Today is the birthday of Johnny Winter. He would be 83 today. Beaumont, Texas sits in the Golden Triangle — the industrial coastal zone where the refineries run day and night and blues music grew up in the roadhouses between the shift changes. John Dawson Winter III was born there on February 23, 1944. He […]
Today is the birthday of Steve Jordan. He would be 88 today. Steve Jordan of Elsa, Texas, played the accordion like it owed him money. He lost sight in one eye as a child, then turned that limit into legend. Fans nicknamed him "El Parche," Spanish for "the patch," after his eyepatch. Critics later called […]
Today is the birthday of Erykah Badu. She would be 56 today. Erykah Badu grew up in South Dallas, Texas, surrounded by gospel, jazz, and incense smoke. She started performing as a teenager at Dallas's famed Black Forest Theatre. Badu released her debut album Baduizm in 1997, and it went triple platinum. Fans still call […]
Today is the birthday of Bob Wills. He would be 122 today. James Robert Wills was born on March 6, 1905, on a farm near Kosse in Limestone County, Texas. His father played fiddle. His grandfather played fiddle. The fiddle was already in the blood. He grew up dancing to it at breakdown dances across […]
Today is the birthday of Townes Van Zandt. He would be 83 today. John Townes Van Zandt was born in Fort Worth, Texas on March 7, 1944, into a family that had given the city its name — the Van Zandts were Texas founders. He grew up wealthy and restless, studying law briefly, then falling […]
Today is the birthday of Ornette Coleman. He would be 97 today. Randolph Denard Ornette Coleman was born in Fort Worth, Texas on March 9, 1930. Fort Worth's Southside was a thriving Black neighborhood with its own clubs, its own music economy, its own culture. Coleman grew up inside it. He taught himself to play […]
Today is the birthday of Herschel Evans. He would be 118 today. Herschel Evans played tenor saxophone like warm syrup poured over cold biscuits, thick and comforting. He grew up in Denton, Texas, where church music shaped his earliest sense of tone. Herschel Evans's Denton, Texas upbringing gave him a sound rooted in feeling, not […]
Today is the birthday of Flaco Jiménez. He is 88 today. Leonardo Jiménez Jr. was born in San Antonio, Texas on March 11, 1939. His father, Don Santiago Jiménez Sr., was one of the founding figures of conjunto music. The accordion was already in the family kitchen. Flaco started playing it as a boy and […]
Today is the birthday of Vinnie Paul. He would be 63 today. Vinnie Paul hit drums like he was trying to crack the earth open. Abilene, Texas, claims his birth, but Arlington shaped his youth. His father, Jerry Abbott, owned Pantego Sound Studio nearby. Music filled that house long before Vinnie ever picked up sticks. […]
Today is the birthday of Paul Wall. He would be 46 today. Paul Wall turned dental hardware into a genuine art form. He grew up in Houston, Texas, deep inside its rap scene. He absorbed DJ Screw's chopped and screwed sound as a teenager. That slow, syrupy influence shaped his laid-back vocal delivery. His name […]
Today is the birthday of Lightnin' Hopkins. He would be 115 today. Sam John Hopkins was born in Centerville, Texas on March 15, 1912. Leon County is in the heart of Central Texas — rolling piney-woods country that sits between the old plantation belt to the east and the blackland prairie to the west. Hopkins […]
Today is the birthday of Charley Pride. He would be 92 today. Charley Frank Pride was born on March 18, 1934, in Sledge, Mississippi. But Texas was where he became Charley Pride. He moved to Dallas in the early 1960s after a career in the Negro American League. He was playing semi-pro baseball and singing […]
