In September 1996, fifty-three year old heroin addict Billy Ochoa was sentenced to 326 years in prison. His crime: committing $2100 worth of welfare fraud. Ochoa was sent to New Folsom supermax prison, joining thousands of other men who will spend the rest of their lives in California's teeming correctional facilities as a result of that state's tough Three Strikes law. His incarceration will cost over $20,000 a year until he dies. Hard Time Blues weaves together the story of the growth of the American prison system over the past quarter century primarily through the story of Ochoa, a career criminal who grew up in the barrios of post-World War II L.A. Ochoa, who had a long history of non-violent crimes committed to fund his drug habit, who cycled in and out of prison since the late 1960's, is a perfect example of how perennial misfits, rather than blood-soaked violent criminals, make up the majority of America's prisoners. This is also the story of the burgeoning careers of politicians such as former California Governor Pete Wilson, who rose to power on the "crime issue." Wilson, whose grandfather was a cop murdered by drug-runners in early twentieth century Chicago, scored a stunning come-from-behind re-election victory in 1994. In so doing, he came to epitomize the 1990s tough-on-crime politician. Award-winning journalist Sasha Abramsky uses immersion reportage to bring alive the political forces that have led America's prison and jail population to increase more than four fold in the past twenty years. Through the stories of Ochoa, Wilson, and others, he explores in devastating detail how the public has been manipulated into supporting mass incarceration during a period when crime rates have been steadily falling. Hard Time Blues deftly explores the War on Drugs, the Rockefeller Laws, the growth of the SuperMax Prisons, the climate of fear that led to laws such as Truth-in-Sentencing, and how the stunning repercussions of imprisoning two million citizens affect all of America. In the tradition of J. Anthony Lukas's Common Ground and Melissa Fay Greene's The Temple Bombing, Abramsky explores this new and dangerous fault-line in American society in a dramatic and compelling manner. From the opening courtroom scene through the final images behind the electrified fences of the nation's toughest, meanest prisons, Abramsky paints a grimly intimate portrait of the players and personalities behind this societal earthquake. Hard Time Blues combines a sense of history with a powerful narrative, to tell a story about issues and people that leads us to understand how The Land of the Free has become the world's largest prison nation.

Showcasing American music and music making during the Great Depression, Hard Luck Blues presents more than two hundred photographs created by the New Deal's Farm Security Administration photography program. With an appreciation for the amateur and the local, FSA photographers depicted a range of musicians sharing the regular music of everyday life, from informal songs in migrant work camps, farmers' homes, barn dances, and on street corners to organized performances at church revivals, dance halls, and community festivals. Captured across the nation from the northeast to the southwest, the images document the last generation of musicians who learned to play without the influence of recorded sound, as well as some of the pioneers of Chicago's R & B scene and the first years of amplified instruments. The best visual representation of American roots music performance during the Depression era, Hard Luck Blues features photographs by Jack Delano, Dorothea Lange, Russell Lee, Arthur Rothstein, Ben Shahn, Marion Post Wolcott, and others. Photographer and image researcher Rich Remsberg breathes life into the images by providing contextual details about the persons and events captured, in some cases drawing on interviews with the photographers' subjects. Also included are a foreword by author Nicholas Dawidoff and an afterword by music historian Henry Sapoznik. Published in association with the Library of Congress.

(Guitar Educational). A comprehensive source designed to help guitarists develop both lead and rhythm playing. Covers: Texas, Delta, R&B, early rock and roll, gospel, blues/rock and more. Includes 21 complete solos; chord progressions and riffs; turnarounds; moveable scales and more. The audio features leads and full band backing.

Experience music history with this memoir by one of the last of the genuine old school Blues and R&B legends, the Grammy-winning dynamic showman Bobby Rush. This memoir charts the extraordinary rise to fame of living blues legend, Bobby Rush. Born Emmett Ellis, Jr. in Homer, Louisiana, he adopted the stage name Bobby Rush out of respect for his father, a pastor. As a teenager, Rush acquired his first real guitar and started playing in juke joints in Little Rock, Arkansas, donning a fake mustache to trick club owners into thinking he was old enough to gain entry. He led his first band in Arkansas between Little Rock and Pine Bluff in the 1950s. It was there he first had Elmore James play in his band. Rush later relocated to Chicago to pursue his musical career and started to work with Earl Hooker, Luther Allison, and Freddie King, and sat in with many of his musical heroes, such as Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, Jimmy Reed and Little Walter. Rush eventually began leading his own band in the 1960s, crafting his own distinct style of funky blues, and recording a succession of singles for various labels. It wasn't until the early 1970s that Rush finally scored a hit with "Chicken Heads." More recordings followed, including an album which went on to be listed in the Top 10 blues albums of the 1970s by Rolling Stone and a handful of regional jukebox favorites including "Sue" and "I Ain't Studdin' Ya." And Rush's career shows no signs of slowing down now. The man once beloved for performing in local jukejoints is now headlining major music/blues festivals, clubs, and theaters across the U.S. and as far as Japan and Australia. At age eighty-six, he is still on the road for over 200 days a year. His lifelong hectic tour schedule has earned him the affectionate title "King of the Chitlin' Circuit," from Rolling Stone. In 2007, he earned the distinction of being the first blues artist to play at the Great Wall of China. His renowned stage act features his famed shake dancers, who personify his funky blues and his ribald sense of humor. He was featured in Martin Scorcese's The Blues docuseries on PBS, a documentary film called Take Me to the River, performed with Dan Aykroyd on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, and most recently had a cameo in the Golden Globe nominated Netflix film, Dolemite Is My Name, starring Eddie Murphy. He was recently given the highest Blues Music Award honor of B.B. King Entertainer of the Year. His songs have also been featured in TV shows and films including HBO's Ballers and major motion pictures like Black Snake Moan, starring Samuel L. Jackson. Considered by many to be the greatest bluesman currently performing, this book will give readers unparalleled access into the man, the myth, the legend: Bobby Rush.

This study focuses on dance as an activist practice in and of itself, across geographical locations and over the course of a century, from 1920 to 2020. Through doing so, it considers how dance has been an empowering agent for political action throughout civilisation. Dance and Activism offers a glimpse of different strategies of mobilizing the human body for good and justice for all, and captures the increasing political activism epitomized by bodies moving on the streets in some of the most turbulent political situations. This has, most recently, undoubtedly been partly owing to the rise of the far-right internationally, which has marked an increase in direct action on the streets. Offering a survey of key events across the century, such as the fall of President Zuma in South Africa; pro-reproductive rights action in Poland and Argentina; and the recent women's marches against Donald Trump's presidency, you will see how dance has become an urgent field of study. Key geographical locations are explored as sites of radical dance - the Lower East Side of New York; Gaza; Syria; Cairo, Iran; Iraq; Johannesburg - to name but a few - and get insights into some of the major figures in the history of dance, including Pearl Primus, Martha Graham, Anna Sokolow and Ahmad Joudah. Crucially, lesser or unknown dancers, who have in some way influenced politics, all over the world are brought into the limelight (the Syrian ballerinas and Hussein Smko, for example). Dance and Activism troubles the boundary between theory and practice, while presenting concrete case studies as a site for robust theoretical analysis.

This comprehensive two-volume set brings together all aspects of the blues from performers and musical styles to record labels and cultural issues, including regional evolution and history. Organized in an accessible A-to-Z format, the Encyclopedia of the Blues is an essential reference resource for information on this unique American music genre. For a full list of entries, contributors, and more, visit the Encyclopedia of the Blues website.

The Early Masters of American Blues series provides the unique opportunity to study the true roots of modern blues. Stefan Grossman, noted roots-blues guitarist and musicologist, has compiled this fascinating collection of 14 songs from seven pivotal early blues guitarists from the Mississippi Delta. In addition to Stefan's expert transcriptions, the book includes online audio containing the original artist's recordings so you can hear and feel the music, as it was originally performed. Artists featured: WILLIE BROWN: (Future Blues; M&O Blues; Ragged and Dirty); SON HOUSE: (Dry Spell Blues; My Black Mama); SKIP JAMES: (Devil Got My Woman; Hard Time Killin' Floor; Special Rider); HAMBONE WILLIE NEWBERN: (Roll and Tumble Blues); CHARLIE PATTON: (Screamin' and Hollerin' the Blues; Stone Pony Blues; 34 Blues); ARTHUR PETTIS: (Good Boy Blues); ROBERT WILKINS: (That's No Way to Get Along).

In Crossing Traditions: American Popular Music in Local and Global Contexts, a wide range of scholarly contributions on the local and global significance of American popular music examines the connections between selected American blues, rock and roll, and hip-hop music and their equivalents from Senegal, Nigeria, England, India, and Mexico. Contributors show how American popular music promotes local and global awareness of such key issues as economic inequality and social marginalization while inspiring cross-cultural and interethnic influences among regional and transnational communities. Specifically, Crossing Traditions highlights the impact of American popular music on the spread of sounds, rhythms, styles, and ideas about freedom, justice, love, and sexuality among local and global communities, all of which share the same desires, hopes, and concerns despite geographic differences. Contributors look at the local contexts of Chicago blues, early rock and roll, white Christian rap, and Frank Zappa alongside the global influence of Mahalia Jackson on Senegalese blues, the transatlantic character of the British Invasion’s relationship to African American rock, and the impact of Latin house music, global hip-hop, and Bhangra in cross-cultural settings. Essays also draw on a broad range of disciplines in their analyses: American studies, popular culture studies, transnational studies, history, musicology, ethnic studies, literature and media studies, and critical theory. Crossing Traditions will appeal to a wide range of readers, including college and university professors, undergraduate and graduate students, and music scholars in general.