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Count Basie and the American Soundtrack
ResumeFelt it in their bones. Blew it on their horns. Played it on keyboards, and behind Billie Holiday and Ella Fitzgerald, in the late 1930s, in a sound known as swing.
It was a time of Depression and FDR, Joe Louis and Amelia Earhart. It had a soundtrack. And Count Basie was a huge part of it.
Do we have a soundtrack today? Gnarls Barkley? Beck?
This hour, On Point: Count Basie, and the sound of America, then and now.Guests:
Roxane Orgill, music critic and author of the new book "Dream Lucky," which chronicles Count Basie's rise in the 1930s.
Tim Riley, NPR music critic and frequent contributor to "Here & Now." His latest book is "Fever: How Rock Transformed Gender."
This program aired on June 6, 2008.