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| PD Productions. Media, Broadcasting and Radio productions for stations worldwide |
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Back to where it all began ... Thank you for taking the time to visit us. My name is David Howard, PD Productions is based in the South West of the UK, but that isn't where our journey into the blues began .... It all started in a small town bar in Louisiana; it was like travelling back in time, dusty, rickety tables, chairs, and a bare wooden floor. Sat on a little platform was a lady and a guy with a guitar, and then the lady began to sing the blues. I could have closed my eyes, although I didn’t realise it at the time, I could have been listening to Ma Rainey or Bessie Smith. Quietly listening, and with encouragement from others we joined with the ‘Tell us your story’...
We knew and felt the songs were telling us of a deep sadness, borne of a deprivation beyond our comprehension. I was listening to the 'Blues' long before that, but never really understood, until then, what was meant by 'Feeling the Blues' ... Each time I produce ‘Backtracking’ I try to show my love and respect for the people and the lives these songs are about, this deprivation, sadness and misery. We are honouring them by keeping their presence and their simple music alive and well.
Each time, we are taking a journey back in time to the abomination of slavery, the depth of the spirituals and of course the expressive blues from all those years ago. Our research and journey since that day has been a discovery of the ‘Blues’ that never ends, of a culture and history that has faded in the mists of time, but remains for us to find. We're honoured and privileged to share with you this great music and its history, back a hundred years and beyond, a genre so rich, so vast so diverse and so real.
Now based in Somerset (UK) What started all those years ago with a handful of blues tracks, a few faded photographs and books has grown exponentially with the help of our good friends, Alan, Terry and Graham, the ‘Doc’ even my dear late cousin Len (Houston) the never ending patience of Pam and so many people from around the world, far too many to mention, Backtracking has become a library of music and resources so vast it’s often difficult to keep track of it all, as it continues to grow.
Thank you for listening to ‘Backtracking’ from here in the UK. At PD Productions, we extend our best wishes to you all.
David – PD Productions (UK) |
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Every Friday we have the Blues ... At PD Productions, our research and journey of discovery never ends, simply because the culture of the blues never ends. We're honoured and privileged to share the music within the genre of the Blues back in time a hundred years and beyond, a genre so vast and so diverse.
So many people from around the world have contributed to our research, and indeed, our library of music, far too many to mention by name. Released every Friday, we invite you to join Backtracking, the blue time machine as we go back to the Roots of the Blues, back, to where it all began. |
| Featured on Backtracking .. |
- The lady sings the blues.
- Blues on the Bayou.
- Gospel blues train.
- Featured artist of the week.
- Spirituals – The blues connection.
- Prison work songs.
- Myths and Legends of the blues.
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The Blues Club Showcase
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This section is for our friends in the UK, Europe and the US to showcase their stuff. Look out for some exciting clips coming down the line in 2025. Showcasing Interviews, video clips, audio productions and much more. In short, the very best of the blues.
Send your file to us at: ... Attach file link. |
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Review / Download page .....
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Zydeco is a music genre that was created in rural Southwest Louisiana by Afro-Americans of Creole heritage. It blends blues and rhythm and blues with music indigenous to the Louisiana Creole culture, such as la la and juré. Many instruments are familiar in this genre, however, predominately on a number of tracks is a French accordion and a Creole washboard instrument called the frottoir. |
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Current production ....
Gospel blues revival
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Gospel music and the blues share a unique relationship, reflecting two sides of the same coin, it has been said, the blues and the spirituals flow from the same pen of experience, and neither is an adequate interpretation of Coloured life without the other. Spirituals and hymns preceded gospel, a genre that evolved through the work of Thomas Dorsey, a former blues singer and composer often called the father of gospel music, and others. The influence between religious music and blues has long been mutual, both genres have their own distinct characteristics, many gospel songs have been transformed into blues or soul songs, and vice versa, by simply changing a few words in the lyrics.
Countless blues, R&B and soul performers started out singing in church. B.B. King, Denise LaSalle, Charley Patton, Son House, Muddy Waters, Bukka White, Memphis Minnie, Mississippi Fred McDowell, Lonnie Pitchford, Otha Turner and Leo Bud Welch, a list by no means exhaustive, these are among the many Mississippi blues artists who have also recorded gospel and spirituals.
Clarksdale-born Sam Cooke, famed for his gospel singing with the Soul Stirrers, made a controversial crossover into rhythm & blues to become a pop icon, while others, such as Gatemouth Moore and Pops Staples, left the blues behind to become preachers or gospel singers. Otis Clay was among those who maintained a foot in both worlds, continuing to sing both sacred and secular music. Blues and gospel singers often recorded for the same companies and socialised with each other, performed in the same communities, and during the segregation era shared similar touring experiences when many places of accommodation and facilities were closed to African Americans. |
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Featured artist of the week .... Ethel Waters
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Ethel Waters (born October 31, 1896, Chester, Pennsylvania, U.S.—died September 1, 1977, Chatsworth, California). She was an American blues/jazz singer and dramatic actress whose singing, based in the blues tradition, featured her full-bodied voice, wide range, and slow vibrato.
Ethel grew up in extreme poverty and was married for the first time at the age of 12, while she was still attending convent school. At 13 she became a chambermaid in a Philadelphia hotel, and that same year she sang in public for the first time in a local nightclub. At 17, billing herself as Sweet Mama Stringbean, Ethel was singing professionally in Baltimore. It was there it is documented that she became the first woman to sing the W.C. Handy classic St. Louis Blues on the stage. Her professional rise was rapid. In 1925 she appeared at the Plantation Club in Harlem, and her performance there led to Broadway.
In 1927 Ethel appeared in the all-Black revue Africana, and thereafter she divided her time between the stage, nightclubs, and eventually movies. In 1930 she was on the Broadway stage again in Blackbirds, a revival of the popular 1924 musical, and the following year she starred in Rhapsody in Black. In 1933 she appeared with Marilyn Miller in Irving Berlin’s musical As Thousands Cheer, her first departure from shows with all-Black casts. After the mid-1950s she worked in television and occasionally in nightclubs. In the 1960s she appeared frequently with Billy Graham in his evangelistic crusades.
 Retrospectively, she is considered one of the great blues singers, she also performed and recorded with such jazz greats as Duke Ellington and Benny Goodman. Several composers wrote songs especially for her, she was particularly identified with Dinah and Stormy Weather, as so often is the case, from a background of poverty to a remarkable lady and an amazing talent that could have so easily been lost to us. |
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