Music
Rapper TTBBY on How Growing Up in East Texas Shaped His Music
Tobias Traylor has overcome poverty, hurricanes, displacement, and mental health challenges, experiences reflected in his music.
Hailing from the north side of Beaumont—known to locals as Big Money Texas—26-year-old Tobias Traylor wants to make sure the world knows him as someone “r...Read More
A Houston Art Exhibit Redefines ‘Chopped and Screwed’ Music
DJ Screw’s life and work act as a springboard for 15 mixed-media artists, reflecting ideas of identity and agency outside the mainstream.
The late, great DJ Screw, born Robert Earl Davis Jr., sold mixtapes in high school for lunch money. He went on to open his own record store—the legendary Scre...Read More
Rahim AlHaj, Iraqi Oud Virtuoso, on How Music Crosses Cultures
AlHaj, who performs in Austin on Friday, is a former political prisoner whose music fuses Eastern and Western influences.
Rahim AlHaj’s music can seem bleak at first. His 2017 album, Letters From Iraq, is a mournful meditation on the violence wrought by the U.S. military invasion...Read More
Janis Joplin’s Inimitable Voice
An authoritative new biography explores what drove the iconic Texan singer.
Texas-born rock icon Janis Joplin has been one of American culture’s most compelling figures for more than 50 years, in large part because of the intrigue she...Read More
Mr. Reynolds’ Opus
How Graham Reynolds became Texas’ top composer.
How Graham Reynolds became Texas’ top composer. by Rose Cahalan October 14, 2019 Walk into composer Graham Reynolds’ East Austin studio, and the first thing...Read More
Ken Burns’ New Documentary Builds a Bigger Tent for Country Music
Co-opted by whites, country music was largely shaped by black and immigrant musicians.
As a filmmaker, Ken Burns sees himself as a uniter and not a divider—an admirable endeavor in these polarized times, but not always a successful one. His 2017...Read More
The Highwomen Are the Superbly Talented, Feminist Supergroup Country Music Needs
On a stunning self-titled album released this week, the four musicians—two of whom are Texans—explore domesticity, motherhood, love, and loss.
In 1973, fresh from recording her raw, woman-to-woman plea to spare her relationship, Dolly Parton mixed “Jolene” in Nashville’s RCA Studio A. She wouldn...Read More
The Symphony Comes to South Dallas
Music education and enrichment opportunities are scarce in my neighborhood, but the Dallas Symphony aims to bridge the gap.
She is growing a cosmic garden, she is one of the fates stretching a string of life before her, she is Moses parting the sea before turning to bring the waves d...Read More
‘Texas Flood’ is a Soulful Portrait of Stevie Ray Vaughan
A new biography captures Vaughan’s journey from record-obsessed Dallas kid to all-time guitar god, taking care to convey what made his music transcendent.
Texas Flood: The Inside Story of Stevie Ray Ray Vaughan succeeds in just the way it must to reach both Vaughan’s fans and those first learning why he’s a sh...Read More