Bill Russell and the Discovery of Jazz
Leading A Revival 12/28/2018 Jason Berry photograph courtesy of Preservation Hall An eccentric man of many talents, William Russell was a catalytic presence in the rise of early jazz. Born in 1905 in Canton, Ohio, the classically trained violinist got hip to the groove in 1928 while teaching in New York. Like most seminal jazz producers, he began as an addictive record-collector scouring stores for rare discs, even going house to house in a black…
Bill Russell’s Explorations Of The Origins Of Jazz
Published in Offbeat Magazine MARCH 1, 1996by: JASON BERRY1 COMMENT 1 When The Outspoken Jazz Documentarian Died, Much History Died With Him. But He Left Behind Enough To Keep Historian Arguing For A Very Long Time. Editor’s Note: This is the second installment of Jason Berry’s continuing series on the history of traditional jazz, to mark what is roughly the hundred-year anniversary of the emergence of jazz as an idiom. Berry’s work has appeared in many…
Rollin’ on the River: Pittsburgh Shanty Boat Life
This article by Sue Morris discusses shanty boat living in Pittsburgh, a topic close to my mom's heart, who lived on several in the 1960s on the Allegheny River. Here are some excerpts: there were plenty of other Pittsburghers who called the rivers home year-round, for whom living on the water was a matter of necessity, not trendiness. No $10,000 water crafts for those folks: they lived in what Pittsburghers of the day called…
Using DNA matches to confirm distant ancestors
Several years ago I took the DNA test and attached it to my tree there. I have two separate trees - one for my father's side and one for my mom's. My mom also took the test, and I attached it to her tree. Ancestry then matches our DNA to the thousands of other testers and then shows me how it thinks we are related. They recently rolled out a new visualization tool called "Thrulines"…
Am I a soldier of the cross
I remember one night while on duty as officer of the guard, tattoo had sounded, I discovered a light in their quarters. The first notes of taps was sounded, I approached silently to discover the reason. I expected to find that the inmates were engaged in a quiet game of "Old Sledge," but as I got near the tent I heard singing in a low subdued tone. I listened, they were singing in German. It…
23 and Me DNA results
I just got my DNA results from 23 and Me. I already took the test, which is usually what I use to connect to cousins since that's where my tree is. But the 23 and Me test looks at the MtDNA which is the direct Maternal line. The test just shows cousins, whereas the MtDNA (or Y-DNA if you're male) is much more accurate since the Y or Mtdna gets passed to son/daughter almost intact…
Staryn Wagner Home Movies
This is a 15-minute compilation of some of the home movies of Staryn Wagner taken by his dad Will Wagner. I've pieced together multiple clips and stills. It's so wonderful that he took and kept these videos. I couldn't include all the footage (then again, how many minutes of crawling do you need to see?), but this gives a nice sampling. I did no color correction. They are as they were transferred. Warning: Will appears…