Review: The Chitlin' Circuit: And the Road to Rock 'n' Roll: And the Road to Rock 'n' Roll

The Chitlin' Circuit: And the Road to Rock 'n' Roll: And the Road to Rock 'n' Roll by Preston Lauterbach
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Louis Jordan died on February 4, 1975, not long after telling writer Arnold Shaw that “as a black artist, I’d like to say one thing…. Rock-n-roll was not a marriage of rhythm and blues [to] country and western. That’s white publicity. Rock-n-roll was just a white imitation, a white adaptation of Negro rhythm and blues.” As a music enthusiast, I am fascinated by considering the roots of rock 'n' roll. When I consider the Sun Records influential musicians such as Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, Roy Orbison, Jerry Lee Lewis and Johnny Cash I see a line of country performers streaming into those legendary studios and rock 'n' roll coming out. Indeed, the Country -> Rockabilly -> Rock 'n' Roll transformation explains more the rock combo instrumentation and verse-chorus-verse structure than a derivation from blues and jazz. Still, Jordan strikes at the heart of the incestuous nature of evolution in popular music.

This excellent history explores the decline of touring big bands where the black-operated "Chitlin' Circuit" kept alive the shrinking ensembles to server their burgeoning audiences and forming a late 40s to early 50s laboratory for performers like Roy Brown, Wynonie Harris, and Little Richard to formulate the rhythms and styles of rock 'n' roll from the pieces left over.

While this book makes a strong case for the birth of rock 'n' roll in the post-Big Band R&B movement and its touring journeymen, there is an important final act here. The book marks the rise of the vinyl era and AM radio with a jukebox mafia and payola DJs as a transformation that changed the economics of the tour-dependent Chitlin' Circuit stars and marked an end to the period. It seems to me with the Internet and digital technologies, the role of the recorded artifact is also sunsetting and we are returning to an era where the live performance is more central to fiscal realities of being a career musician. Pushing the artists back to an ad hoc venue reality... Could it lead to the birth of something as brave as rock 'n' roll, and if so, who will be the pioneers this time?

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