skip's blog

categories are a joke if you're any good

I hate categories. The only workable system of musical order is the alphabet. Is this guy a blues singer? Country? Singer/songwriter?

I've asked the same about Mose Allison, Willie Nelson, Ray Charles, Lalo Guerrero, Merle Haggard, Bob Dylan, Taj Mahal, Terry Adams, Richard Thompson, and just about anyone else who does intelligent music.

As this film attests, the question isn't new. The problem is that nowadays, you get these weird, awful words like "eclectic", "musician's musician" etc, and they marginalize great music.

This is Jimmie Rogers. He sold millions of records during the Depression (the first one, not this one), and he recorded with country guys, Hawaiin musicians, Louis Armstrong, the Carter Family, and more.

I'm convinced that he'd be unsignable today, just because he covered so much ground by virtue of his own musical nature. And he was one of the greatest things to ever have happened, right up with Louis Armstrong and Leonard Bernstein. And I'm convinced that -- had he lived a few years longer -- he would have been to country music approximately what Stokowski was to orchestral music.

posted by skip heller @ 8:43 PM