Area of state responsible for Ukraine later in the week Marie Vonnegut the former ambassador to Ukraine who was abruptly forced out of her position is scheduled to testify Winsor Johnston n.p.r. News Washington in northeast Syria at least 8 people are dead several others wounded after a car bomb exploded in a town near the border with Turkey Syrian Kurdish fighters considered to be terrorists by Turkey are blamed for the attack the violence between the groups has escalated since Turkey invaded northeast Syria last month after the u.s. Withdrew a majority of its troops from the region some u.s. Troops have remained but they're not defending the Kurds who were allies to the u.s. To battle ISIS and in the killing of ISIS leader Al Baghdadi chairman of the joint chiefs of staff Mark Milley tells A.B.C.'s This Week their sole focus is to keep ISIS from getting a hold of the oil fields in the region there are still ISIS fighters in the region and unless pressure is maintained a less attention is maintained on that group then there's a very real possibility the conditions could be set for reemergence of ISIS he says about 600 u.s. Troops will remain behind Spain is facing political deadlock yet again after today's parliamentary elections the Socialist Party won the most votes but fell short of a majority will see a benefit is has more the far right party Vox saw the biggest political rice they more than doubled their voter base compared to the previous elections in April when no party won enough votes to rule with a majority Vox whose leaders have taken on an anti-feminist anti immigrant and anti independence stance have already joined forces with the 2 other right wing parties in regional and one is a pole government it's still unclear if that could happen at a national level during the campaign which centered a lot around the independence movement and got the Lumia all 3 right wing parties criticised interim prime minister better Sanchez and his socialist government for not being tough enough on the region for n.p.r. News I'm Lucy had been of us embedded said Ana And you're listening to n.p.r. News from Washington. 50 years ago today the 1st episode of Sesame Street aired on public television N.P.R.'s Elizabeth Blair reports the show was like nothing else on t.v. When it premiered with an integrated cast a psychedelic graphics and most importantly Muppets. 3 month or you Sesame Street became one of the few t.v. Shows parents felt good about letting their kids watch everybody were. The goal was to help close the educational gap between rich and poor children because I love to go on thing. A few years ago when Sesame Street signed a deal with h.b.o. 3 long time human characters were let go Bob Luis and Gordon the outcry was so strong the president of Sesame Workshop apologized today Sesame Street or versions of it are in more than $150.00 countries Elizabeth Blair n.p.r. News Mercury is putting on a rare celestial show tomorrow much of the world will be able to view the solar system's smallest innermost planet as it looks like a tiny black dot when it passes between the sun and the earth unlike the planets 2016 trip this time Mercury will pass practically dead center in front of the Sun The 5 a half hour trip will be visible to the eastern u.s. Canada all of Central and South America and Europe and Africa will catch a part of the action Mercury's next trip in front of the sun won't happen until 2032 Asian markets are trading lower at this hour the Hang Seng in Hong Kong is down 1.4 percent the Asia dollar down about 4 tenths of a percent I'm Janine Herbst n.p.r. News support for n.p.r. Comes from n.p.r. Stations and other contributors include the estate of Joan b. Kroc whose bequest serves as an enduring investments in the future of public radio and seeks to help n.p.r. 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This is Fresh Air weekend I'm Terry Gross I've heard many songs about murder over the years folk ballads country songs Arias but I think singer songwriter Allison more or song Cold cold earth is the 1st murder ballad I've heard where the singer actually witnessed the crime more I was 14 when she heard the gunshots her father fired killing her mother and then himself leaving Alice and her 17 year old sister orphaned her sister Shelby Lynne is also a singer songwriter the murder suicide is the subject more has tried to avoid talking about in public until now her new memoir blood is about growing up in Alabama witnessing her parents' dysfunctional marriage and watching her father's rages in which she would beat a dog or Allison's mother or sister the good part of her childhood was the music her mother sang her father played in local bands and wrote some songs she later discovered one of which she performs on her new album more and her sister won awards for their duets when they were children Moore's new album is a companion to her memoir and is also called Blood Alison Morris music has been nominated for an Oscar a Grammy and an Academy of Country Music Award as you can probably tell this interview will have stories related to depression domestic abuse murder and suicide . I also more brought her guitar to the studio and she'll sing some songs for us a little later but 1st I want to play a track from her new album the song about the murder suicide called cold cold or we'll start with the 2nd verse. To. The. In. In the cold. Say it's snowing really. There said Will. Alison Moore welcome to Fresh Air Congratulations on your new memoir and on this wonderful new record you know there's a great tradition of murder ballads in folk music but this is one this is a murder ballad you wrote about your own parents. I want you to tell the story through your memoir and read an excerpt of the memoir from the morning of the murder and you were sleeping in the living room on the floor because your mother had left your father and moved with you and your sister to a rental apartment she had served him divorce papers he wanted back into the family and your mother and her best friend Carolyn were concerned that he might do something dangerous so she Carolyn the friend was sleeping in your bed which is why you were sleeping in the living room floor. So if you could read an excerpt from the beginning of your book in which you describe your perception of the murder suicide. I think it was around 5 am when the gunshots welcome there were 2. They came very close to one another imagine the sound of a 36 rifle firing and then think of the time it takes to snap your fingers 4 times to the tempo of 13 by big star. Then imagine it firing again. I lay there for what feels now like a few minutes terrified to move even as the meter or even to bury. My eyes darted around the barely lit living room for a clue about what to do. I knew without question what I'd heard Then mistake will sound that takes a life but I couldn't quite comprehend that I'd heard that sound coming from the front yard that was just on the other side of the living room wall. I was only a few feet away I wondered if it could have been thunder left over from the storm that came the day before or maybe another one coming I wondered if it could have been something else that might imitate the pub rationed from a cannon now I knew it wasn't anything but what I knew it was I've been close enough to guns to recognize exactly the sound they make a pop but a little longer than a pop burst violent and hard then the reverberation. I told myself no it couldn't be what I knew it was even as I simultaneously started rearranging every cell in my body to start accepting that yes it was yes I knew that it was. I got up off the floor where I'd slept and shook myself to the kitchen door I was 14 years old. I opened the door which opened onto a carport and called out into the thick early morning for mama. Mama. I didn't turn my head to the left. Well I knew they probably were in the darkness was merciful enough to give me no peripheral vision I just stared straight ahead as I called her one time and not again I knew there was no need to repeat myself and I wasn't surprised when there was no response I couldn't step outside. I turned around to go back to the living room and met since you and Carolyn headed in my direction Carolyn said something about hearing what she thought might have been a gun and that she'd looked into mamma's bedroom and it was empty I knew mamma wasn't in her bedroom I knew she was outside that I hadn't confirmed it with my. Sissy did she walk straight out the front door into the approaching morning she then walked back inside. Carolyn keep Allison in the house it's Mom and Daddy I'm going to go get help. And that's Alice and more reading from her new memoir which is called Blood. You know one of the really just horrible things in terms of what your father did is he he didn't think about you and your sister at all I mean. Your mother and killed her and then killed himself. That's horrible enough but he left 2 orphans behind and he left you both with the most traumatic memories and that strikes me as being so selfish I mean obvious to selfishness a very Underwood well meaning words he was here but it does it trouble you. How little he thought about you when he did this horrific action. I'm pretty sure he did not live his life as a person who never thought about us I know that he did. I also know that he made many of his decisions with seemingly no regard for his fame. He was sick he was quite possibly mentally ill. I think it's safe to say that this decision was not one. That was made with a clear head of his you know that's one of the reasons why I got the autopsy reports I wanted to see what his alcohol level was. And that's not to say that if he had been sober he would have made the same decision because I think he did just break at this point. So I don't know if this was something that he had thought of how he did carry a gun in his van all the time he kept it under a bean bag that my mama had actually made for him to have in this band that he liked so much so how she got out there with him I don't know and she you know she told my sister and me a couple months before this happened that on several occasions he had begged her to shoot him and put the gun in his hand so that it would look like a suicide. Well let's take a break here and then we'll talk some more if you're just joining us my guest a songwriter and singer and musician Allison Moore She's written a new memoir and has a companion cd and the memoir is about growing up in a family with an abusive father who eventually when else was a teenager he shot and killed her mother and then shot and killed himself and her new cd is all songs that relate to that in some way they're both called Blood. We'll hear more of my interview with Allison more after a short break I'm Terry Gross and this is Fresh Air weekend. Knew our family foundation supports w.h.y. Wise fresh air and its commitment to sharing ideas and encouraging meaningful conversation support for n.p.r. Comes from this station and from new offering a personalized weight loss program that uses psychology and small goals to change habits with a goal of losing weight and keeping it off learn more at noon Oh am. And from Progressive Insurance to offering a streamlined shopping experience where home and auto can be bundled together now that's progressive learn more a progressive dot com or 1800 progressive. Support for a from anyone comes from Fresno master presenting sunrise mass and Jubilee Deo on Sunday November 17th 2 30 pm at the should go in performing arts center this music inspires hope and joy offering consolation and peace tickets and information at Fresno community chorus dot org or 559-709-6245. It's time to stop and listen to the music that's been flowing into the this is on both sides of the Atlantic so I hope you'll join me for some fresh new signs this week on the swollen Shomron. Tonight at a public radio. This is Fresh Air weekend I'm Terry Gross let's get back to my interview with singer and songwriter Alison Moore her new memoir blood is about her childhood her parents' dysfunctional marriage and the trauma of having heard the shots when her father killed her mother then turned around the rifle and took his own life Moore was 14 her sister was 17 when they were orphaned her sister Shelby Lynne is also a singer songwriter more or wrote a series of songs connected to her memoir there on a new album also called Blood. You know you're writing your book that living life afraid and you were afraid of your father and your mother and your sister were afraid of him too. One thing we can say about your father that's positive is that he loved music and he so much wanted to be a songwriter and a professional musician he had bands that he played in but I mean they didn't they didn't go anywhere as they played you know local places. And he had to have day jobs are sometimes he was just an employed but he loved music and he had reel to reel I reel to reel tape recorder and would tape the family singing with tape you and your sister singing when you were when you were young and you have a briefcase in which he collected some of the lyrics that he had written and some of those recordings that he made of the family and there's a song that you sing on the new album that's a lyric he wrote. And a melody that your sister Shelby Lynne wrote for the song and I want to play the song from the recording because I'm just not sure you could ever top. The version of the recording it just seems perfect to me but tell us a little bit about the origin of this song and what it says to you about your father and I remember this by saying it has a very telling title I'm the one to blame. Yeah. Shortly after they died my sister found this lyric and all briefed case of his and he would have been 25 or 6 when he wrote it. Yeah just the title alone I'm the one to blame the lyric is. I'm the one to blame I've paid the cost time it's made me see just how much I've lost jealousy and pride drove me to shame I'm so sorry dear but I'm the $1.00 to blame sorrow took the pride. Take the blame that's the line that blows me away well I was I don't lie sorrow took the pride I'll take the blame because it reveals such as sadness and such a just that is just a despondent line and it reveals so much in you know I have no idea what his intentions were for this song I never heard him sing it I have no current recollection of the song at all so to find it after he died was just. It shook us to the core and but you know in typical survivor fashion my sister thought he must pretty good I think up music. And she did and she put great music to it. Neither of us have ever recorded it but I thought this album was a perfect opportunity to do so I wanted him to have a voice I wanted to say finally here you go daddy. You get to be heard. So let's hear the song with your father's lyric and your sister's melody I am the one to blame this is from Allison more new album Blood. On. The Coen. Harris may be. Just stared. Home. Drug. Meat shaking. And I am so relieved. That I'm no nibbling. Some. Let me. Take the. Heat. It's. Been. All it's Woods who. Didn't know you. Know. This not to sing. Was the church. Is gong. To sing. Me my. Exam Oh my God bless. I just think that is such a sad song and your version of it just I get chills when I listen to it it's really . So emotional. He said that he was jealous of your mother's talent like your mother was a natural singer and you and your sister just grew up knowing how to sing harmony and you both have great voices but your father had to work on it and you never you know he's the one who really what he wanted to be a professional and wasn't Do you think jealousy of your mother's talent figured into his anger at her. I do and I will say that my mother had a leg up she was raised in a very musical family her mama was one of 14 children she was born in 1906 that was in the Great Depression and they didn't have much to do to entertain themselves but saying and play music so my grandparents would have what we called Finland at their house and we would often join in and everybody just need you everybody all my mama's side of the family most of them just knew how to sing and play and sit around and at least play 3 or 4 cores on the guitar and know how to hear harmony part and it was just a it was a way of life music on my mama side of the family was just a given somebody came over in the afternoon for a piece of pad a cup of coffee as they often did they would end up picking out a teen on the guitar or the piano and just it was just always around my daddy. Did not have that it's experience his parents were not musical so maybe he didn't have a chance to develop as great in years she had maybe you know maybe I don't know there was a lot of natural talent in my mother she had a great voice she had great rhythm she had a great ear. Daddy had to work very much harder at just being Ok and I did like he had his rhythm wasn't very good and you know he wasn't someone who could really sing harmony that you know. I have a tape of the 2 of them singing together of Mom and Daddy singing together and he all the sudden changes the key and she whispers to him you change the key and he corrected himself but the tape cuts off very quickly and I thought Oh God I wonder what price she had to pay for correcting him because he hated to be corrected I want to end with a song that you do on your new album Blood and it's called heal and it's the last song on the album and it's kind of like a prayer it's an absolute prayer it's a it's a plea. Who are you praying to God I was unclear whether you had any belief left in God I absolutely believe in God and I believe in God more now than I have ever believed in God I you know I wrote and this memoir this prayer I used to pray please God don't let daddy hurt mama and I would pray it and pray it and pray it and mostly at night waiting on her to come talk to us and please God don't let daddy hurt Mama because what we heard. Indicated that he would. And. I also say that I didn't pray for a long time after. After they died. And that. I don't know what that means other than maybe I thought it was useless I was too angry. I was not in a place where I felt close to my own spirit but as I've gotten older I've realized what an important part of life that is to have a relationship with your spiritual self. And what a comfort that is because having faith that life unfolds as it should whether are we whether we agree or not with the way it unfolds . Is a source of peace and comfort. Possibly more thank you so very much. Thank you Terry Gross. Manna how. Long. Can we. Stand. That's Alison more from her new album Blood now our jazz critic Kevin Whitehead has a review of a new box set of early recordings by the pianist and singer Nat King Cole covering the years 1906 to 1943 it's one of several tribute collections released this year celebrating the centennial of his birth we'll call it spot but no them where you did it go down and just fun will show them the get go. When you. Come on what I've been oh make me wait with. Nat King Cole in 1900 later in his career as one of the great 20th century pop singers publicists sold the idea that the pianist had only reluctantly backed into singing see for example a short bio pic where he plays himself the Nat King Cole me. Zirkle story which you can find online to be sure he was a formidable pianist who come up and Earl Hines of Chicago early on and sometimes later he could catch Hines's blend of and take action and point time. His call on his 1st record Chicago in 1936. Holes career didn't really get going until a coup