Just finished Episode 2 of "Country Music" on PBS. The episode is almost as much about radio as it is about Country Music. Covers the 'Barn Dances' and actually gets into an aside on radio regulations during the depression. By memory, some of the stations were WSM, WHN, WLS, WSB, KVOO, WPTF, and of course XERA and the Carters. What is interesting is how many are still carrying the original call letters. And looking at the equipment for a remote, I sometimes wonder how they ever got it to work. I could on;y wonder what Ken Burns could do if he set his sights on just radio.
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"Country Music"
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Actually he has. In 1991, Ken Burns did a film documentary based on the book Empire Of The Air:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empire_of_the_Air:_The_Men_Who_Made_Radio
It's about the early days of radio, and the founders of the industry.
And because radio at that time was all commercial, it was also as much about the various SPONSORS of radio as it was about radio. So you had a snake oil salesman who owned a radio station, and used country music to lure people to listen to his pitches for various products. Or the Grand Ole Opry was used as a means to sell life insurance. And it worked! People loved the music, and implored the company to send a salesman to their house. Now these were innocent times, and there weren't as many laws having to do with the way products were sold as there are now. But clearly the popularity of music was used to help sell products. That basic business model still exists today.
Dr. Brinkley and his infamous "Goat Gland Cure" on KFKB (Kansas First Kansas Best) comes to mind......!!!
I really enjoyed the film last night. It provided a look at people who I had known mostly as "old-timers" in music -- Bill Monroe, Bob Wills, The Carters -- and some of their songs and their interpersonal relationships.
One thing I was really surprised by was the mention of WSM's "Apex Band" sister, as a means of settling a dispute over NBC program carriage in Nashville.
One thing I was really surprised by was the mention of WSM's "Apex Band" sister, as a means of settling a dispute over NBC program carriage in Nashville.
A review of "Country Music" in Rolling Stone reveals that the story will end in 1996, with the rest of country music since then being wrapped up in a short concluding montage. I haven't been able to find any explanation by Burns as to why he would cut the documentary off just as massive changes were taking place in country music. Perhaps he doesn't like the way the genre has gone, which would be something that shouldn't affect a true documentarian. Perhaps he just didn't know how to connect Taylor Swift and Jason Aldean to Kitty Wells and Hank Williams, or even to Reba McEntire and George Strait. Whatever the reason, I'm disappointed. I'm out of the main demographic for today's country, but I still think an in-depth look at 21st-century country music and the people involved in shaping and making it would be the logical way to end the film.
I've thought a Ken Burns series on radio would be awesome, and awesomely difficult, too, because so much of radio's history is local (particularly from the end of Golden Age network radio in the early-mid 50s to the rise of syndication in the late 80s).
Yes it was mentioned in part 1, and then in part 2, Brinkley was driven out of Kansas City, moves to Mexico, starts XERA and hires the Carter Family to sing at his new 500,000 watt radio station.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XERA-AM
"Actually he has. In 1991, Ken Burns did a film documentary based on the book Empire Of The Air"
The three volume set was really good. I still have the books somewhere. Need to go and try to find the documentary. But the documentary and the second episode of "Country Music" seems to indicate a fascination with radio, especially the origins.
The three volume set was really good. I still have the books somewhere. Need to go and try to find the documentary. But the documentary and the second episode of "Country Music" seems to indicate a fascination with radio, especially the origins.
From an interview in the WSJ:
The documentary ranges from the 1920s to 1996, when Bill Monroe died and Garth Brooks broke sales records. The stopping point was critical: The filmmakers are historians, and history needs time to settle. “We could have a great conversation about whether Blake Shelton or Taylor Swift will endure as significant artists in 20 years,” Mr. Duncan says. “Maybe, maybe not.”
For Mr. Cash, the filmmakers [] bent their decision not to go beyond 1996. They included his death—in 2003—in the final episode of “Country Music.”
"Every time we lie, we incur a debt to reality, and that debt eventually must be paid."
I imagine it will continue into part 3. The sweet spot for Burns is the first half of the 20th century. Most of his films have dealt with that era, including the Roosevelts and Jazz. I thought it was interesting he referenced Henry Ford, who disliked country music, in part 2. Burns had done an earlier film on the automobile industry. But certainly radio was a big cultural element from the mid 20s to the 50s. It was interesting that only NBC added country music to its network. CBS founder Bill Paley was not a fan. Ironically his record label, Columbia, was one of the earliest labels to establish an office in Nashville. But his biggest country star, Johnny Cash, hosted a TV show on ABC, not CBS. And CBS later dropped a lot of its rural shows from its TV schedule.
I'm wondering if he is leaving himself an opening to add a chapter or two to it at a later date. Seems like that would be the most likely option.
I heard an interview with Burns where they asked him about ending the show with events 20 years ago. Paraphrasing, he said that historians can't get the full picture of events (with appropriate context) until about 20 years after the fact. Thus, he wasn't comfortable covering events more recent than that. Maybe somewhat of a rationalization, but it does make sense.
Works for me. I am hoping that he will enlist someone to continue/finish the project for him, should he not live those additional 20 years.
The only film he updated was Baseball with something he called "Tenth Inning" that came out ten years after the original series.
His next film will be about Ernest Hemingway, and then he has a major project on Stand Up Comedy in the works.
He already has, at least from the earliest of the missing years. 1996 was 23 years ago, yet all he put in the film from the years after that was the death of Johnny Cash. Do current U.S. history textbooks stop 23 years ago and only mention the Bush-Gore election or 9/11?
Rolling Stone Country has been doing a series of interviews with some of the artists in the series. Yesterday was Marty Stuart, and today is Ketch Secor:
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/...w-ketch-secor-ken-burns-country-music-885584/
It's interesting to read how much Burns was influenced by these artists. They sort of guided him through the story. The article says Ketch is 41, but he looks like he's in his 20s. He was one of the writers of that Wagon Wheel song you hear in the Bank of America funding announcement. He wrote it based on a line from Bob Dylan.
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/...w-ketch-secor-ken-burns-country-music-885584/
It's interesting to read how much Burns was influenced by these artists. They sort of guided him through the story. The article says Ketch is 41, but he looks like he's in his 20s. He was one of the writers of that Wagon Wheel song you hear in the Bank of America funding announcement. He wrote it based on a line from Bob Dylan.
Hopefully he'll be working with Kliph Nesteroff, who has written an incredible book about the history of standup.
Kathy Mattea has a recurring role in the new documentary as one of its narrators. She and Burns share West Virginia roots and they collaborated -- along with other artists from country and folk music -- on an excellent album and film, "Songs of the Civil War," that came out after "The Civil War" aired as a sort of companion piece. Mattea also worked as a tour guide at the Country Music Hall of Fame in her first year or so in Nashville, so she's legitimately interested in the history of the genre.
Obviously I'm not up on what HS textbooks are saying today, but the sections on 'modern history' in textbooks tend to be very short and hit only the highlights. When I was in HS a little over 20 years ago, our textbook had about 6 pages (one "lesson") on everything after Watergate. It mentioned George Bush (41) as president, but not Bill Clinton. The '88 election might have been the very last event mentioned. I was especially interested in the section on Iran-Contra, which was covered in a couple of paragraphs, and I recall a photo of Ollie North being printed along side.
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