Oxford American # 99, Winter 2017

THE MUSIC OF KENTUCKY

Notes on the songs, including:
"Rainbows"
Minda Honey on James Lindsey

"Me Hungry"
Jay Ruttenberg on King Kong

"Camp Nelson Blues"
Nathan Salsburg on the Booker Orchestra and two Kentucky octets

“I'm Going to Organize, Baby Mine“
Elyssa East on Sarah Ogan Gunning

"Eights"
Joe Manning on Rachel Grimes


POINTS SOUTH

Hey, Loretta!, by Marianne Worthington

Louisville Lip, by Erik Reece

If God Had a Name, by Jason Howard

A Peculiar Composition, by Michael L. Jones

Ain't Half Bad, by Leesa Cross-Smith

Living Too Close to the Ground, by Will Stephenson

Just As I Am, by Jewly Hight

Real People Radio Stories, by Jeffrey A. Keith

The Lexington Cure, by Rebecca Gayle Howell

Three previously unpublished poems by Thomas Merton

Fragment
Pastoral
Poem


He's Not There, by J. D. Daniels

Paradise Waiting, by John Thomason

Fire in My Bones, by Ashley Blooms

Let's Gather, by Harmony Holiday

"That Place in the Middle," by Ronni Lundy

Cleo, Cleo Black as Coal, a story by Crystal Wilkinson

FEATURES

Blank Place
Richard Hell after Lexington
by Amanda Petrusich

Watershed
Southeastern Kentucky’s Phipps Family legacy
by Silas House

Border Wars
When the South is everywhere and nowhere
by Zandria F. Robinson

Tuned Up in the Spirit
The Old Regular Baptists and the joyful sound
by David Ramsey

Death Rattle
Searching for the old jawbone
by John Jeremiah Sullivan

SOUTHERN SCENE

Cowboy Steve, photo by Guy Mendes



Art by: David McClister, Steve Squall, James Dechert, Dave Banks, Les Leverett, Chloe Meynier, James Robert Southard, LaVon Van Williams Jr., Judith Eisler, Chris Sikich, Letitia Quesenberry, Audrée Anid, Dennis Mader, Ray Johnson, Gina Phillips, Bob Hower, Steve Schapiro, Lina Tharsing, Ted Kincaid, Ray Kleinhelter, Nadezda Nikolova-Kratzer, Les McCann, Emily Joyce, LaToya Ruby Frazier, Robert Beatty, Meg Wilson, Alan Lomax, Tom Martin, Adrian Morales, Juliana Hawawini Johnson, Guy Mendes

Cover: Sturgill Simpson – Photo by David McClister, Loretta Lynn – Photo by Les Leverett, Courtesy of Grand Ole Opry, LLC, J.D. Wilkes – Photo by James Dechert, Les McCann – Photo by Dave Banks, James Lindsey – Photo by Steve Squall