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Accompanied by her band in their first public performance together in more than a year, Valerie June delivered a mighty passionate performance of âCall Me a Foolâ in a session aired Monday on
Late Night With Seth Meyers. The song is a single from the Memphis native and part-time Nashvillianâs new LP
The Moon and Stars: Prescriptions for Dreamers.Â
âYouâre working in an imaginary realm,â June told
Scene contributor Brittney McKenna in a recent interview about songs and songwriting. âI like to live there as much as I can, because itâs just so beautiful and so ethereal and magical, these places where songs and art and poems and stories come from. Itâs what
The not-singing bird
With endless silence. David Olney
People say it was a poetic exit. I assure you, NOBODY wants to die onstage figuratively or literally. On Jan. 18, Americana pioneer, singer-songwriter, recording artist, pre-pandemic streamcaster, actor, and my longtime client and good friend David Olney died of an apparent heart attack midsong. He was center stage between Amy Rigby and Scott Miller at the 30A Songwriter Festival in the Florida panhandle. His last words: “I’m sorry.” His mantra, however, was, “Always be true to the song.”
Understanding the covenant between the audience and performer, David earned rapt attention from folks wondering how to classify what they were witnessing. Was it country? Folk? Blues? Vaudeville? Scottish newspaper
Year in Music 2020 We talk with Kyshona Armstrong, Lilly Hiatt and Becca Mancari, count down the yearâs top local albums and much more Dec 17, 2020 5 AM Tweet Share
Itâs been very easy to feel overwhelmed in 2020, when it seems like the rules get rewritten every day â by a global pandemic, a long-overdue public conversation about systemic racism and more. But faced with an industry and a society undergoing all kinds of turbulence, musicians and business folk across Nashvilleâs constellation of music scenes responded with ingenuity and compassion. Even though thereâs still much work to be done, thereâs a great deal to take away from this extraordinary year â and to be proud of. In our Year in Music issue, we get perspective from outstanding musicians Kyshona Armstrong, Lilly Hiatt and Becca Mancari; our critics take stock of the yearâs top local albums; we hand the mic to an array of singers, songwrit