Deep Roots Magazine

Deep Roots Magazine

Roots Music and Meaningful Matters

 
 

 

My Own Field Trip

A field trip with her students to Hawaii's Hoa 'Aina O Makaha reminds TOUTKA WONGSE-ONT of some eternal truths about nature--strong, spontaneous feelings that nonliving things could not evoke.
by David McGee
 

 
 

Our Christmas Best to You

An unassuming tape from the late '80s, sent as a holiday gift to media friends by what its now BONNEVILLE INTERNATIONAL, turns out to be the most heartwarming of Yuletide messages, an instant seasonal classic.
by David McGee
 

 

 

Harold’s Hungry Eyes

KEVIN WALDRON's new picture book, HAROLD'S HUNGRY EYES, is as funny and instructive as his drawings are evocative. Illustrations abound and JULES offers her critical perspective to boot.
by David McGee
 

 
 

VaShawn Mitchell Knows What He Was ‘Created 4’

One of gospel’s “triple threats,” VaShawn Mitchell could barely contain his excitement during a phone interview about his new album, Created 4 This, his fourth long player. Mitchell developed Created 4 This as...
by David McGee
 

 

 

Joy To The World

A wonderful and heartwarming thing happened when the Jay Ungar & Molly Mason Family Band showed up at the University of Mary Washington to play a program of evocative, sometimes poignant, sometimes haunting seasonal tunes, new ...
by David McGee
 

 
 

The Anti-Slavery Roots of ‘O Holy Night’

Attacked for his opposition to inequality, slavery, injustice and other kinds of oppression, French poet PLACIDE CAPPEAU insinuated his unpopular thoughts into an 1847 poem that became 'O Holy Night'
by David McGee
 

 

 

Genesis of a Gospel Song: ‘Total Praise’

In his new series GENESIS OF A GOSPEL SONG, gospel editor BOB MAROVICH gets the inside story from RICHARD SMALLWOOD on how the latter wrote 'Total Praise,' one of the greatest contemporary gospel songs.
by David McGee
 

 
 

The Music of Nature

From his outstanding 1878 book MUSIC AND SOME HIGHLY MUSICAL PEOPLE, the distinguished African-American author JAMES M. TROTTER exults in 'the music of Nature'
by David McGee