Henry Carrigan

When Mary Gauthier was 7 years old, she and her mother would head to the bookmobile on Saturday mornings near their home in Baton Rouge. It was her favorite day of the week. After she got inside the mobile library, she took her time selecting her books: “Kids were allowed

The late, great Shel Silverstein left us with wry, tongue-in-cheek nods to the vagaries of life in songs such as “A Boy Named Sue,” “One’s on the Way,” “Big Four Poster Bed,” “Marie Leveau,” and “The Cover of the Rolling Stone.” Yet, Silverstein might be best remembered, and most

“Mickey Newbury simply sang with soul ablaze. After all, the long-time Nashville-based singer, a criminally overlooked artist during his lifetime but his generation’s most successful songwriter, owned an otherworldly tenor demanding fire from deepest depths.” So writes Brian T. Atkinson in his captivating new oral history, Looks Like Rain:

The best music photographs, especially the photos of live performances, whether in small clubs or arena stages, re-create the passion of the artist’s performance. The photos take us there, give us front row seats, capture the lines of agony and ecstasy etched in the performer’s face, in their