Sonny Terry - in Popular Culture

In Popular Culture

Terry's rendition of the traditional song "Fox Chase", was used by the experimental filmmaker Len Lye as the soundtrack for his short film, Color Cry (1952). "Old Lost John" was used by Werner Herzog twice: at the conclusion of his 1977 feature film Stroszek and also during shooting scene in Bad Lieutenant. Port of Call: New Orleans (2009). He also appeared in The Colour Purple directed by Steven Spielberg. With Brownie McGhee, he appeared in the 1979 Steve Martin comedy The Jerk. Terry collaborated with Ry Cooder on "Walkin' Away Blues" as well as a cover of Robert Johnson's "Crossroad Blues" for the 1986 film Crossroads. More recently Terry's track "Whoopin' The Blues" was used for a EON Wind Farm brand commercial. It also appeared in the film 24 Hour Party People (Winterbottom, 2002).

Sonny Terry's harmonica is sampled in the song "Love is Eternal Sacred Light" on Paul Simon's forthcoming album So Beautiful or So What.

Read more about this topic:  Sonny Terry

Famous quotes containing the words popular culture, popular and/or culture:

    “Popular culture entered my life as Shirley Temple, who was exactly my age and wrote a letter in the newspapers telling how her mother fixed spinach for her, with lots of butter.... I was impressed by Shirley Temple as a little girl my age who had power: she could write a piece for the newspapers and have it printed in her own handwriting.”
    —Adrienne Rich (b. 1929)

    “The poet needs a ground in popular tradition on which he may work, and which, again, may restrain his art within the due temperance. It holds him to the people, supplies a foundation for his edifice; and, in furnishing so much work done to his hand, leaves him at leisure, and in full strength for the audacities of his imagination.”
    —Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)

    “As the twentieth century ends, commerce and culture are coming closer together. The distinction between life and art has been eroded by fifty years of enhanced communications, ever-improving reproduction technologies and increasing wealth.”
    —Stephen Bayley (b. 1951)