Happy Valentine’s Day! Love is in the air today as we share with you a clip from the American Archive, contributed by Chicago Public Media (WBEZ), featuring Little Milton singing “I Want to Love You” at the Chicago Blues Festival in June of 1987.
“The Chicago Blues Festival has been a Chicago institution for over 30 years and has grown to hold the title of the largest free blues festival in the world. Held every summer in Chicago’s Grant Park, the festival has consistently featured blues legends alongside the future stars of the genre and, despite Chicago’s embarrassment of riches when it comes to blues artists, features performers from around the world. If they’ve sung the blues, chances are they’ve appeared at the festival,” says Chicago Public Media’s Director of Studio and Broadcast Operations Adam Yoffe. “WBEZ has been lucky enough to capture some of the earliest years of the festival to tape, and are excited to bring them to the archive in the coming months.”
Chicago Public Media’s music archives feature interviews and live performances with many of the most revered jazz and blues figures in the country and includes hundreds of reels that date from the mid-1980s to the early ’90s, such as performances of jazz greats Etta James and Dizzy Gillespie and blues legends Lonnie Brooks and Koko Taylor.
This program we’re sharing today was originally recorded on 1/4″ audio tape and was digitized in the first 40,000 hours of the American Archive collection, which are now being preserved at the Library of Congress.
And while your in the Valentine’s Day spirit, you should check out today’s Google Doodle. WBEZ’s This American Life has collaborated with Google on today’s Doodle, featuring candy hearts and Valentine’s Day-themed stories produced by This American Life.
blog.americanarchive.org 