[Mama_Bear]

[Mama_Bear]

If you would like to be added to, or removed from, the Finest Ping List, FReepMail me.

[WKB]

MISSISSIPPI PING

[The Thin Man]

Good morning, Mama_Bear.

This was almost a perfect presentation except for one thing. How you can do a thread on Mississippi and not mention the classic song "Mr. and Mississippi" is beyond me.

Ok, that was a stretch, but I had to find something complain about. Got a reputation to maintain. :-)

[oyez]

Mississippi is where I discovered America.

[Billie]

Good morning, Miz Bear. I love these Southern States, and you make them so inviting with your soft, pretty illustrations and presentations. I see Mississippi Riverboats and huge colonial homes with white columns and porches with rocking chairs, and oh, those magnolias! And of course, those dresses!

[mwyounce]

Thanks for the great tribute to Mississippi!

Sure, when people think of music and Mississippi, they think blues, but did y'all know that Hattiesburg is the birthplace of Rock 'n' Roll too?

Read on...

IS HATTIESBURG THE BIRTH PLACE OF ROCK AND ROLL?
October 18, 1996
http://www.lib.usm.edu/~archives/blind.htm

Have you ever wondered why a local radio station signs on by saying, "Coming to you from Hattiesburg, the birth place of rock and roll. Look it up."? One reason may be that in the book The Illustrated History of Rock and Roll, published by Rolling Stone magazine, two songs recorded in Hattiesburg in 1936 by native Mississippi musicians are identified as possibly the earliest rock and roll recordings.

The two songs are "Barbecue Bust" and "Dangerous Woman." They were recorded in Hattiesburg in 1936 by the Mississippi Jook Band, consisting of the legendary Blind Roosevelt Graves singing vocals and playing guitar and his brother Uaroy Graves on tambourine and kazoo. They were joined for the recording session by one of Mississippi's most influential musicians, Cooney Vaughn, who played piano.

According to the Rolling Stone history, "The Graves brothers of Hattiesburg, Mississippi, who recorded 'rocking and reeling' spirituals for Paramount in 1929, made several blues records as the Mississippi Jook Band in 1936. Their 'Barbecue Bust' and 'Dangerous Woman' featured fully formed rock & roll guitar riffs and a stomping rock & roll beat."

Roosevelt Graves was born in Rose Hill near Meridian. After World War II, Graves moved to Gulfport, where he is said to have died in 1960. Piano player Cooney Vaughn performed weekly on radio station WCOC in Meridian prior to World War II.

In 1936 Paramount Records talent scout and Jackson furniture store owner H.C. Speir located the Graves Brothers, whom he had recorded in Indiana in 1929, performing in a church in McComb and arranged for them to do a second recording session in Hattiesburg.

To play piano in the Hattiesburg session, Speir chose Cooney Vaughn, described by Ed Komara, archivist in the Blues Archives at the University of Mississippi, as an influential live performer in Hattiesburg, where musicians from the Delta and New Orleans on their way by train to a gig would stop over in The Hub City to hear Vaughn play.

The combination of Vaughn's uninhibited piano style with the religious feeling and musical versatility of the Graves Brothers resulted in a the beginnings of a new type of music -- rock and roll.

[petitfour]

Thank you for this tribute to my home state. Despite all the talk about hoop skirts and mint juleps and what-not, what makes Mississippi so special to me are the stories of reg'lar people who live there. Faulkner wrote about 'em. Eudora Welty wrote about 'em. Grisham writes about 'em. And there are many more great writers who call Mississippi home. Not to mention talented songwriters and performers. And then there's Dahth Vader. James Earl Jones is THE voice of Mississippi.

[Aquamarine]

Another remarkable State Post Mama Bear!
I know how difficult it is to feature one of the States, my Georgia Post almost did me in. lol :)

[WVNan]

Hi Lori. Well, you've put up another of my "home" states. My youngest child was born in Jackson, Miss. in 1969. That year Camille hit the Gulf Coast and toppled a tree over on our house, even though we were 200 miles inland. Scary and destructive storm.

Miss. is one of my favorite states too. The people were very warm and friendly. We were living there when the schools integrated. A lot of people pulled their children out of school. We left ours in and they did just fine. It was a bit tense but not as bad as depicted on the daily news (of course).

[petitfour]

Here's an official MS website for folks who are interested in knowing some places to visit while in MS.

http://www.mississippi.gov/ms_sub_sub_template.jsp?Category_ID=38