The story of young rapper Roxanne Shante getting a "college clause" in her major label record deal has been circulating for decades, but in the last few weeks it has come under fire after Slate ran a piece by Ben Sheffner that reports many of Shante's assertions about her education and career are false. Read the wise Jeff Change and Wayne Marshall on the controversy here.
2012 Fundraising Campaign
Help launch Best Music Writing as an independently published book series through a pre-order today
Our Kickstarter campaign was, as you can see, a success! Thank you!
Past readings for the 2011 Best Music Writing Book
December 6, powerHouse Arena (NYC)
December 8, Housing Works Cafe (NYC)
January 10, Politics and Prose (DC)
BMW 2011
Buy 2011's edition, guest edited by Alex Ross, here:
at Powell's Books
or through Indiebound
What is BMW?
Best Music Writing is a beloved anthology that celebrates the year in music writing by gathering writing from essays to Tweets on every sound and style of music from hip-hop to R&B to jazz to pop to blues. It is essential reading for anyone who loves great music and accomplished writing. Scribes of every imaginable sort—novelists, poets, journalists, musicians— are gathered to create a multi-voiced snapshot of the year in music writing that, like the music it illuminates, is loud, irreverent, loveable, odd, and always original.
Follow @musicwriting
Praise for the BMW Series
"Da Capo's annual Best Music Writing series is as close as rock scribes get to the Oscars."—Village Voice, 2010
"Essential, as usual."—Booklist, 2009
"The Best Music Writing series from Da Capo Press has been putting out consistently impressive collections of each year’s most important music writing for the last decade, and this year’s special 10th anniversary edition is no exception."—PopMatters, 2009
“The stories behind the music can be as inspiring as the music itself…
will likely inspire the reader to seek out a lot of new music.”—New York Press
“…one of the few regular publications to be dependably open to every type of music imaginable…Whether an authoritative aggregation or merely a starting point,
it’s a shame it’s only an annual.”—Relix
“In all it’s quite a celebration of the vast enterprise known as music.”—Signal to Noise
More praise for BMW
“Our favorite year-end read.”—Cleveland Scene
“Terrorism, sexual misconduct, and wholesome nostalgia, treated with a discernible backbeat and sprightly writing make for an excellent anthology.” ––Booklist
“the book finally reflects the current state of not just music journalism but music listening… These essays encapsulate a chilly, malefic year for music indeed.” —The Stranger
“Da Capo’s Best Music Writing 2006’s essays create a confrontational, challenging, and varied portrait of music criticism that highlights a visceral reaction to music over academic posturing…”—VenusZine
