Highway 61 Revisited, By Jim Austin, Stereophile

Ron Resnick

Site Co-Owner, Administrator
Jan 24, 2015
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Beverly Hills, CA
In the July 2018 Edition of Stereophile Jim Austin, the columnist for My Backpages, wrote an article titled “Highway 61 Revisited.” In the piece Jim describes his visit to Clarksdale, Mississippi, a small city in which many famous blues musicians were born.

Jim finds Clarksdale today to not be “the rural Deep South I know.” He explores a mix of Southern blues clubs that do not try to hide their authentic grit and natural decay, as well as a club owned by Hollywood and local celebrities that is “juke-joint authentic, real but not infectious.”

Then he writes the insightful and powerful paragraph which prompted me to post this thread:

You can’t force things back the way they were, and you wouldn’t want to if you could. The blues gestated on the porches of African-American shacks — gritty, impoverished places — in the minds, throats, and fingers of former slaves. The roots of the blues — hence of all America’s music, including jazz and rock ‘n’ roll — are in that suffering and the effort to redeem it through art, or at least to find peace.​




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JackD201

WBF Founding Member
Apr 20, 2010
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Manila, Philippines
Very coincidental that earlier today I was pondering this quote as I was brushing up on basic economic philosophy.

‘happy contrivance of any production of art, should often be more valued, than the very end for which it is unintended’

Seems to fit right in yes?
 

Ron Resnick

Site Co-Owner, Administrator
Jan 24, 2015
16,017
13,347
2,665
Beverly Hills, CA
Yes, it does!
 

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