Mark Zwonitzer
Auteur van Will You Miss Me When I'm Gone? The Carter Family and Their Legacy in American Music
Over de Auteur
Mark Zwonitzer is a documentary filmmaker.
Werken van Mark Zwonitzer
Will You Miss Me When I'm Gone? The Carter Family and Their Legacy in American Music (2002) 268 exemplaren
The Statesman and the Storyteller: John Hay, Mark Twain, and the Rise of American Imperialism (2016) 94 exemplaren
American Experience: We Shall Remain, America through Native Eyes [2009 TV series] (2009) — Director — 29 exemplaren
American Experience: Walt Disney: He Made Believe [2015 TV episode] (2015) — Director — 9 exemplaren
American Experience: The Massie Affair [2005 TV episode] — Director/Screenwriter — 3 exemplaren
American Experience: Mount Rushmore [2002 TV episode] — Director — 2 exemplaren
American Experience: Transcontinental Railroad [2003 TV episode] (2003) — Director/Screenwriter — 1 exemplaar
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Algemene kennis
- Gangbare naam
- Zwonitzer, Mark
- Geboortedatum
- 1962-08-28
- Geslacht
- male
- Beroepen
- film director
- Organisaties
- PBS
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Misschien vindt je deze ook leuk
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- 14
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- 441
- Populariteit
- #55,516
- Waardering
- 4.2
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- 10
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This is a detailed and highly readable biography of The Original Carter Family -- a group which, perhaps more than any other in all the world, defined the course of American "old-time country" music and its offshoots -- bluegrass, "classic" country, modern country. The hundreds of songs they recorded included many classics, and their style -- in particular, the guitar work of Maybelle Carter -- helped set the course for almost all musicians after her. For more than half a century -- through the lives of Maybelle, Sara, and A. P. Carter, and Maybelle's daughters Helen, June, and Anita Carter, and June's husband Johnny Cash -- they helped shape American music.
This book doesn't cover that very well. There are plenty of vital Carter Family songs that I don't recall hearing mentioned ("The Storms Are On the Ocean," "Give Me the Roses While I Live," "Gold Watch and Chain," "Hello Stranger," and "When the World's On Fire" are just a handful of examples). As far as discographic information goes, forget it. Also, the descriptions of the Carters' musical style is, let's just says, pretty meaningless if you haven't heard it; it's clear the authors aren't actually interested in musical technique. And the book really doesn't make clear how different the music of Mother Maybelle and the Carter Sisters was from the Original Carter Family (bluegrassers, you may insert an accordion joke here), and how the later Carters continued to turn more and more pop and less and less old-time country. This book isn't history; it's biography.
Of course, biography has its place, and that place is very important. Indeed, I wanted this book more for biography than history, because I wanted information about the personality traits of the Carters -- and found, indeed, some very intriguing information about A. P., the member of the Original Carter Family who didn't really play an instrument but who collected and edited most of their texts. The information about A. P., if accurate, is tremendously interesting and significant. If it's true.
But there's the rub. If it's true. There is no documentation! None, nada, nothing. At best, there may be a statement that "so-and-so says," but even that is rare, and most of what we read here is completely un-sourced.
Admittedly there is, in this case, a complete lack of written documentation; there are no diaries, no family histories, none of the things biographers love. The authors admit to have gotten their information from talking to people who knew the Carters. But this book was written twenty years after Sara and Maybelle died; it was written a century after many of the events it describes. Who was still around to tell these stories? And what checks did the authors make on those very old memories? No way to tell. At a number of places (e.g. in descriptions of the way the earliest Carter recordings were made), we know that the book is wrong (the recordings were made electrically, not acoustically). So I find it very hard to trust this book.
If you just want information about the Carters, this is probably the best source out there. But don't treat it as gospel. At best, it's someone else's sermons on a gospel text.… (meer)