Listen

An extraordinary archive of the most iconic sites on the American musical landscape.

Prompted by the closing of New York’s famed CBGB, Rhona Bitner embarked on a thirteen-year journey to photograph 403 venues across twenty-six states and eighty-nine cities—the studios, concert halls, arenas, high schools, bars, ballrooms, prisons, and fields where the most memorable songs were inspired, recorded, performed, and listened to.  Close to 300 of those photographs are included in this book.

Featuring Jimi Hendrix’s recording studio, Elvis’s Graceland music room, Aretha Franklin’s family church, the Georgia auditorium where fourteen-year-old Little Richard was discovered and Ray Charles, Otis Redding, James Brown, and Sam Cooke took the stage, and the high school where a young Bob Dylan first performed, this book showcases each locale that played a seminal role in the soundtracks of generations. While Bitner recorded these sites empty and silent, the reverberations of fabled tunes still echo from within their walls. With informative texts on each location and archival images of performers recording or playing in the venues, this encyclopedic collection is a must-have addition to the libraries of music aficionados everywhere.

Rhona Bitner is an artist whose photographs are in the collections of the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Art Institute of Chicago, and the Pinault Collection, among others. She lives and works between New York and Paris. Iggy Pop is a legendary musician known as the “godfather of punk.” Éric Reinhardt is a French writer and editor. Natalie Bell is the exhibitions curator at MIT’s List Visual Arts Center. Jon Hammer is a writer, artist, and rhythm guitarist. Greil Marcus is a music critic, journalist, and author. Jason Moran is a jazz pianist, composer, and performance artist.