Photo by Zach Tate
It was 1943, while singing an a cappella version of Bing Crosby’s “Home On The Range” at his Texas City elementary school, when 8-year-old Don Westmoreland got his first taste of show business. [Read more…]
Photo by Zach Tate
Bob Emmons loves the blues. He plays the blues with his band, The Groove Kings. He listens to the blues in mass quantity — both live and recorded. And, in partnership with his wife, Katie, Emmons owns and operates one of the area’s most respected blues music venues — Katie’s Bar. [Read more…]
Guitar player and songwriter J. Scott Rivera is a big fan of vinyl records. His band released the self-titled “Texas Devils” album this year in limited-edition devil-red vinyl. Photo by Zach Tate
Vinyl records are a trendy topic among many music lovers these days, but few fans are as passionate about the medium as guitar player and songwriter J. Scott Rivera. [Read more…]
Charles “Smokey” Culver next to his 1950 Chevrolet farm truck, “Jitterbug,” at the Habitat For Horses ranch in Hitchcock. Photo by Zach Tate
Charles “Smokey” Culver writes poems and songs about cowboy life, ranching, horses, trains, law enforcement, the outdoors and the Old West. His words have been heard on stages across Texas, Arizona, New Mexico and various places cowboy poets and fans of the genre gather. [Read more…]
It was a hot summer day in the late 1960s in the small town of Jasper, Texas, when 7-year-old Robert “Buddy” Manchac was riding his bike home from his dad’s roller rink. He took a shortcut into forbidden territory that would forever change his life. [Read more…]
Janet and Wrecks Bell are a match made in musical heaven. The two own the legendary Old Quarter Acoustic Café, which opened in Galveston in 1996. Photo by Zach Tate
Though the walls can’t talk at Galveston’s legendary Old Quarter Acoustic Cafe, they speak virtual volumes of music history to anyone who walks through the door, with the finer details happily filled in by owners, Wrecks and Janet Bell. [Read more…]
Living the dream for many artists often is synonymous with surviving the reality. And for League City singer-songwriter Mark Lum, an appearance on the popular TV talent show “The Voice” was one such tale of survival. [Read more…]
Keith Neubauer’s deep and abiding affection for Galveston is obvious as soon as you meet him. [Read more…]
Songs about heartaches and hangovers are par for the course for most honky-tonk flavored songwriters. Houston troubadour Mike Stinson, in from Virginia by way of Los Angeles, gives listeners that and a whole lot more in his lyrically rambunctious songs. [Read more…]
In the early 1970s, when Texas singer-songwriter Bob Livingston was forming the legendary Lost Gonzo Band, backing up and recording with the likes of Jerry Jeff Walker and Ray Wylie Hubbard, and contributing to the formation of the Austin outlaw country scene, he was known as “Cosmic Bob.” Today, in other parts of the world, Livingston could very well be known as the “Buddy Holly of Bangladesh” or the “Texas Troubadour of Tunisia.” [Read more…]