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Born in Louisiana, Matthews moved to Los Angeles when he was 18. He was a materials handler for McDonnell Douglas Aerospace in Long Beach, and as a side job he delivered newspapers. When he retired from Douglas in 1990, he still had his side job; the paper promoted him to district advisor, helping the younger carriers, and he never retired from that position. But his true love was the zydeco and Cajun music of his home state, and the dancing that went along with it. "He lived, ate and breathed" dancing, said his wife, Vivian. He would teach zydeco jitterbug, the Cajun waltz, the Cajun two-step and the Cajun hustle at the annual Long Beach Bayou Festival and similar events. On Sept. 10, he was performing zydeco dances at a fund-raiser for victims of hurricane Katrina when he collapsed and died on stage from an apparent heart attack. He was 68. From This is True for 11 September 2005 Suggestions for further reading:
 By: Mick BerryJason Gianni List Price: $32.95 Amazon Price: $21.75 Editorial Review: This guide to popular drum styles offers approximately 400 musical examples in standard drum notation showing grooves and practical variations, and provides overviews of the history and development of almost all popular music styles. Among the many styles and subsidiary styles covered are blues, rock, jazz, Afro-Cuban, Brazilian, klezmer, zydeco, funk, bossa nova, polka, Dixieland, surf, and disco. While this resource and two-CD set can serve as a simple encyclopedia for those who need to know how to play a particular style, suggestions on varying the beat patterns for those who want to explore further and create their own patterns are also included. In addition, the two CDs contain performances of the musical examples in the book, which is designed with a lay-flat binding for easy use.  By: Ben Sandmel List Price: $30.00 Amazon Price: $30.00  By: Shane Theroit List Price: $19.95 Amazon Price: $19.95  By: Roger Wood List Price: $34.95 Amazon Price: $26.56 Editorial Review: To most people, zydeco appears as quintessentially Louisiana as gumbo. Certainly, the music originated among black Creoles of southwest Louisiana. But the swamps of southwest Louisiana spill across the Sabine River into southeast Texas, and the music originally known as "la-la" quickly trickled west, too. There it fused with blues to create a new sound that came to be known, spelled, and recorded as "zydeco." Black Creoles from Louisiana began moving into southeast Texas in search of better jobs during the first half of the twentieth century. As they resettled, so did their music. Texas Zydeco describes how many of the most formative players and moments in modern zydeco history developed in Texas, especially Houston. As the new players traveled back and forth between Houston and Lafayette, Louisiana, they spread the new sound along a "zydeco corridor" that is the musical axis around which zydeco revolves to this day. Roger Wood and James Fraher spent years traveling this corridor, interviewing and photographing hundreds of authentic musicians, dancers, club owners, and fans. As their words and images make clear, zydeco, both historically and today, belongs not to a state but to all the people of the upper Gulf Coast.  By: Tim BoomerMick Berry List Price: $32.95 Amazon Price: $21.75 Editorial Review: The incredible diversity of the bass guitar is revealed in this all-inclusive style guide. Each chapter covers particular styles or families of styles, gradually introducing players to techniques that will allow them to get the most out of their instrument and easily increase their bass repertoire. More than 400 bass grooves are presented, spanning an excess of 100 styles that musicians can follow along with on each of the two accompanying CDs. In addition to techniques for mastering the various styles, historical information about how they developed is included, giving players a one-of-a-kind opportunity to be true masters of the bass guitar. |
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