{"id":29550,"date":"2013-07-16T10:36:07","date_gmt":"2013-07-16T15:36:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/?p=29550"},"modified":"2014-09-23T08:28:13","modified_gmt":"2014-09-23T13:28:13","slug":"curator-sings-praises-of-the-blues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/curator-sings-praises-of-the-blues\/","title":{"rendered":"Curator sings praises of the blues"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>It comes as no surprise that Greg Johnson, blues curator and associate professor at the J.D. Williams Library, originally planned to be a musicologist.<\/p>\n

The sought-after instrumentalist plays trombone, guitar, Celtic harp, tin whistle and the bodhran drum with various local ensembles. Johnson is also a longtime bassist for the L-O-U Symphony Orchestra and the Tupelo Symphony Orchestra.<\/p>\n

Johnson\u2019s love for music, particularly the blues and blues history, landed him a job at the Blues Archive more than a decade ago.<\/p>\n

After earning a Bachelor of Music and master\u2019s degree in library and information science from the University of Southern Mississippi in 2000 and 2002, respectively, Johnson said he jumped at the opportunity to work at the University of Mississippi.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe it was luck or just great timing, but I was looking for a job where I could pair my love of music and history, and the university was looking for someone with a library of science degree with knowledge of the blues,\u201d said the Suqualena native.<\/p>\n

Johnson developed his love of the blues alongside his dad, Joe Johnson, who was an avid listener of the \u201cHighway 61\u201d blues program on Mississippi Public Broadcasting. But once Johnson acquired the job as blues curator, he realized he needed to learn a lot more about the history, sociology and musicology of the genre.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe didn\u2019t study a lot of blues during my undergraduate years,\u201d he said. \u201cOnce I got this amazing job, I had to really learn a lot more, which involved a lot of reading and listening.\u201d<\/p>\n

Johnson\u2019s lifelong passion makes it easy for him to share his insights with fellow blues researchers and archivists, and especially with individuals new to the blues.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany new listeners have an assumption the blues are sad,\u201d he said. \u201cWhile, historically, blues came from depressing circumstances, it\u2019s not all sad. In fact, a lot of the blues is about having a good time. It\u2019s about rising above the sadness. It\u2019s about singing so you can move on.\u201d<\/p>\n

What\u2019s more, to aid new blues aficionados, Johnson joined Ed Komara, Crane music librarian for the State University of New York at Potsdam, to co-author 100 Essential Blues Books<\/em> by Scarecrow Press (publication pending). The manuscript, which is still in the editing phase, examines the most important books of blues scholarship and how they have informed an understanding of the genre. Komara was a music librarian\/blues archivist at UM from 1993 through 2001.<\/p>\n

When not studying, researching, collecting, archiving or listening to the blues, Johnson performs traditional Irish and Scottish music with girlfriend Shaundi Wall of Oxford, a singer and percussionist.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It comes as no surprise that Greg Johnson, blues curator and associate professor at the J.D. Williams Library, originally planned to be a musicologist. The sought-after instrumentalist plays trombone, guitar, Celtic harp, tin whistle and the bodhran drum with various local ensembles. Johnson is also a longtime bassist for the L-O-U Symphony Orchestra and theRead the story …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[831,1141,45],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nCurator sings praises of the blues - Ole Miss News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/curator-sings-praises-of-the-blues\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Curator sings praises of the blues - Ole Miss News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"It comes as no surprise that Greg Johnson, blues curator and associate professor at the J.D. Williams Library, originally planned to be a musicologist. The sought-after instrumentalist plays trombone, guitar, Celtic harp, tin whistle and the bodhran drum with various local ensembles. Johnson is also a longtime bassist for the L-O-U Symphony Orchestra and theRead the story …\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/curator-sings-praises-of-the-blues\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Ole Miss News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"-0001-11-30T00:00:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2014-09-23T13:28:13+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/NJL_1570-A-300x199.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@OleMissRebels\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@OleMissRebels\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/\",\"name\":\"Ole Miss News\",\"description\":\"The official source for University of Mississippi news\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":\"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/?s={search_term_string}\",\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"@id\":\"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/curator-sings-praises-of-the-blues\/#primaryimage\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/NJL_1570-A-300x199.jpg\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/curator-sings-praises-of-the-blues\/#webpage\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/curator-sings-praises-of-the-blues\/\",\"name\":\"Curator sings praises of the blues - Ole Miss News\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/curator-sings-praises-of-the-blues\/#primaryimage\"},\"datePublished\":\"-0001-11-30T00:00:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2014-09-23T13:28:13+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/#\/schema\/person\/8b6e223dd0bf1755ba903576c69132fa\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/curator-sings-praises-of-the-blues\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/#\/schema\/person\/8b6e223dd0bf1755ba903576c69132fa\",\"name\":\"lmphill2\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/#personlogo\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/0.gravatar.com\/avatar\/6cbf2a2e8e0347309ffe57be863ca429?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"lmphill2\"}}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29550"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29550"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29550\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40039,"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29550\/revisions\/40039"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29550"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29550"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29550"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}