All songs by King Rollo except 3 (Trad Arr. King Rollo), 5 (Blake/King Rollo/Fuller) and 13 (Chuck Berry). Tracks 1 & 4 original recordings by David Butcher for BBC Radio Sufolk 13 October 2008. Tracks 5 & 13 recorded live at Rotherham Open Arts Festival 13 Oct 2007. Track 11 recorded live at George Hotel, South Molton, Devon 14 Sept 2007. Other studio recordings, production and mastering by King Rollo at Rostren, Brittany during October 2009. Keyboards on 1, 4, 11 & 13 by Dr A. Tracks 5 & 13 Harmonica, Lorenzo Mouflier; Bass, Nick Evans; Kit drums, Ian Croft: Djembes/percussion Godfrey Pampalipe and Limsa Nyoni. All other parts by King Rollo.
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Cover illustration by Juliet Asher. Photo by Alan White
This album is dedicated to the memory of Hamilton King.
click image to enlarge
13 tracks, 50 mins playing time. Push the buttons to hear a sample of each song.
An audio anthology of African-American culture. By King Rollo
Narrative extracts, poems, songs and music are woven together in a 42 minute audio show.
Many of the elements are distillation from the stage show John Doe - A Story of the Blues.
The show content is of:
Writings from Gwendoline Brookes, Olaudah Equiano, William WellsBrown, Harriet Jacobs, Frederick Douglas, Ida Wells, Zora Neale Hurston, Langston Hughes, Al Young Robert Haydon, Paul and Laurence Dunbar.
Songs by Joe Williams, Arthur 'Blind' Blake, Charles Brown, together with traditional songs and songs written by the performers.
The performers are Ian Siegal, Freddie James, Gordon Smith, Pete 'Pigmeat' Smith', 'King Rollo' and harmonica from Lorenzo Mouflier. The narrator is King Rollo.
