Deep Roots Magazine

Deep Roots Magazine

Roots Music and Meaningful Matters

 
 

 

Love From Both Sides Now

One voice, one piano, some chestnuts from the Great American Songbook, one quiet, powerful original and an unerring aim for the heart: the Wailin' Jennys' HEATHER MASSE and the legendary DICK HYMAN make art on LOCK MY HEART.
by David McGee
 

 
 

Fisk Jubilee Singers: From Whipping Post to Throne Room

The early struggles and ultimate triumph of the FISK JUBILEE SINGERS, as reported by JAMES M. TROTTER in his 1878 book profiling 'remarkable musicians of the colored race.' '
by David McGee
 

 

 

Border Patrol

In a true border crossing event, GABRIEL ESPINOSA and TIERNEY SUTTON deliver a nuanced tribute to the songs of BURT BACHARACH and Mexican songwriting legend ARMANDO MANZANERO.
by David McGee
 

 
 

Sounds To Silence The Din of Discord

Three JULIANA HALL-composed songs cycles--based on verses by Shakespeare, Emily Dickinson and Marianne Moore--are masterfully rendered on LOVE'S SIGNATURE.
by David McGee
 

 

 
Maria Muldaur featured

THE DEEP ROOTS ELITE HALF-HUNDRED, 2025

The Best of the Rest, the Deep Roots Elite Half-Hundred for 2025 is online! Blues, gospel, classical, folk, bluegrass, Christmas albums, classic soul, soundtracks...all present and accounted for in chronicling the music that me...
by David McGee
 

 
 

Remembering Private Snafu

A true historical obscurity, PRIVATE SNAFU was the title character in a series of animated instructional shorts filmed for and shown only to WWII soldiers to instruct them in security, personal hygiene and other issues.
by David McGee
 

 

 

Gerald Scott’s ‘Edgy Sunday Morning’ Testimony in Song

A month before his senior class graduated from high school, Gerald Scott penned a song for the choir to sing at the commencement ceremony. “It was 2003, I was eighteen years old, and I wrote a song called ‘Destiny’ for th...
by David McGee
 

 
 

‘Speak Less, But Let Each Note Come From The Soul’

On its eponymous debut album Bolo Bolo makes the connections between different cultures and traditions and forges them into something new
by David McGee