Host Ellen Rocco

Special Guests:


Pat Johnson,
live on The Blue Note, 8/19/03


The Conrad Story Blues Band in concert 4/30/02


Don Washington Band in Concert 7/24/01
Don Washington Band website


Automatic Slim in Concert 7/3/01

 

The Blue Note

Join Ellen Rocco for the best in blues, every Tuesday from 3 to 4:45 pm.

I grew up in Manhattan (and, for a while, in Queens). Went to City College, in Harlem. Highlights of my college years: poetry seminar with Paul Blackburn, the City College cafeteria--a political gulag with tables invisibly marked for the Young Conservatives, SDS, the Maoists, Communist Party, Socialist Party, Young Republicans, druggies, etc--and Wednesdays at The Apollo Theater for amateur hour or the Moulin Rouge Cafe for the world's best juke box, where I was introduced to the blues, thanks to Big George, my guide through the alleys and backdoors of uptown New York. Here I am, years later in northern New York, still totally hooked on blues, jazz, R&B and, more recently, world beat.

Finding Music

You can find or special order any of the music heard on this program from local music stores, including:
Northern Music & Video, Potsdam: 315-265-8100
Strawberry Fields, Potsdam: 315-265-7700
Ampersound, Saranac Lake:
518-891-3114
Peacock Music, Plattsburgh:
518-561-0555

If you're listening for someone or something in particular on The Blue Note--and don't hear it--let me know. I prefer blues and blues-related music that's direct and gutsy. You won't hear the overproduced stuff--those tracks with excessive horns and guitars, or the songs where the individual voice is muddied. Muddy Waters you will hear. Along with all the greats from the '30s to the '60s--Sonny Boy Williamson, Robert Johnson, Bessie Smith, Howlin' Wolf, BB King, Albert King, Jimmy King, Koko Taylor--plus the best of the voices and groups of the past two or three decades, like Johnny Winter, Taj Mahal, Alvin Youngblood Hart, Keb Mo', Dave Hole, Coco Montoya, Corey Harris, Rory Block, Maria Muldaur...and so on.

Stay in touch. Tell me what I'm missing or hitting right...or just let me know you're tuning in. Thanks for listening.

Music Maker Relief Foundation
Dedicated to helping the true pioneers and forgotten heroes of the blues gain recognitiuon and meet their day-to-day needs.

Alex Chadwick profile of founder Tim Duffy


Muddy Waters
1915-1983
Wasn't that a man?

E-mail Ellen

The Blue Note’s
Very Casual List of Recommendations for Gift-Giving

For the Blue Note Listeners’ BEST OF THE CENTURY LIST, click here!  And, if you're looking for the more perfect musical gifts, click here for some Ellen's gift list from 2000.


Program Playlists


Recent | 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 | 2002 | 2001

Blues
June 12, 2009 | NPR· Italian import Daniela Schaechter is a brilliant young pianist and singer, taking the jazz scene by storm. Judging by her list of awards and the number of jazz luminaries she's played with, one might think she'd been gigging professionally for dozens of years. Schaechter performs her own tune "Dark Blue," and McPartland joins in for "It Could Happen to You."
 
June 9, 2009 | NPR· There is no controversy surrounding Koko Taylor's title "Queen of the Blues" — she was simply the best. Taylor's 40-year career lasted until only a few weeks before her death. In this World Cafe interview from 1994, Taylor talks about how she got started as a musician, as well as about her love for and commitment to the blues.
 
June 8, 2009 | NPR· Legendary Chicago blues man Lonnie Brooks, along with his son Wayne Brooks, performs a few numbers and talks about the evolution of blues music and what it's like to still perform at age 75. Hear the Brooks play hit tunes, including "Feeling Good Doing Bad," "Sweet Home Chicago," and "Inflation."
 
June 4, 2009 | NPR· Her name is synonymous with Chicago blues, and her voice was growling, thunderous and full of soul. Grammy Award-winning blues singer Koko Taylor died in a Chicago hospital Wednesday.