Menu
Idea

music

381
Filter by:

Filter by published date

Viewing 31–60 of 381 results. Go to first page

How Jukeboxes Made Memphis Music

When R.E. Buster Williams ruled jukeboxes and jukeboxes ruled music.
by Robert Gordon via Oxford American on December 10, 2024
Soldiers sing at the end of the day in Vietnam, January 1968.
partner

The Soundtrack to Vietnam War History Isn’t Quite Historically Accurate

Why rock overtook every other genre to define our understanding of America at war.
by David Suisman via HNN on December 3, 2024
"REM" musicians pose in front of a mirror.

How R.E.M. Created Alternative Music

In the cultural wasteland of the Reagan era, they showed that a band could have mass appeal without being cheesy, or nostalgic, or playing hair metal.
by Mark Krotov via The New Yorker on November 13, 2024
Illustration of Ives seen as an American counterpart to Mahler.

Charles Ives, Connoisseur of Chaos

Celebrating the composer’s 150th birthday, at a festival in Bloomington, Indiana.
by Alex Ross via The New Yorker on November 4, 2024
Portrait of Jenny Lind by George Healy.

Jenny Lind, Taylor Swift, and Another Era's Tour

How the Taylor Swift of her age captivated New Orleans.
by Craig Fuchs via The Historic New Orleans Collection on October 24, 2024
A stylized painting of the United States military commiting a massacre in Korea.

The Jazz Beats of a Coup

How the US State Department used jazz music for its national security aims.
by Esha Krishnaswamy via Historic.ly on October 3, 2024
Mike Dirnt, Billy Joe Armstrong, and Tré Cool from the band Green Day.

How Green Day’s American Idiot Pitted Punk Against George W Bush

Twenty years ago, a trio of Calfornian stoners released a polemic against Republican America that politicised a generation.
by Pippa Bailey via New Statesman on September 30, 2024
The Village Vanguard in Greenwich Village.

How Greenwich Village’s Iconic, Iconoclastic Music Scene Came to Be

Max Gordon, Prohibition, and the transformative creation of the Village Vanguard.
by David Browne via Literary Hub on September 18, 2024
The Eagle Hotel in July 1913 decorated for the 50th anniversary of the battle of Gettysburg.

Battle Hymns

Charles Ives and the Civil War.
by Allen C. Guelzo via The American Scholar on September 12, 2024
Kamala Harris stands in front of a crowd of voters holidng "Freedom" signs.

Kamala Harris’s “Freedom” Campaign

Democrats’ years-long efforts to reclaim the word are cresting in this year’s Presidential race.
by Peter Slevin via The New Yorker on August 23, 2024
Joni Mitchell.

How Joni Mitchell Pioneered Her Own Form of Artistic Genius

On the long and continuing struggle of women artists for recognition on their own terms.
by Ann Powers via Literary Hub on June 17, 2024
Eden Ahbez.

The Strangest Hit Songwriter in History

He wrote one of my favorite songs, but was so much more than a composer.
by Ted Gioia via The Honest Broker on June 12, 2024
Espresso by Sabrina Carpenter surrounded by African American artists' records.

The Song of the Summer Is Actually the Song of 1982

Sabrina Carpenter’s “Espresso” is one of several recent hits bringing back the genre that never got a name.
by Dan Charnas via Slate on June 4, 2024
A collage of the covers of famous EPs.

The Little-Known Legacy of the EP

“An Ideal for Living” explores the fascinating backstory of a mini music format.
by Steven Heller via Print on June 4, 2024
A drawing of a crowd watching a baseball game in 1886.

Before ‘Fans,’ There Were ‘Kranks,’ ‘Longhairs,’ and ‘Lions’

How do fandoms gain their names?
by Elizabeth Minkel via Atlas Obscura on May 30, 2024
Ella Fitzgerald at the Newport Jazz Festival in Newport, Rhode Island, 1970.

The Genius of Ella Fitzgerald

She remade the American songbook in her image, uprooting the very meaning of musical performance.
by Sam Fentress via The Nation on May 28, 2024
Lincoln Center on the opening night of the Met Opera, 1966.

Curtains for Lincoln Center

On the falsification of Lincoln Center’s history.
by James Panero via The New Criterion on April 17, 2024
Sheet music for "Massa's in de Cold Ground" as sung by Christy's Minstrels.
partner

Christy’s Minstrels Go to Great Britain

Minstrel shows were an American invention, but they also found success in the United Kingdom, where audiences were negotiating their relationships with empire.
by Betsy Golden Kellem via JSTOR Daily on March 27, 2024
Painting of Arnold Schoenberg in Los Angeles.

How Arnold Schoenberg Changed Hollywood

He moved to California during the Nazi era, and his music—which ranged from the lushly melodic to the rigorously atonal—caught the ears of everyone.
by Alex Ross via The New Yorker on March 11, 2024
Ella Fitzgerald performs at Lorton Reformatory in 1959.

In the 1960s, Prison Chaplains Created a Star Studded Music Festival at Lorton Reformatory

Syncopation and swing reigned supreme at the annual Lorton Reformatory Jazz Festival in the 1960s.
by Dominique Mickiewitz via Boundary Stones on March 1, 2024
Two elderly Black women.

How the Memory of a Song Reunited Two Women Separated by the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade

In 1990, scholars found a Sierra Leonean woman who remembered a nearly identical version of a tune passed down by a Georgia woman’s enslaved ancestors
by Joshua Kagavi via Smithsonian on February 29, 2024
A bedroom decorated with Bob Marley merchandise and the Jamaican flag.

Bob Marley’s ‘Legend’ Is One of the Bestselling Albums Ever. But Does It Tell His Full Story?

After 40 years and more than 25 million copies sold, what story does ‘Legend’ tell us about Bob Marley and the people listening to it?
by Eric Ducker via The Ringer on February 14, 2024
Black and white photo of the outside of a bar, with "CB GB: OMFUG" written on an overhang, and graffiti and posters on the walls and windows

Real Estate Developers Killed NYC’s Vibrant ’70s Music Scene

In the 1970s and early ’80s, NYC’s racially and ethnically diverse working-class neighborhoods nurtured groundbreaking rap, salsa, and punk music.
by Kurt Hollander via Jacobin on February 11, 2024
A turntable and records.

What’s Old is New Again (and Again): On the Cyclical Nature of Nostalgia

Retro was not the antithesis to the sub- and countercultural experiments of the 1960s, it grew directly out of them.
by Tobias Becker via Literary Hub on December 13, 2023
Shirley Horn in a publicity shot, 1960.

How to Take It Slow

Following the rhythm of Shirley Horn.
by Lauren Du Graf via Oxford American on December 5, 2023
Katherine Rye Jewell standing in front of a tree and brick building on Vanderbilt University's campus.

‘Live From the Underground’ Details the Influential World of College Radio

What made those left-of-the-dial broadcasts so special during the 1980s, ‘90s and 2000s?
by Michael Patrick Brady via WBUR on December 5, 2023
Sly Stone with daughter Nove, ca. 1980.

On the Sly

A memoir of the Family Stone.
by Carl Wilson via Bookforum on December 4, 2023
Collage of Louis Armstrong playing the trumpet, waving, and smoking, and a picture of his home in Queens.

Louis Armstrong Gets the Last Word on Louis Armstrong

For decades, Americans have argued over the icon’s legacy. But his archives show that he had his own plans.
by Ethan Iverson via The Nation on October 30, 2023
Lou Reed, January 1, 1970.

Lou Reed Didn't Want to Be King

Will Hermes's new biography, "Lou Reed: The King of New York," tries—and fails—to pin the rocker down.
by Hannah Gold via The Yale Review on October 16, 2023
Billy Joel and Bruce Springsteen .
partner

How the American Suburbs Created Bruce Springsteen and Billy Joel

The musical culture of the New York metropolitan area, combined with themes of suburban life, suffuse the legends' music.
by Jim Cullen via Made By History on October 13, 2023
View More
30 of
381

Filter Results:

Suggested Filters:

Idea

Person

brought to you by
© Bunk History