Journal of Texas Music History | Volume 1, Number 2

Karl Hagstrom Miller
Is a doctoral candidate in history at New York University. He is completing a dissertation exploring folklore, phonographs, and the segregation of southern music in the early twentieth century. He has also written about tourism and segregation in San Antonio’s Market Square, the 1970s salsa scene in New York City, and the music of Charles Mingus. He currently lives and makes a glorious racket in the city of his youth, Austin, Texas.

Roger Wood
Is the author of the book Down in Houston: Bayou City Blues (a collaboration with photographer James Fraher), to be published in 2002 by University of Texas Press.  He has contributed a chapter on zydeco (on which his article in this issue is based) to The Roots of Texas Music, forthcoming in 2002 from Texas A&M University Press. He has also written for The Da Capo Jazz and Blues Lover’s Guide to the U.S. (3rd ed., 2001) and published feature articles on regional music history in various periodicals, including Living Blues, Houston Press, and Arkansas Review.

Joe Specht
Is director of the Jay-Rollins Library at McMurry University in Abilene. In addition to presenting numerous papers on topics ranging from the Chuck Wagon Gang to the 13th Floor Elevators to Willie Nelson, he has contributed entries to The Encyclopedia of Country Music (Oxford University Press, 1998) and the forthcoming Handbook of Texas Music. His interview with and discography of Hoyle Nix was published in Old Time Music in 1980. A former host of his own radio show, “Burning Memories: The Texas Tradition,” Specht has an extensive record collection devoted to all aspects of Texas music.

John Mark Dempsey
Is Assistant Professor of Broadcast Journalism at the University of North Texas. He is the editor of a recent book, The Jack Ruby Trial Revisited: The Diary of Jury Foreman Max Causey. Dempsey also works as a radio news broadcaster for the Texas State Network. He holds a Ph.D. in educational public relations from Texas A&M University.