Searching For The First Rock And Roll Song

Series produced by Jamie Dell'Apa

Series image
Image by: Regular Listener, J.T. Lindross, From Finland 

We, the rock and roll generation, have never found our self-defining first rock and roll song. Host Jamie Dell'Apa presents music and musicians you've never heard from the small regional record companies who pioneered rock and roll. Songs that could have been the first rock and roll song. Songs that fill the gap in understanding where we came from and who we are.

Searching For The First Rock and Roll Song features records coveted by collectors from the era when rock and roll was emerging but hadn't yet settled on a definition of itself. Music from before rock and roll was domesticated into a commercial music industry. When country and western sounded like swing, pop music sounded like rockabilly, rockabilly sounded like rhythm and blues, and doo wop sounded like girl groups and all those musics sounded an awful lot like what we now call, “rock and roll”.

Not a hits, oldies, or “history of” radio show. it's all the songs that influenced our now-legendary musicians who are regularly featured in all those hits, oldies, and “history of” radio shows.

Hosted by WWOZ in New Orleans for the last 18 years, the show is carried by a dozen stations.

P.S. We never find the first rock and roll song. Just like our journey through life, the search is the joy. Finding the final destination in life or music is something to continually delay until after next week's episode.
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Searching For The First Rock and Roll Song features records coveted by collectors from the era when rock and roll was emerging but hadn't yet settled on a definition of itself. Music from before rock and roll was domesticated into a commercial music industry. When country and western sounded like swing, pop music sounded like rockabilly, rockabilly sounded like rhythm and blues, and doo wop sounded like girl groups and all those musics sounded an awful lot like what we now call, “rock and roll”.Not a hits, oldies, or “history of” radio show. it's all the songs that influenced our now-legendary musicians who are regularly featured in all those hits, oldies, and “history of” radio shows. Hosted by WWOZ in New Orleans for the last 18 years, the show is carried by a dozen stations. ... Show full description


654 Pieces

Order by: Newest First | Oldest First
Piece image
1. (Short) Searching for the 1st R&R record on Saturday Night NOLA radio from Saturday 9pm to midnight on KFCF Fresno 2. (Short) Locally o...

Bought by KFCF FM and KFCF FM


  • Added: Sep 24, 2021
  • Length: 02:58:38
  • Purchases: 2
Caption: The Universals
Scratching through another corner of my endless musical library - I found a great deal of songs you've never heard by musicians you've never heard...

Bought by KCHU, GCR (Global Community Radio), KPRG, Prairie Public, and WYAP


  • Added: Sep 23, 2021
  • Length: 03:56:06
  • Purchases: 5
Caption: Little Ray
Little Ray was a Los Angeles sensation because he could command a stage and audience - a talent that stood out even in a city full of entertainers....

Bought by GCR (Global Community Radio), KPRG, KFCF FM, and Prairie Public


  • Added: Sep 16, 2021
  • Length: 02:57:14
  • Purchases: 4
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Featuring the music from J&S records, a record company started by a Black woman in 1956, Zell Sanders. Also couplets of sound-alike songs. Two un...

Bought by KCHU, GCR (Global Community Radio), KFCF FM, WYAP, and Prairie Public


  • Added: Sep 10, 2021
  • Length: 02:57:21
  • Purchases: 5
Caption: 4 Pennies
The first rock and roll music arguably was centered in the post World War II era when a new music captured the imagination and hope of people in th...

Bought by GCR (Global Community Radio), KPRG, KFCF FM, and Prairie Public


  • Added: Sep 02, 2021
  • Length: 02:57:15
  • Purchases: 4
Piece image
Music from the post World War II era when a new music captured the imagination and hope of people in the US and around the world. The first music w...

Bought by KFCF FM, KPRG, GCR (Global Community Radio), and Prairie Public


  • Added: Aug 25, 2021
  • Length: 02:57:06
  • Purchases: 4
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Searching for the first rock and roll record, means finding tens of thousands of records that could legitimately be the "first record," I think t...

Bought by GCR (Global Community Radio), KPRG, KFCF FM, and Prairie Public


  • Added: Aug 09, 2021
  • Length: 02:56:59
  • Purchases: 4
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The first rock and roll song with a focust on music and musicians from the bayous of Louisiana. Where the sticky humidity and ever-present liquor ...

Bought by Prairie Public and WYAP


  • Added: Aug 20, 2021
  • Length: 02:56:45
  • Purchases: 2
Caption: Count Ossie
Tonight's show focuses on the similar sounds of early ska and rock and roll. Not a technical presentation, your ears will hear it and your soul wi...

Bought by KPRG, GCR (Global Community Radio), KFCF FM, Prairie Public, and WYAP


  • Added: Aug 05, 2021
  • Length: 02:57:01
  • Purchases: 5
Caption: Little June and the Januaries
Picking mushrooms in the factory was dark, dismal, and without a future. The only light came from the radio where in 1973, Chuck E. Weiss would pl...

Bought by KPRG, KFCF FM, and Prairie Public


  • Added: Jul 30, 2021
  • Length: 02:57:15
  • Purchases: 3
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Same program as 210724 but with KFCF fund drive messages

Bought by KFCF FM


  • Added: Jul 24, 2021
  • Length: 02:58:26
  • Purchases: 1
Caption: The Dazzlers
The bayous of South Louisiana were virtually isolated from the US by its watery jungles of bayous so we developed differently than the rest of the ...

Bought by KPRG, GCR (Global Community Radio), KFCF FM, Prairie Public, and WYAP


  • Added: Jul 21, 2021
  • Length: 02:56:51
  • Purchases: 5
Caption: Bobby Byrd and the Flames
Searching for the first rock and roll record leads us to country and western songs about the atom bomb and jazz. Mix them together and you get the...

Bought by KCHU, KPRG, KFCF FM, GCR (Global Community Radio), and Prairie Public


  • Added: Jul 14, 2021
  • Length: 02:57:01
  • Purchases: 5

  • Added: Jul 06, 2021
  • Length: 02:57:12
  • Purchases: 6
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Tonight we feature Australian rock and rollers, songs about green stamps, and cartoons in our search for the first rock and roll song. We search i...

Bought by KPRG, GCR (Global Community Radio), Prairie Public, and KFCF FM


  • Added: Jul 02, 2021
  • Length: 02:57:11
  • Purchases: 4
Caption: Brenton Wood and Wendel Williams
Musical riffing off Greg Adams writings on his Weird Music website. Greg Adams wrote for the All-Music Guide for 10 years and has written liner no...

Bought by GCR (Global Community Radio), KFCF FM, Prairie Public, and WYAP


  • Added: Jun 22, 2021
  • Length: 02:55:30
  • Purchases: 4
Caption: Billy Mcallister
Music from the post World War II era when a new music captured the imagination and hope of people in the US and around the world. The first music w...

Bought by KCHU, KPRG, KFCF FM, GCR (Global Community Radio), and Prairie Public


  • Added: Jun 14, 2021
  • Length: 02:56:42
  • Purchases: 5
Piece image
Music from the post World War II era when a new music captured the imagination and hope of people in the US and around the world. The first music ...

Bought by KCHU, KPRG, GCR (Global Community Radio), KFCF FM, and Prairie Public


  • Added: Jun 10, 2021
  • Length: 02:57:08
  • Purchases: 5
Caption: Groovy Joe Poovey
Music from the post World War II era when a new music captured the imagination and hope of people in the US and around the world. At first it wasn...

Bought by KCHU, KPRG, KFCF FM, GCR (Global Community Radio), Prairie Public and more


  • Added: Jun 03, 2021
  • Length: 02:57:11
  • Purchases: 6
Caption: Sugar Pie and Pee Wee
Music from the post WWII era when a new music caught fire in the US and around the world. At first it wasn't called rock and roll, it was just "ho...

Bought by KCHU, KPRG, Prairie Public, KFCF FM, and GCR (Global Community Radio)


  • Added: May 26, 2021
  • Length: 02:57:04
  • Purchases: 5