Television Program Outlines  

Part One: Americans Old and New
Northern Minnesota to Douds, Iowa

Airing on PBS Wednesday, January 6 at 10:00 PM, EST

The most musically varied section of the series, Part One gives a taste of the myriad flavors of the contemporary American melting pot, from the Native American Ojibwe to the early Scandinavian and German immigrants, to such recent arrivals in the area as Laotian Hmong and Mexican communities. There are contemporary urban sounds, from acoustic singer/songwriters to gospel, r&b, punk and alternative rock. As the river grows from a trickle that one can step across to a majestic expanse of water dotted with riverboats and barges, the music shows the breadth and variety of cultures that have developed along its banks.

In northern Minnesota, the Mississippi River is a narrow stream, running through lakes and marshes. The Ojibwe (Chippewa) named it "Mizi Zipi," "the great river," and we find members of the tribe still poling their canoes along its banks, harvesting a fall crop of wild rice. At a small-town powwow, they gather to socialize and celebrate their ancient but still vital culture. We focus on a local drum group, Chippewa Nation, as they play for gaily-clad dancers at the powwow, and we join two members at the riverbank as they sing intimate, courting songs and talk about their lives and music.
By the time it reaches Brainerd, the river has passed the lake region, and is a clear, free-flowing stream. On a winter evening, we visit the Skål Club Spelmanslag at a rehearsal in a thickly wooded cabin, the home of a local fiddle maker. A large, loosely-knit group of Scandinavian immigrants, they play the fiddle tunes of the old country, a dozen or more musicians joining together in a rich tapestry of sound. At his home, we visit group leader Paul Wilson who sings an American comic song in "Scandihoovian" dialect and describes the importance of music as an avenue for the rediscovery of his heritage. 
Coming into the Twin Cities, the river broadens, and the music follows suit, showcasing the range of contemporary sounds. The metro area is home to a fertile rock scene, and the most successful band to emerge onto the national stage is Soul Asylum. We visit their rehearsal loft in an old warehouse district, and hear them talk about the low-key comforts of the Minneapolis scene.  They hang out later with post-punk riot grrrl pioneers Babes in Toyland at a bowling alley, then catch the Babes’ show at a downtowm club. Balancing the ebullient energy of drummer Lori Barbero and the tortured cry of guitarist and singer Kat Bjeland, the Babes is an angry, tough, and surprisingly appealing band. Sitting in a local cafe, the three members are thoughtful and funny, laughing about the abrasiveness of their sound while explaining something of its power. 
The Twin Cities have also boasted a proud folk tradition, stretching back to the days when Dylan started playing here in the early Sixties. In a rowdy bar in the university district, folk legend Spider John Koerner is joined by an all-star band of Prairie Home Companion regulars, including old partner Tony Glover, Dakota Dave Hull, Willie Murphy, and Peter Ostroushko. They stomp out a set of acoustic folk and blues, then adjourn to Hull's house to trade tunes. 
On a quiet street in St. Paul, we visit the Twin Cities' growing Southeast Asian community--a Hmong cultural center, where a large group of Hmong qeej players, children learning to play a bamboo reed instrument used in rituals in the Laotian mountains where their parents were born. They dance as they play, a dozen small boys in perfect choreography. Two teenage boys talk about the discipline required to learn the qeej, then show off their performance styles, looking like break dancers as they twirl, tumble, somersault, and roll into a headstand, without ever missing a note. 
In a far larger rehearsal studio, we join Sounds of Blackness, the 30-member group that has ranged from top gospel hits to soul dance numbers. In a shouting, dancing performance, they trace two centuries of African-American music, from slave-time spirituals to rap. We visit the group's founder and leader, Gary Hines, in his office, decorated with Grammys and other awards, then drive around town with him, seeing the neighborhoods where he got his musical roots. We also talk with younger members, hearing how they went from local church groups to international success.
South of the Twin Cities, the country gets more hilly, and the river broadens, running through a series of locks and dams. On the Wisconsin bank of lock number four, we find Karl Hartwich pulling his boat up to a floating tavern, the Dam Saloon, then sitting over a couple of beers on the saloon deck to talk about the German immigrant style known as "Dutchman music," running over examples on his button concertina. On a nearby hilltop, Hartwich and his band, The Country Dutchmen, perform in an outdoor tent at a polka festival, with Karl's mentor and polka legend, Syl Liebl, sitting in for a few tunes.  As the dancers twirl, the Dutchmen stomp out a rollicking beat that mixes German oompah tuba with accordion polka and a touch of country guitar.
Downriver, in Davenport, Iowa, trumpeter Manny Lopez grew up playing Mexican music, but switched over to jazz in his 20s.  Heir to a local jazz tradition that reaches back to the days when New Orleans bands on the riverboats inspired young locals like Bix Beiderbecke, Lopez is seen playing at a road race and in a nightclub during the annual Bix Festival. With his powerhouse son on drums, he blows his way through a jazz set that climaxes as he is given one of Bix's old cornets and recreates the master's solo on "Jazz Me Blues."
Just across the river, in Moline, Illinois, a very different polka band is playing a Mexican dance. La Otra Mitad sings the ranchera songs of the Mexican immigrants who for three generations have been working in Moline's railyards and meat-packing plants. Over the years, the various immigrant groups have mixed, and the band is led by an Italian accordionist, while its Mexican members recall playing as a fake Italian band in their youth, and boast that they can play full nights of anything from country to Slovenian music. 
Greg Brown, one of the most successful folksingers in the country, brings the first episode to a close, with his rare mix of hip urbanity and country roots. He hangs out with an old friend, in the living room of his house in Iowa City, and Brown sings "Flat Stuff," his wry ode to the prairie. He talks about growing up in southern Iowa, with the range of musics that traveled up the river from the south. Then we wander down to his family farm, the rundown plot of land that inspired many of his most rooted regional songs, and conclude the hour with “Canned Goods,” Brown’s loving portrait of his grandmother.

Part Two: Midwestern Crossroads
Galena, Illinois to Ste. Genevieve, Missouri

Airing on PBS Wednesday, January 13 at 10:00 PM, EST

In the center of the country, communities have deep roots, fed by the constant flow of commerce along the river. This is where north and south meet, the rougher, rural styles coming face to face with big city sophistication. Hillbilly and blues are honed and polished into bluegrass, rock 'n' roll and soul music. St. Louis was a historic trading center, where goods that traveled up the river were put on trains to the coasts, and where people from all over the country came together, overlapping and interacting.

On the river near Galena, Illinois, we find John Hartford piloting the riverboat Twilight. As he steers a course down the center of the river, he talks about the old steamboat days and music along the river.  Down in the dining salon, he plays banjo and fiddle for the voyagers, singing a lilting version of his "Gentle on My Mind," and songs he has written about growing up on the banks of the river and about the rough and rowdy pilots he has known in his 30 years of working on the boats.
In Hillsboro, Illinois, a prototypical example of small town midwestern America, we look in on a bluegrass festival. Gathered by a campfire, a group of older men play the pre-bluegrass country style of the area, with guitars, fiddles and harmonica, then join in a campground watermelon feast. The Bob Lewis Family is our featured band, and we see them onstage, the two youngest children clog-dancing while the rest of the family plays highballing breakdowns. The younger members of the family jam with friends around a picnic table, singing high, lonesome harmony and picking lightning instrumentals featuring Joy Lewis Calhoun, a prize-winning mandolin player. 
Perhaps the most common music played throughout the midwest, though it is rarely credited, is that of the thousands of high school marching bands. Many a great musician got his or her start in the school band, and many other people had their one musical experience there. In a suburb of St. Louis, we find the St. Charles High School band rehearsing in their practice room, then follow them to the St. Charles Pirates football game. The team loses, but the half-time show has all the marching band trademarks: tight formations, bouncy cheers, and blaring brass.
Moving downriver to St. Louis, we visit a suburban church and find soul-gospel singer Fontella Bass, playing piano and singing a passionate response to her majestic mother, the gospel legend Martha Bass. Later, in her home, Fontella talks about the days when St. Louis was a blues and soul center, and her youth touring the south with her mother and grandmother before she ran away to become a blues star. Seated at the piano, she plays a bit of her soul hit, "Rescue Me," pointing up the differences and similarities between the soul and gospel styles.
 If one man exemplifies the St. Louis music scene, it is Oliver Sain. Sain came north from Mississippi with Little Milton, and established himself as a central figure in the r&b scene. He "discovered" Fontella Bass and Ann Peebles, writing their first hits and producing their music, and worked closely with such other local stars as Ike and Tina Turner. Today, he runs a recording studio and continues to gig regularly. He performs at his weekly club, playing saxophone and keyboards with his jazz-r&b quintet; then moves downtown for the St. Louis Tribute to Oliver Sain, a benefit featuring twenty of the most accomplished musical acts of the city's history, including the fiery James Family and Ike Turner.
Across the river in East St. Louis, we see Eugene Redmond, a poet who has been a central voice of black St. Louis for decades. Working with Katherine Dunham's dance group, Redmond has led a revival of interest in the African tradition, and we watch as he gives a dynamic performance of poetry with backing by an African drumming group, the Sunshine drum group, led by Sylvester “Sunshine” Lee. Later, the poet and the drummer speak about the economic stress of life in East St. Louis, the beacon of hope presented by  the musical legacy of Miles Davis, and the continuing vitality of the local black cultural scene.
Down in a waterfront rock club, The Bottle Rockets play their brand of rootsy country punk. Mixing small-town, honky-tonk roots with a contemporary attitude, their songs have an edgy humor and gritty power. We follow them downriver to their apartment in Festus, Missouri, where they live upstairs from a neighborhood bar, and look in on a rehearsal session that digs back into their country roots. Down in the bar, leader Brian Henneman talks about growing up in an industrial town on the river banks, feeling like misplaced weirdos, then discovering a national audience of fans. We also see the band down on the river banks.
On New Year's eve, the streets of historic Ste. Genevieve, Missouri, fill with oddly-costumed revelers: The Ste. Genevieve Guignolée singers preserve a medieval French custom, wandering through inns and bars and singing an old wassailing song.  With three fiddlers and over a dozen singers dressed in a composite of colonial and medieval costumes, they keep alive the heritage of the area's earliest European settlers, but mostly they come together to celebrate the New Year.

Part Three: Southern Fusion
La Center, Kentucky to Jackson, Mississippi

Airing on PBS Wednesday, January 20 at 10:00 PM, EST

As we move south, we can feel the music getting wilder.  Memphis was the crucible that forged the sounds of rockabilly and soul, and it remains a recording center.  In the Mississippi Delta, music is deeply rooted in the soil. Even the pop sounds remain close to their roots, and all secular musical styles come back to the blues. Gospel is at its most heartfelt and powerful, whether in small country churches or climbing the national charts.

Kentucky is rarely thought of as a river state, but in the corner that touches the Mississippi, in a small rural church, we find the Boundless Love Quartet, singing in the Blackwoods Brothers style that influenced country and rock singers from Hank Williams to Elvis Presley. We visit a singer at her job in a local school, and see how their music fits into the life of the community. 
One of Elvis's first appearances outside Memphis was at the King of Clubs, a highway honky-tonk roadhouse in northern Arkansas. Owner Bob King reminisces about those days, and presents longtime local star Sonny Burgess, one of the original Sun Records rockabillies. While his labelmates went on to fame and fortune, Burgess has continued to chop out rock and country for the Saturday night dancers at clubs like this. His energy undiminished by the years, he raves through his classic "Red-Headed Woman." Later, he takes us on a tour of the area, a wide-open county that was a center of gambling, booze and music for all of Arkansas, and a heartland of early rock 'n' roll.
Coming into Memphis, we start with a montage of African-American social dancing and rhyming (Memphis community music). Small children in a school yard play clapping games that hark back to Africa. Out behind the Katie Sexton Community Center, girls in spangled costumes perform intricate drill team maneuvers to the accompaniment of a high-energy team of drummers. Then, on the University of Memphis campus, a tuxedoed team of step-dancers throw down an immaculate set of steps to a hot rhymed chant, advertising the elegance and prestige of their fraternity.
Beale St. was once the center of black Memphis, and it remains a magnet for music-loving visitors to the city. The dean of Beale St. is  Rufus Thomas, the blues singer and humorist who introduced B.B. King and dozens of others to the local scene and who, more than 30 years after his "Walking the Dog" helped establish Stax Records, continues to bill himself as "The World's Oldest Teenager."
Memphis was one of the most productive recording centers of the 1950s and '60s, and we hear about those days from the definitive studio duo, Andrew Love and Wayne Jackson, The Memphis Horns. An inter-racial team that is the most-recorded horn section in the world, they show the underpinnings of the "Memphis sound" and talk about the racial mix that created it. They are joined in their session by Ann Peebles, the Memphis soul queen best known for "I Can't Stand the Rain." Peebles and the horns perform a blues, backed only by piano, showing their deep roots in the jazz and blues tradition, then put on their headphones to lay down a smoking soul track.
At the King Biscuit Blues Festival in Helena, Arkansas, we meet Robert Lockwood, Jr. among the last of the great Delta bluesmen. Lockwood was a stepson and protégé of Robert Johnson, and he talks about the golden age of the Delta blues. Sitting with an acoustic guitar, he shows us how he mastered Johnson's style, then adapted it into his own music. 
That night, we sail on a riverboat, with a band featuring two local masters, Levon Helm and James Cotton. Helm is best known for his work with The Band, but he started out here and he recreates those days with a hot band of his old Arkansas buddies. The music mixes Band classics like "Up on Cripple Creek" with classic blues tunes, and Helm talks about the music scene of his youth, and the blend of black and white styles that came together in rock 'n' roll.
We cross the river to find Jack Johnson fishing on a muddy creek. He stayed behind in Clarksdale, Mississippi when many of the blues greats went north to Chicago and beyond, and he’s kept alive the raw, heartfelt sound of the Delta. Jack sits in his back yard with an acoustic guitar, talking about how the old-time blues fill his eyes with tears, then shows how he stretches the guitar’s strings to make it sing. We follow Jack as he heads out into the stark, flat country of the Delta to a crossroads juke joint. A general store by day, the room turns into a dance hall on Saturday nights, and Jack is there with his longtime partners, Frank Frost and Sam Carr, better known as The Jelly Roll Kings, the hottest down-home band in Mississippi. Crowded together in the stuffy room, they play a raucous, roadhouse set.
Back in town, at a Clarksdale elementary school, Johnny Billington is taking the blues to the schools, trying to instill pride in the city’s heritage among the young. He tells the kids how blues players used to the best-dressed people in town, and teaches them what it means to have the blues.
In Greenville, we see how the blues has changed, and yet kept those roadhouse roots. In a classic "chitlin circuit" club, the Flowin’ Fountain, we meet Little Milton, leading his uptown, horn-powered, soul-blues band. Milton is a singer and guitarist who rivals B.B. King for sheer power and artistry, but he has remained on the black club circuit, outselling King but never quite crossing over to a mainstream audience. He talks about his early years in Greenville, introducing us to Li'l Bill Wallace, a guitarist who was one of his teachers, and discusses the evolution of the blues. Onstage, he ranges from blues to soul hits, and is joined in a wild finale by another chitlin' circuit star, Arkansan Bobby Rush.

In Vicksburg, at the southern edge of the Delta, we find the congregation of Greater Jerusalem Baptist Church, singing the old-time spiritual style that preceded gospel. The minister preaches in a singing shout, and the congregation moans with camp-meeting fervor. Following a church member, we drive up to Jackson for a performance of The Mississippi Mass Choir, contrasting the old and new sounds of gospel's choir style. Formed by auditioning the top African-American church singers from throughout the state, the Mass Choir has consistently been the top-selling choir in gospel music, and their trademark blend of innovative arrangements and shouting traditional church passion are unmatched.

Part Four: Louisiana, Where Music is King
Natchez, Mississippi to Delacroix Island

Airing on PBS Wednesday, January 27 at 10:00 PM, EST

In the bayous of Louisiana, country and blues come together with French styles, in the potent dance rhythms of Cajun and zydeco. New Orleans is almost a world unto itself, with its old French culture and its Caribbean orientation. There is the vibrant street life of a tropical port, the rhumba-influenced second-line rhythms of New Orleans r&b and several generations of jazz horns. A touch of the vanishing Spanish culture of the Gulf islands adds a wistful close.

In Natchez, a local fair is going on, highlighted by a balloon race. As the balloons rise in the background, we talk with Kenny Bill Stinson, a young white guitarist from across the river in East Monroe, Louisiana. Stinson is part of the new wave of local artists, blending blues and country with modern folk and rock influences. On the patio of a local restaurant in historic Natchez-under-the-Hill, he turns in a set that ranges from Robert Johnson and Hank Williams to his own high-powered tunes.
In Baton Rouge, the governor's mansion was for two terms the home of Gov. Jimmie Davis, the singer most famous for "You Are My Sunshine." We join Gov. Davis's 98th birthday party, where he sings his hit with Merle Haggard and the Louisiana Hayride band. Haggard and Hayride veterans talk about Davis's legacy as the "Singing Governor."
Moving on down the river into Cajun country, we wander past the docks where the Cajuns’ shrimp boats tie up, and we wind up in the back yard of D.L. Menard, "The Cajun Hank Williams." Menard is a famous singer, guitarist, and wildly bizarre raconteur, author of some of the century's top Cajun hits, and he is holding a backyard barbecue with a mix of old friends and young musicians, including Christine Balfa, a modern bandleader whose father Dewey Balfa was the leading artist in the Cajun revival. The dancing goes on all afternoon, as D.L. talks about the fusion of country and Cajun in his music.
We next visit Geno Delafose, one of the hottest young accordionists and singers in zydeco, the African-American equivalent of Cajun, with its potent admixture of blues and r&b. Delafose is from one of the foremost zydeco families, and we see him fronting his band amid a crowd of dancers at Slim's Y-ki-ki, a longtime zydeco dance hall, and being interviewed in French on a zydeco radio show. At home, on his horse ranch in Eunice, Delafose talks about his music and Louisiana's black cowboy tradition.
Driving through the swampy bayous, we arrive in New Orleans. The streets of the French Quarter reveal a rich variety of performers. David and Roselyn have been playing their music on Royal St. for over 20 years. A striking couple, they play a half-dozen instruments and sing songs flavored with the city's second-line rhythms. A young tap-dancer does his stuff in a doorway, and a banjo player cuts up in Jackson Square, where a scruffy group of kids forms a ragtag brass band. In Louis Armstrong Park, we find the Tremé Brass Band, a traditional marching band that has continued to evolve with the years, blending the talents of older musicians like drummers Uncle Lionel Batiste and Benny Jones with those of younger players like trumpeter James Alexander.  
In a club in the Treme neighborhood, The Soul Rebels provide a look at the modern evolution of the brass band sound. The Rebels, all in their 20s, use the standard brass band line-up of trombones, trumpets, clarinet, tuba, snare and bass drum, but play a fiery modern style that goes heavy on the rhythm and draws on everything from the classic New Orleans songs to reggae and rap. In an interview on some nearby steps, three of the Rebels discuss their position as spokesmen for the next generation of local artists.
Back in the French Quarter, we come upon the legendary r&b singer Eddie Bo, playing his nightly gig at Margaritaville. Ebullient, dancing in front of the piano, Bo embodies the New Orleans beat, than attempts to explain its “mystical” origins.  He demonstrates a heavy bass beat on the piano in a new tune called “Fingers” and tells us of the proud tradition of New Orleans piano players, including Professor Longhair and Tuts Washington. 
In a bar across from Armstrong Park, we find Henry Butler, the dean of contemporary piano players. Butler plays everything from Crescent City r&b to contemporary jazz, and sometimes sings in a gruff, soulful voice. He sits at the piano and traces the evolution of the New Orleans sound from Caribbean rhythms to Jelly Roll Morton to the present. Then, on a festival stage, he runs through a startling range of music, from solo piano explorations of standards like "Basin St. Blues" to uptown r&b. He is joined by  Eddie Bo in a romping finale. 
Soul Queen Irma Thomas concludes our tour of New Orleans music. The city's best-known female vocalist, Irma is a soul shouter who has often been compared to Aretha Franklin. At an intimate performance at her club, the Lion’s Den, she leads her band through a hot set of hits--including “Time is on My Side”-- and talks about her forty years in music.
Driving on down the river, we come to the islands that dot the edge of the Gulf of Mexico and meet Irvan Perez. Perez grew up on Delacroix Island, fishing and trapping muskrat. He is one of the leaders of the Isleño community, immigrants from Spain's Canary Islands who have kept their culture intact for more than two hundred years. Sitting in the prow of his fishing boat, he sings a haunting Spanish ballad, as we drift out of the river and into the open waters of the Gulf.