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Music to our ears: "Musicians know who Ralph Peer was, and now his life and contributions to our nation’s music are made available to all of us in Barry Mazor’s wonderful and absorbing biography."
Read the entire review in the New York Times Book Review.
“Mr. Mazor discusses the evolution of American music and intricacies of music publishing with equal authority. He likewise brings impressive clarity and cohesion to considering the big-picture nexus of culture, commerce and evolving technology in which Peer’s saga unfolds. He tells this complex, intertwined story with ample substance for serious scholars while also making his book welcoming and accessible for neophytes.”
Read the entire Wall Street Journal review of Ralph Peer, the man who pioneered the marketing of American indigenous music.
"During a two-week period late in the summer of 1927, a little-known producer named Ralph Peer recorded 77 songs in a hat warehouse he had converted to a studio. It would turn out to be a landmark moment, known as the Bristol Sessions, that Johnny Cash would later call 'the single most important event in the history of country music.'"
More about Ralph Peer—and Barry Mazor's biography of the legendary A&R man—on PBS.org.
"This is a fascinating and significant book...one that sheds light on the eventual wedding of 'race' records and 'hillbilly' records after World War II that gave us rock ’n’ roll."
Read the entire Seattle Times review from music critic Paul de Barros.
When Peer got into the music industry, the focus was on sheet music and songs fresh off Broadway. Genres like blues and gospel got little-to-no attention outside of churches and local dives. Then in 1920, Peer recorded Mamie Smith singing "Crazy Blues." And things changed...
Find out how in the "Marketplace" interview with Ralph Peer biographer Barry Mazor.
"No one blazed that trail as adventurously, aggressively, profitably or indelibly as legendary A&R (artists & repertoire) man Ralph S. Peer, the subject of a compelling and eminently readable new biography by Barry Mazor."
Curious? Read the rest of this rollicking review over at Paste.