originjazz

I've read all of the responses here and just wanted to answer the question about my Milton Brown biography. Much attention was given to questioning Milton's brother Roy Lee and the surviving members of the band, who were still alive in the 1980s when I did this research. I was careful to ask about influences and their unanimous response was that the only direct influence from black musicians came from listening to race records in the Kemble Bros. Furniture Store where they rehearsed. Fort Worth was a segregated town and there was very little mixing of the races. I did report a story Fred Calhoun told about blacks not being allowed to enter the dance halls where the Brownies played, but he visited with some who were sitting outside on a railroad dump, listening to and enjoying the music. The song appendix in the back of the book goes into great detail about the black influences on the Brownies - how they got their theme song from a Famous Hokum Boys 78, how they loved Big Bill's rent-party style songs and the Mississippi Sheiks. The end notes for each chapter list many African American artists who influenced the Brownies' recordings, such as Papa Charlie McCoy, Jimmie Noone, and the Washboard Rhythm Kings. Mr. Lowe needs to read my book again where he will find plenty of references to ALL of the influences on the Brownies, both black and white. I do not try to skew history just to make it "fairer" to one race as opposed to another. I reported what I found. When Mr. Lowe says there was "probably a lot of undocumented black music of the Southwest that had a powerful influence on white musicians," that's a supposition based on conjecture. If there was "undocumented music," how does he know what that music was? I wrote the book around the memories of the Brownies and the few fans that still survived and then analyzed those remembrances. Milton Brown was influenced by a lot of music played on the radio and on records, of which black music was a part. These influences have been clearly spelled out in the book. To say that my book has "literally no mention of African Americans" just shows that Mr. Lowe needs to revisit it. - Cary Ginell