“Music Heritage in the Shoals”
Creating a Poster for NCPH
By: Avery Calvert
Every year the National Council on Public History hosts a nationwide conference. This year my friend, Renae, and I created a poster to present at the conference and it was accepted! Our poster, Music Heritage of the Shoals, encapsulates the need for a comprehensive music-based archive in the Shoals area. The Shoals is renowned for its music and this heritage is a cornerstone of local tourism, but much of its history is not preserved in a single archive. Our project advocates for a single archive so it will be easier to expand our music heritage to include figures like W.C. Handy and Sam Phillips, whose narratives are separated from the current studio narrative, as well as to establish Muscle Shoals music in the national narrative. Many music heritage stories are disjointed, but by creating this archive we can share that the Shoals has always been a hub for music even before the 1960s and 70s.
Collaboration among many stakeholders such as the Muscle Shoals Sound studio, FAME music studio, the University of North Alabama, the Swampers and their families, the Muscle Shoals National Heritage Area, and the Florence-Lauderdale Public Library, is paramount to this project’s success. The Florence-Lauderdale Public Library and the Alabama Music Hall of Fame preserve music history from the 60s and 70s, but there is an immediate need to share and collaborate with the other stakeholders. Many of the original musicians and artists have passed away, but with those who are still living, we need to establish oral histories and personal collections of their papers and equipment.
Establishing music from the Shoals into the national narrative is important because figures like W.C. Handy and Sam Phillips were born here, yet their narratives are separated from the greater local narratives of the studios.The Shoals area produced music known around the world, specifically with African American artists. Aretha Franklin is the most known musician who recorded in the Shoals, but other major African American artists like Etta James and Wilson Pickett also recorded at FAME. While these stories are fairly well known for people in the music industry, many do not see the connection to W.C. Handy. Also known as the Father of the Blues, W.C. Handy was born in Florence, Alabama, ironically born in an area that almost 100 years later would serve as a catalyst for the popularity of R&B. There is a great need to collaborate with the W.C. Handy museum in town to connect these two histories. Our project aims to reveal these connections and help people understand that music has been in the Shoals much longer than the 1960s and 1970s.
After establishing these collections, a formal archive needs to be created that is solely dedicated to their preservation. Having an archive would help expand the music heritage narrative in the Shoals area. Renae and I are part of an effort at UNA (including graduate students, the history department, University Archives, and others across disciplines) to establish the need for a music heritage archive. UNA is the perfect place to host this archive because of the current university archive capacity and our close proximity to the museums and places where this history occurred. By building this archive, a more complete history of the Shoals will be preserved.
As this project progresses, I am hopeful that this archive will preserve parts of Shoals history that might otherwise be lost! So far this project has been exciting and interesting and I cannot wait to see where it takes me next!
