. And I said, hey I could do this. I can sing like Wanda Jackson. He just wanted more of Wanda than I was used to putting out. And apparently it worked.
White and Jackson came up with inspired and wide-ranging song choices that reflect Jackson’s long history with country, gospel, and even the big-band music she remembers from her childhood as well as with rock and roll: Harlan Howard’s woozy lament “Busted”; the Andrew Sisters’ kitschy tropical travelogue, “Rum and Coca Cola,” a fitting companion to her own “Fujiyama Mama”; Dylan’s rockabilly fever dream, “Thunder on the Mountain.” They also recorded a cover of contemporary bad-girl Amy Winehouse’s “You Know That I’m No Good,” which White first released as a single in 2009, paired with “Shakin All Over.” The Winehouse song suits her, Jackson says, but she’s careful to draw the line between life and art:
On the one hand, I’m good, on the other hand, I’m bad. That seems to be the image this new generation of fans that I have has given me. It’s like the title of the documentary about my life that recently came out: ‘The Sweet Lady with the Nasty Voice.’ Maybe that says that I become a different person, a different persona, when I sing those songs. I have a good reputation, always have had, and respect from everyone as a lady, and that pleases me very much. But the young girls think I’m this hard gal that gets her way and storms in. It’s just because of the material I’ve sung and the way I’ve sung it. And that’s okay. That’s cute.
- BAM
Wanda Jackson to release Jack White-produced album in January
Wanda Jackson (Photo by Jaconna Aguirre/The Oklahoman Archives)
Third Man and Nonesuch Records announced today the release of the new album from Rock and Roll Hall of Famer and Maud native Wanda Jackson. “The Party Ain’t Over,” produced by her friend Jack White of The White Stripes, will be out Jan. 25, 2011.
With a remarkable career that began in 1955, Jackson, credited with being the first woman to ever record a rock and roll song—“Let’s Have a Party” in 1958—was convinced by her friend Elvis Presley to cross over from country to rock and rockabilly music. Now known around the globe as “The Queen Of Rock” and “The First Lady of Rockabilly,” Jackson will be honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2010 Americana Music Awards in Nashville tonight. The award, in the category of performance, will be presented to her by Jack White.
That these two musical luminaries would find one another is hardly surprising. Jackson, a longtime Oklahoma City resident, is an icon to everyone who knows and loves the roots of rock and roll. White, some 30+ years her junior, is one of music’s most enigmatic visionaries. The two teamed up last year to record a 45rpm single for White’s Third Man Records. The vinyl and iTunes release, a cover of Amy Winehouse’s “You Know I’m No Good” b/w “Shakin All Over” was a big success and the pair hatched a plan to record a full-length album.
“The Party Ain’t Over” was recorded in Nashville at White’s studio, where he brought together a formidable band, including himself, Jack Lawrence (The Dead Weather/Raconteurs), Carl Broemel (My Morning Jacket), Patrick Keeler (Raconteurs), Ashley Monroe, Jackson Smith, and Karen Elson, to name a few, and hand picked the songs—11 tracks dating in origin from the early 1900s to 2007. The result: a retro modern collection of music that showcases Wanda, now in her seventh decade and sounding as wickedly charismatic as ever.
From the album opener, the classic Johnny Kidd and the Pirates hit “Shakin All Over,” to the final track from Jimmie Rodgers’ notable blues series, “Blue Yodle #6,” Wanda’s soulful, ripping voice barrels through from song to song, moving effortlessly from rockabilly, rock and roll, country and gospel—leaving a vibrant, distinctive stamp on a release that embraces the past just as much as it embraces the future.
Here is “The Party Ain’t Over” tracklist:
1. Shakin All Over
2. Rip It Up
3. Busted
4. Rum and Coca-Cola
5. Thunder on the Mountain
6. You Know I’m No Good
7. Like a Baby
8. Nervous Breakdown
9. Dust on the Bible
10. Teach Me Tonight
11. Blue Yodle #6
–3D
Wanda Jackson to receive Americana Awards lifetime achievement honors tonight
Rock and Roll Hall of Famer and Maud native Wanda Jackson will once again be honored for her contributions to American music tonight.
The Americana Music Association will cite the 72-year-old for lifetime achievement during tonight’s Americana Awards in Nashville, Tenn.
Jackson, in the association’s words, is “the undisputed Queen of Rockabilly and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame member whose growling glamour reshaped the role of women in both rock and roll and country.” She will be honored in the performance category.
This year’s other lifetime achievers are John Mellencamp, whose songs have influentially combined the blue collar sweat of rock and roll and the humble grit of honky tonk; Luke Lewis, Chairman of Universal Music Group Nashville, whose visionary commitment to the label’s Lost Highway imprint has created a home for numerous Americana greats; Greg Leisz, the go-to lap and pedal steel, guitar and mandolin virtuoso who has enriched recordings by Lucinda Williams, Joni Mitchell, Jackson Browne, Robert Plant & Alison Krauss and more; and Brian Ahern, whose work as a producer includes seminal albums by Emmylou Harris, as well as output from Marty Robbins, George Jones, Anne Murray, Billy Joe Shaver, Rodney Crowell, Jesse Winchester and Ricky Skaggs.
Back in the 1950s and ’60s, Oklahoma City’s own rockabilly queen with the knockout voice became one of the first women to perform rock ‘n’ roll.
Jackson will be one of the performers on tonight’s awards show, along with Emmylou Harris, The Avett Brothers, Rodney Crowell, Rosanne Cash, Patty Griffin, Sam Bush, Ray Wylie Hubbard, Ryan Bingham, Corb Lund, Sarah Jarosz, Carolina Chocolate Drops, Joe Pug, Will Kimbrough.
–3D
What to do in Oklahoma on May 26, 2010
Terry Ferris II plays at 3 p.m. today during the Big 12 Baseball Tournament street party on Mickey Mantle Drive in Bricktown.
Today’s featured event:
Hear Academy of Contemporary Music at the University of Central Oklahoma student bands play for free at 3 p.m. and 6 p.m. today-Friday and 3 p.m. Saturday during the Big 12 Baseball Tournament street party on Mickey Mantle Drive in Bricktown.
ACM@UCO acts performing include Blaise, Jeff Hickman, Terry Farris II, David Goad, Thunder Thieves, C.Y., Scott Hartman and WunderJazz.
Rock and Roll Hall of Famer and Oklahoma legend Wanda Jackson will close the party with a free show at 6 p.m. Saturday.
For more information, go to www.acm-uco.com.
For more events, go to www.wimgo.com.
-BAM
What is country music? ACM entertainer of the year nominees illustrate genre’s diversity
Checotah native and 2005 “American Idol” winner Carrie Underwood is trying to defend her Academy of Country Music entertainer title and become the first woman to twice capture the academy’s top award at tonight’s ACM Awards. (Associated Press file and publicity photos)
A version of this story appears in Sunday’s Life section of The Oklahoman.
Country music’s best includes vast array
When the Academy of Country Music announces its entertainer of the year tonight, the fan-voted winner will have emerged from an octet of superstars that represents the genre’s current state of diversity.
Checotah native and 2005 “American Idol” winner Carrie Underwood is trying to defend her ACM entertainer title and become the first woman to twice capture the academy’s top award. Young superstar Taylor Swift would undoubtedly like to nab the trophy and to go make a matched set with her Country Music Association entertainer title.
Representing the guys are Norman rabble-rouser Toby Keith (pictured left), traditionalist royalty George Strait, Aussie standout Keith Urban, island-loving hitmaker Kenny Chesney and singer/songwriter/guitarist triple-threat Brad Paisley. Continuing the trend of bands breaking country ground, Georgia country-rockers Zac Brown Band round out the expanded field of eight entertainer nominees.
Like so many aspects of entertainment, country music is increasingly splintered. Contemporary pop- and rock-influenced country dominates radio, but traditionalists like King George, Alan Jackson and newcomer Easton Corbin get their share of play. too. The red dirt/Texas music scene keeps drawing crowds with its blend of country, folk and rock. and fans of Southern rock, outlaw country and old-school honky-tonk can all find bands playing their song.
“Right now in country music is a great time for a lot of different kinds of country music,” Underwood said last fall before her Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame induction. “If you turn on the radio you can find something you like, whether you like things that are more kind of contemporary country or … things that are traditional country or more kind of rock-influenced.”
Not all country fans share such warm-fuzzy feelings toward genre diversity. If Swift notches big wins tonight, as she did at November’s CMAs and January’s Grammys, my BAM’s Blog live blog is sure to be peppered with protests of “She’s not country!” from country purists.
And fans aren’t the only ones complaining: Last fall, George Jones (pictured right) said country-pop stars like 
Swift and Underwood “have stolen our identity.”
“They had to use something that was established already, and that’s traditional country music. So what they need to do really, I think, is find their own title, because they’re definitely not traditional country music,” he told the Associated Press.
“It’s good to know that we still do traditional country music. Alan Jackson still does it, so does George Strait. We still have it, and there’s quite a few of us that are going to hope that it comes back one of these days.”
Some take an even harsher view of mainstream country.
“It sucks. It’s horrific, horrible crap. I mean, it’s awful,” said modern-day Texas outlaw Jackson Taylor (pictured left) at last summer’s Country Fever in Pryor. “I don’t even like people to call us country anymore. We’re honky-tonk.”
But dissent about what constitutes country is nothing new, and acceptance of a controversial artist often comes with the passage of time. Now widely revered, as a country mega-star, Oklahoman Garth Brooks was viewed by many as too rock when he blasted on the scene in the ‘90s. with his bombastic arena shows. Faith Hill and Tim McGraw are now country’s power couple, but last decade, Hill drew traditionalist ire with her glossy pop crossover hits. And McGraw, like Swift, recently collaborated with Brit rockers Def Leppard.
The practice of country artists dabbling on the rock side of genre lines is as old as rock ‘n’ roll itself. After Elvis Presley popularized rockabilly, fellow country-rooted crooners such as Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins and Oklahoman Wanda Jackson applied their pipes to the early rock sound. Though Cash retained his core identity as a country legend, he won acclaim in 2003 with his cover of industrial rock act Nine Inch Nails’ “Hurt.”
“I’ve read books of Hank Williams’ sessions where … guitar players were playing things and then asking if that was too country. So I think that’s always been going on,” said Gary Allan (pictured left), who counts Cash, Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings among his early influences, in a phone interview.
“To me, country music, it’s songs about life. It’s Monday through Friday. Rock ‘n’ roll’s usually about what happens on the weekends.”
Jim Heath, frontman of Dallas psychobilly trio Reverend Horton Heat, said roots country guys like him harbor “disdain for the slick, produced, big country artists of modern times.” who take more musical cues from AC/DC than Jimmy Bryant.
“Country music is about heritage. … It’s about family, it’s about how your granddad used to play 
fiddle. It’s about how you learned to play licks from the local country guy and then you morphed those,” said Heath (pictured right) by phone. “Innovation is always good, but the out and out throwing aside of the heritage is I think what a lot of the modern country is.”
Though Lee Ann Womack is best known for her crossover smash “I Hope You Dance,” the Texan favors a traditional country sound.
“Real country music, to me, is fiddles and steel guitars. That doesn’t mean that all good music has fiddles and steel guitars, but that’s what it is to me,” she said. “There’s a place in the world for any good music; that’s for sure.”
Rachel Reinert (pictured left) of ACM top new artist-nominated quartet Gloriana, touring with Swift, believes the country music world is wide enough for an array of artists and fans.
“Whether you enjoy outlaw or traditional or bluegrass or contemporary or whatever, there’s people out there who actually enjoy it. There’s room for everyone, so I don’t understand why people would want to be ugly about it, because there’s just no reason to be. If you don’t like, then don’t listen to it,” she said.
More ACM coverage
The 45th Annual Academy of Country Music Awards, hosted by Reba McEntire, will air live from the MGM Grand in Las Vegas from 7 to 10 tonight on CBS. Follow along with my live blog of the show here at BAM’s Blog.
-BAM
Oklahoma country music “Starmaker” Jim Halsey to be honored in Oklahoma History Center exhibit opening this afternoon
Jim Halsey (Kelly Kerr photo)
The career of Jim Halsey, Oklahoma-based music manager, agent, impresario, teacher and author, is the subject of a new exhibit opening today at the Oklahoma History Center, 800 Nazih Zuhdi Drive (formerly 2401 N Laird Ave.).
The 1,800-square-foot exhibition “Starmaker: Jim Halsey & the Legends of Country Music” will open with a public signing event for Halsey’s new book, “Starmaker,” from 3 to 5 p.m. Admission is free.
An invitation-only reception for Halsey, hosted by Roy Clark, Wanda Jackson and the Oak Ridge Boys, will take place later this evening, according to NewsOK.
Halsey has been the agent of more than 40 top music stars over the past 60 years and built the largest country music agency in the world, based in Tulsa. He guided — and in many cases discovered — artists such as Clark, the Oak Ridge Boys, Merle Haggard, the Judds, Hank Thompson, Reba McEntire, Mel Tillis, Clint Black, Tammy Wynette, Freddy Fender and Don Williams.
After he sold his company to the William Morris Agency, he founded the Jim Halsey Institute, which focuses on helping others pursue their dreams in the music industry. He continues to manage the Oak Ridge Boys.
The exhibit will display many items from Halsey’s career, from gold and platinum albums marking his clients’ achievements to awards and citations given to Halsey for his contributions to the music industry.
In “Starmaker,” released by Tate Publishing this month, Halsey shares secrets he learned while shepherding stars’ careers.
Halsey still lives near Tulsa with his wife, Minisa.
EXHIBIT OPENING/BOOK SIGNING
“Starmaker: Jim Halsey & the Legends of Country Music”
When: 3 to 5 p.m. today.
Where: Oklahoma History Center, 800 Nazih Zuhdi Drive (formerly listed as 2401 N Laird Ave.).
Admission: Free.
Information: okhistorycenter.org.
-BAM
Wanda Jackson talks about working on upcoming album with Jack White
Wanda Jackson and Jack White
Oklahoma’s own Queen of Rockabilly Wanda Jackson recently talked to CMT.com about her forthcoming album, which was produced by Jack White of the White Stripes, the Raconteurs and now the Dead Weather.
“It’s just thrilling me to death because I was a bit leery of recording something I wasn’t sure that my rockabilly fans would want,” Jackson told CMT.com from her Oklahoma City home. “But I’m finding that isn’t true at all. They love the idea. Jack, in one sense, has brought me into the 21st century – and that’s what I needed. I was beginning to think, ‘I don’t know if I can keep riding on the past things I’ve done. I might need some new direction.’ Well, he came along and he gave it to me. I’m indebted to him forever.”
The Maud native, 72, was thinking of doing a duets album, which seemed appropriate considering the likes of Elvis Costello, Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen championed her election last year to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The vanity plate on her shiny new red Cadillac reads “ROC HAL 9,” she told CMT.com.
According to the interview, Jackson’s publicist knew a stylist who knew White, but when the dots were finally all connected, White declined the duets offer. But the musician/producer offered to record Jackson and put out a single and album on his own Nashville-based label, Third Man Records.
Fans got a first listen to their collaborative effort with the double-sided single of Amy Winehouse’s sultry “You Know I’m No Good” and Johnny Kidd and the Pirates’ rambunctious “Shakin’ All Over” that came out in January on vinyl and in digital formats.
The full album is expected in fall.
Jackson described White as a “forceful” producer.
“In a word!” she told CMT.com with a laugh. “But in such a loving, gentle manner that you want to please him. He is brilliant and everyone knows that. He is so talented. He’s only 34 years old, so I thought just the fact that he wanted to produce me was very, very flattering. Of course, I knew about what he had done with Loretta Lynn’s album (as producer of ‘Van Lear Rose’), and that was a great album also. So I was kind of anxious to see what kind of material he was wanting me to do.”
As they recorded during a closed session at White’s home studio in Nashville, Jackson found in him a kindred spirit.
“I’ve always been this way,” she told CMT.com. “Jack, once again, brought it out. On ‘You Know I’m No Good,’ I got a little bit … not mad… frustrated. I was wanting to do it his way, but it seemed I couldn’t make it happen. He says, ‘We’re rolling,’ and I say, ‘I always have to push,’ because he had just told me for about the 10th time, ‘That last take was great. Now let’s get one more and just push it a little bit more for me.’ So that’s when I said, ‘I always have to push.’ ‘Well, I pushed and went through it and that’s the take that everyone hears. I just had to get a little angry – and that’s exactly what the song was calling for.
“I did same thing on ‘Fujiyama Mama.’ My daddy just came up to me and said, ‘You rear back and sing that thing the way you want to sing it.’ It’s like, ‘I’m gonna do it!’ And that’s the version you hear on ‘Fujiyama Mama.’ So it’s worked before. Maybe it will work this time,” she said, referring to one of her signature early rockabilly hits.
Jackson will headline this year’s official Oklahoma showcase “Sax, Clogs & Rock-n-Roll” at the at the 24th Annual South by Southwest Music Conference & Festival. The official Oklahoma Showcase is set for Thursday, March 18 in downtown Austin, Texas. She also has a heavy summer tour schedule planned, she told CMT.com.
To read more of Jackson’s fascinating interview with CMT.com, click here.
-BAM
Wanda Jackson to headline Oklahoma showcase at South by Southwest festival March 18
Wanda Jackson, shown performing at a 2009 event, will headline the official Oklahoma showcase “Sax, Clogs & Rock-n-Roll” at the South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas, on March 18. (Photo by Jaconna Aguirre/The Oklahoman Archives)
Wanda Jackson and Jack White recently collaborated on the Queen of Rockabilly’s upcoming album, due out this month.
Queen of Rockabilly and Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Wanda Jackson will headline this year’s official Oklahoma showcase “Sax, Clogs & Rock-n-Roll” at the at the 24th Annual South by Southwest Music Conference & Festival, it was announced today.
The official Oklahoma Showcase is set for Thursday, March 18 in downtown Austin, Texas.
The Oklahoma Showcase is hosted by the Oklahoma Film & Music Office to promote the depth of musical talent and diversity Oklahoma has to offer, and to help local artists launch their careers through networking with members of the music industry and national media. According to a news release, the state film and music office teamed with the Norman Music Festival to develop a diverse lineup of some of the most talented artists from across the state.
“The Oklahoma showcase at South by Southwest is such an incredible opportunity for Oklahoma musicians, and an eye opening experience for music industry insiders who are becoming increasingly aware of the strength and maturity of our state’s rapidly evolving music community,” said Jill Simpson, director of the Oklahoma Film & Music Office, in the release.
Oklahoma musicians representing a variety of genres will perform on two stages from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. at The Copa, 217 Congress Ave. in Austin.
Main stage performers will include Fiawna Forte, Green Corn Revival, The Pretty Black Chains, The Red Alert and Jackson. The acoustic stage will feature K.C. Clifford, Camille Harp, Chase Kerby and Daniel Walcher.
Jackson’s legendary 50-year career is hitting some serious high notes. The Oklahoma City resident was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame last year, with a little push from friends like Bob Dylan, Elvis Costello and Bruce Springsteen. The Maud native recently collaborated on an album with rock experimentalist Jack White of the White Stripes, The Raconteurs and The Dead Weather. The album is scheduled for release this month via Third Man Records.
More than 1,000 people registered to attend the inaugural” Sax, Clogs & Rock-n-Roll” in 2009. Last year’s showcase featured performances by Stars Go Dim, Marcy Priest, Ryan Lindsey, Ali Harter, Colourmusic, Daniel Walcher, The Uglysuit, Beau Jennings, and Samantha Crain and the Midnight Shivers.
A SXSW Music or Platinum badge is required to attend, or people can register by calling the Oklahoma Film & Music Office at 230-8445. Oklahomans in Austin can also present an Oklahoma driver license at the door to gain admittance.
The South by Southwest Music Conference & Festival is set for March 12-21 in Austin. For more information, go to www.sxsw.com.
- BAM
First of Wanda Jackson’s Jack White-produced songs due out this month
Wanda Jackson performs a 2009 show. (Photo by Jaconna Aguirre/The Oklahoman Archives)
Oklahoma rockabilly legend Wanda Jackson will release the first two songs from her recent recording sessions with the multi-talented Jack White of the White Stripes later this month.
The Oklahoman’s Entertainment Editor Gene Triplett spoke with Jackson’s husband/manager Wendell Goodman, who confirmed the songs would be released on iTunes and seven-inch vinyl.
The songs are covers of Amy Winehouse’s “You Know I’m No Good” and early British rock band Johnny Kidd and the Pirates’ “Shakin’ All Over.”
Gene broke the news in November that alternative rock star White, who also leads the bands the Raconteurs and the Dead Weather, had invited the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer to Nashville to record under his production guidance. To read the rest of Gene’s latest story on this intriguing musical pairing, click here.
Goodman did not know the exact release date for the first two Jackson-White songs, but the Oklahoma Rock Newsblog reports that the tracks are due out Jan. 26.
-BAM
