ROCK AND ROLL

In this excerpt from American Masters - Janis Joplin: Little Girl Blue, Janis' letter home reveals a glimpse of the troubles she had with her band, Big Brother and the Holding Company, until she finally decided to leave to form her own.

Reed was always at the forefront of American avant-garde music, beginning with creation of the Velvet Underground in 1965. Gritty and realistic, the brutal honesty in Reed’s lyrics and sound made him a cultural icon of the disenfranchised throughout the ’60s and ’70s. From punk ...

Kris Kristofferson reflects on how the Troubadour launched his career, alongside artists who performed at the legendary club, Carole King, Roger McGuinn of The Byrds, J.D. Souther, Richard "Dickie" Davis, and Barney Hoskyns. This scene is an outtake from Troubadours: Carole King / James Taylor ...

Robby Krieger, guitarist for The Doors, talked to PBS at the 2010 SXSW festival in conjunction with a screening of When You're Strange, a film about The Doors premiering for AMERICAN MASTERS. Krieger talks about the the use of previously unseen archival footage used in ...

John Densmore, the drummer for The Doors from 1965 to 1973, talks about Tom DiCillo's in-depth work on the film When You're Strange, Jim Morrison's original film "HWY: An American Pastoral" (presented with the program), and the different path he has taken as a rock ...

THE WIZARD OF WAUKESHA By Dave Tianen, reprinted with permission from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel New York - For decades, arthritis has slowly devoured the talent in Les Paul's hands. The right essentially has become a stiff claw. The ring and pinkie are all that ...

"The Wizard of Waukesha" took up his first instrument, a harmonica, at age eight. By 13, he was performing. His incredible trajectory is thoroughly explored in AMERICAN MASTERS Les Paul: Chasing Sound. Here are some highlights from his life and career. 1915 Lester William Polfuss ...

Ahmet Ertegun (1923-2006) The Greatest Record Man Of All Time by Robert Greenfield "I think it's better to burn out than to fade away... it's better to live out your days being very, very active -- even if it destroys you -- than to quietly... ...

Ahmet Ertegun once told graduates of Berklee College of Music in Boston that he loved jazz, blues and hanging out. From the start, Ertegun devoted his career to what he loved. His incredible life is fully explored in AMERICAN MASTERS Atlantic Records: The House That ...

Since her introduction to filmmaking through the classic rock documentaries Woodstock and Gimme Shelter, Susan Steinberg has developed an intriguing body of work on subjects as diverse as Edward R. Murrow and Paul Simon. In interviews both before and after Ahmet Ertegun's death in December, ...