Music - Tom Irwin | Thursday, February 2,2012

From Springfield to Memphis

In the last few columns I’ve mentioned the amazing and wonderful fact that three area blues organizations selected three Springfield-based blues bands as representatives to the International Blu

Music - Tom Irwin | Thursday, January 26,2012

2012 forecast

By Tom Irwin

What good are predictions anyway? Is there any meaning in the fact that someone states “so-and-so shall do that and turn out this way” and then it does, or doesn’t for that matter? R

Music - Tom Irwin | Thursday, January 19,2012

Early morning ruminations

By Tom Irwin

Oh boy, call it a late one, or early as the case may be. The clock says 4:32 a.m. and I’m wide awake. The problem stems from the schedule switch I attempt to accomplish each week as the nighttim

Music - Tom Irwin | Thursday, January 12,2012

Talking with Todd

By Tom Irwin

I just had the best time visiting with Todd Snider on the phone. I’ve always heard he was a nice guy and he even wrote a song called “Alright Guy” that made number one on the country

Music - Tom Irwin | Thursday, January 5,2012

Elvis by the numbers

By Tom Irwin

As I prepare to research Elvis Presley and numbers, what better snack than one of the King’s favorite repasts. According to one of the many Internet sites on everything-about-Elvis, the recipe i

Music - Tom Irwin | Thursday, December 29,2011

New Year’s news

By Tom Irwin

Wow, I feel like one of those people saying, “Wow, it’s New Year’s already? I thought we just celebrated the last one.” Or something akin to that exclamation of realization and

Music - Tom Irwin | Thursday, December 22,2011

Holiday music musings

By Tom Irwin

If you want a way to mess up a good weekend for local live music, try putting Christmas Eve on a Saturday night and see what happens. That’s what the calendar gave us for 2011 and the Pub Crawl

Music - Tom Irwin | Thursday, December 15,2011

No Plain Jane

By Tom Irwin

When I first saw Nora Jane Struthers she was standing around at a Folk Alliance conference in Memphis, Tenn., in February of 2010, passing out promo EPs of her upcoming CD. At those get-togethers ever

Music - Tom Irwin | Thursday, December 8,2011

Frank rocks out of town

By Tom Irwin

Whenever area guitar players get mentioned, Frank Huston’s name is sure to come up early in the conversation. Huston, now into his fourth decade of playing music on the local scene, is moving to

Music - Tom Irwin | Thursday, December 1,2011

December goodies

By Tom Irwin

I got started on one thing and that led to another and, before you know it, so many cool things were going on now and through the next week I just had to write about as many as I could. Let’s ch