Afterglow is a weekly one-hour radio program of jazz and American popular song hosted by David Brent Johnson and produced by WFIU Public Radio. Afterglow airs Friday at 10 p.m. on WFIU HD1.
“She Wrote the Song” highlights standards written or co-written by women composers who, in the early decades of American popular song, had to struggle for the limelight, as women had to in so many areas of American life.
Tenor saxophonist Ben Webster (born March 27, 1909) had one of the warmest, most identifiable sounds of any 20th-century jazz musician; pianist Jimmy Rowles once said that listening to him could make people fall in love.
“The Fireside Afterglow” provides a laidback seasonal theme for the last days of December, featuring music that evokes love, reflection, peace, and the warm moods of winter.
Johnny Mercer captured the sound and soul of America in the words he wrote for songs such as “Moon River,” “Too Marvelous For Words,” and “I Thought About You.” Afterglow founding host Dick Bishop joins us for a career-spanning look at the life and music of the songwriter from Savannah, as we honor the his centennial this week and next.
Afterglow features a different take on haunted music for Halloween, with evening laments and anguished odes to lost and longed-for love from Julie London, Kay Starr, Duke Ellington, Cassandra Wilson and more.
Lester Young had a strong appreciation for singers and their art; he also insisted upon knowing the words of any tune that he played. This centennial celebration of the great tenor saxophonist features his recordings with Billie Holiday and other vocalists such as Ella Fitzgerald and Jimmy Rushing.
Billie Holiday’s discography doesn’t reflect the breadth of her big-band experience. “Swing It, Lady, Swing” collects nearly all of the big-band recordings that she did make.
Afterglow’s stroll down the lane of reverie continues this week with “Street of Dreams Revisited,” featuring music from Patricia Barber, Louis Armstrong, Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday, Madeleine Peyroux, Peggy Lee, Jackie Paris, Mary Ann McCall, and others.
Stormy weather ahead this week on Afterglow, with a slew of songs that invoke the rain, especially as inspiration or lamentation for romance, from Billie Holiday, the Four Freshmen, Frank Sinatra, Antonio Carlos Jobim, Patricia Barber, Peggy Lee, and more.
Afterglow welcomes fairer weather this week with a long-running program tradition–”Songs of the Season,” this time celebrating the arrival of spring. Cassandra Wilson kicks things off with her recent recording of “Spring Can Really Hang You Up the Most” (written by the wonderful, underrated songwriting team of Fran Landesman and Tommy Wolf).
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