Embedded Files
Brooks, D. (2021). Liner notes for the revolution: The intellectual life of Black feminist sound. Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
"Daphne A. Brooks explores more than a century of music archives to examine the critics, collectors, and listeners who have determined perceptions of African American women on stage and in the recording studio. Liner Notes for the Revolution offers a startling new perspective on these acclaimed figures--a perspective informed by the overlooked contributions of other Black women concerned with the work of their musical peers." [From the Publisher]
Maultsby, P. K. & Burnim M. V. (2017). Issues in African American music: Power gender race representation. Routledge.
"Issues in African American Music: Power, Gender, Race, Representation is a collection of twenty-one essays by leading scholars, surveying vital themes in the history of African American music.” [From the Publisher]. The chapters by Susan Ochler Herrick, Portia K. Maultsby, Daphne Duval Harrison, Sherrie Tucker, Eileen M. Hayes, and Maureen Mahon are particularly relevant to this project
Carby, H. V. (1999). Cultures in Babylon: Black Britain and African America. Verso.
This book of collected works brings together key essays by Black British feminist Hazel Carby. The section on “Women, Migration and the Formation of the Blues” is particularly relevant to this project.
Dahl, L. (1992). Stormy weather: The music and lives of a century of jazzwomen (2nd Limelight). Limelight editions.
This book traces the history and experience of women in jazz, a field of music dominated by men. The book includes extensive profiles of select women in jazz. The chapters on women instrumentalists and blues women are particularly relevant to this project.
Davis, A. Y. (1998). Blue legacies and black feminism. Vintage Books.
This book explores the sound labor of three women from the classic blues era -- Gertrude “Ma” Rainey, Bessie Smith, and Billie Holiday -- and the ways in which their music reflected a “feminist consciousness in working-class black communities.” Davis also sheds light on the historical processes by which Black women became marginalized in the blues.
Garon, P. & Garon, B. (1992). Woman with guitar: Memphis Minnie's blues. Da Capo.
This book chronicles the life, music, and impact of blues artist Memphis Minnie. Despite recording hundreds of songs Woman with Guitar remains the lone definitive biography of this influential artist.
Harrison, D. D. (1990). Black pearls: blues queens of the 1920's (1st paperback). Rutgers University Press.
“This book tells of the cultural and social impact of the blues during the 1920s when the genre was dominated by women, both on stage and on record. Harrison (Afro-American Studies Department, University of Maryland) writes with authority, focusing particularly on Sippie Wallace, Edith Wilson, Victoria Spivey, and Alberta Hunter as she analyzes the music and the collective black experience out of which it grew.” [Library Journal Review]
Hayes, E. M. & Williams L. F. (2007). Black women and music: More than the blues. University of Illinois Press.
“Features a collection of essays that detail black women's experiences in various forms of music and details such topics as black authenticity, sexual politics, access, racial uplift through music, and the challenges of writing black feminist biographies.” [From the Publisher] Maria V. Johnson’s essay on “Black Women Electric Guitarists and Authenticity in the Blues” includes extensive discussion of Beverly “Guitar” Watkins who is one of the artists featured in this project.
Jackson, B. (2005). A bad woman feeling good: Blues and the women who sing them (First). W.W. Norton & Company.
This book serves as a corrective to the erasure of women’s contributions to blues traditions by chronicling the lives and sound labor of “the first blueswomen” and their contemporaries. “The stories of these singers’ lives shed light upon the changing historical context of women in the twentieth century, and their art is a window into the inner lives of women at that time” (p. xi).
Bernstein, J. A. (2004). Women's voices across musical worlds. Northeastern University Press.
This collection of interdisciplinary essays focuses on women, gender, and music across time and space. The chapter by Tammy Kernodle on “The Blues as the Black Woman’s Lament” is particularly relevant to this project. The chapter examines Black blues women’s lament as a form of racial and sexual empowerment in which the blues becomes a powerful vehicle for making “public their private expressions” (p. 211).
Mahon, M. (2020). Black diamond queens: African American women and rock and roll. Duke University Press.
In Black Diamond Queens, Maureen Mahon draws on recordings, press coverage, archival materials, and interviews to document the history of African American women in rock and roll between the 1950s and the 1980s. Mahon details the musical contributions and cultural impact of Big Mama Thornton, LaVern Baker, Betty Davis, Tina Turner, Merry Clayton, Labelle, the Shirelles, and others, demonstrating how dominant views of gender, race, sexuality, and genre affected their careers.” [From the Publisher]
McGinley, P. A. (2014). Staging the blues: From tent shows to tourism. Duke University Press.
“ In Staging the Blues, Paige A. McGinley shows that even though folklorists, record producers, and festival promoters set the theatricality of early blues aside in favor of notions of authenticity, it remained creatively vibrant throughout the twentieth century. [T]his pioneering study foregrounds virtuoso blues artists who used the conventions of the theater, including dance, comedy, and costume, to stage black mobility, to challenge narratives of racial authenticity, and to fight for racial and economic justice.” [From the Publisher]
Royster, F. T. (2022). Black country music: Listening for revolutions (First). University of Texas Press.
“After a century of racist whitewashing, country music is finally reckoning with its relationship to Black people. In this timely work—the first book on Black country music by a Black writer—Francesca Royster uncovers the Black performers and fans, including herself, who are exploring the pleasures and possibilities of the genre.” [From the Publisher]. This book features many of the artists profiled in this project, including Elizabeth Cotten, Elvie Thomas and Geeshie Wiley, the women of Our Native Daughters, Valerie June, Kaia Kater, Yola, and many more.
Wald, G. (2007). Shout sister shout!: The untold story of rock-and-roll trailblazer sister Rosetta Tharpe. Beacon Press.
“Drawing on interviews with and reminiscences of family and colleagues, a portrait of Rosetta Tharpe traces the life and career of the pioneering gospel singer, songwriter, recording artist, and guitar prodigy and examines her influence on the musicians of her era.” [From the Publisher]
Dissertations
Bynoe, L. T. 1996). African American blues women's contributions to womanist theory: An ethnographic educational study. University of San Francisco.
Bynoe, L. T. 1996). African American blues women's contributions to womanist theory: An ethnographic educational study. University of San Francisco.
"This descriptive, ethnographic study portrays African American women who sing the Blues with the distinction o f womanist theory and African centered methods. The study illuminates the aspirations o f African American Blues women and their contributions to womanist theory" [Introduction]
Matabane, M. I. (2014). Axe to grind: A cultural history of Black women musicians on the acoustic and electric guitar in the United States. Emory University.
Matabane, M. I. (2014). Axe to grind: A cultural history of Black women musicians on the acoustic and electric guitar in the United States. Emory University.
"This research study documents and explores black women’s experiences playing the guitar as creative enterprise and as a means to redefining their roles in life and self-identity beyond racial and gender limitations imposed by the broader society" [Abstract]
Documentaries
Wild Women Don't Have the Blues
Wild Women Don't Have the Blues
"Wild Women Don't Have the Blues shows how the blues were born out of the economic and social transformation of African American life early in this century. It recaptures the lives and times of Ma Rainey, Bessie Smith, Ida Cox, Alberta Hunter, Ethel Waters and the other legendary women who made the blues a vital part of American culture. The film brings together for the first time dozens of rare, classic renditions of the early blues." [From California News Reel]
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