649. Leah Payne
24 October 2025

649. Leah Payne

Louisiana Anthology Podcast

About
649. This week we chat with Leah Payne about her book, God Gave Rock and Roll
To You: A History of Contemporary Christian Music
. We focus especially on the role of the family of Jimmy Swaggart, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Mickey Gilley in the history of Rock and Roll. Her book chronicles the confluence of evangelical, Pentecostal, and
charismatic networks through the lens of Contemporary Christian
Music, or CCM. The book indexes American evangelicalism’s
political and social aspirations as seen through its cultural
intermediaries: the youth group leaders, non-profit groups,
industry executives, and parents who contributed to what was
morally permissible and economically profitable in CCM. 


    Now available: Liberty in Louisiana: A Comedy.
    The oldest play about Louisiana, author James Workman wrote it
    as a celebration of the Louisiana Purchase. Now it is back in
    print for the first time in 221 years. Order your copy today!



    This week in the Louisiana
    Anthology
    . H. P. Lovecraft. "The
    Call of Cthulhu." "In a natural glade of the swamp stood
    a grassy island of perhaps an acre’s extent, clear of trees
    and tolerably dry. On this now leaped and twisted a more
    indescribable horde of human abnormality than any but a Sime
    or an Angarola could paint. Void of clothing, this hybrid
    spawn were braying, bellowing, and writhing about a monstrous
    ring-shaped bonfire; in the centre of which, revealed by
    occasional rifts in the curtain of flame, stood a great
    granite monolith some eight feet in height; on top of which,
    incongruous in its diminutiveness, rested the noxious carven
    statuette."
    This week in Louisiana history. October 25, 1769. Bloody"
    O'Reilly executes rebels who ousted Ulloa to hang but no
    hangman, they were shot instead.


    This week in New Orleans history. Earl Cyril Palmer born in
    New Orleans and raised in the Tremé (October 25, 1924 –
    September 19, 2008) was an American rock & roll and rhythm
    and blues drummer, and member of the Rock and Roll Hall of
    Fame. Palmer played on many recording sessions, including
    Little Richard's first several albums and Tom Waits' 1978
    album Blue Valentine. playing on New Orleans recording
    sessions, including Fats Domino's "The Fat Man", "I'm Walkin"
    (and all the rest of Domino's hits), "Tipitina" by Professor
    Longhair, "Tutti Frutti" by Little Richard (and most of
    Richard's hits), "Lawdy Miss Clawdy" by Lloyd Price, and "I
    Hear You Knockin'" by Smiley Lewis.


    This week in Louisiana.

    Halloween in New Orleans

    Website


        If you thought that Halloween was just a
    night for the kids to go trick or treating with their parents
    in tow, you need to think again. Here in New Orleans, like
    everything else, it’s different.

        Halloween, Crescent City-style, is second
    only to Mardi Gras for wild and crazy, dressing-up-in-costume
    kind of fun and it isn’t just for kids, either. Adults get to
    join the fun and craziness as well. In fact, there are a few
    events that are much more fun for the grown-ups than for the
    little ones! You can go on our haunted tours, visit our voodoo
    shops, our costume shops, our street parties, and we even have
    events for the kids!


    Postcards from Louisiana. Delfeyo Marsalis at Snug Harbor.






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