Going Back to T-Town: The Ernie Fields Territory Big Band by Carmen Fields

Going Back to T-Town: The Ernie Fields Territory Big Band 

There was a time when countless music patrons in the Midwest, South and Southwest went to dances and stage shows to hear a territory band play. Territory bands traveled from town to town, performing jazz and swing music, and Tulsa-based musician Ernie Fields (1904-97) led one of the best. His daughter, Carmen Fields, tells the story of his emergence less than a decade after Tulsa’s infamous race massacre, to chase his musical dream. The book details his successes, disappointments and perseverance that kept his group alive from the early jazz era to the 1960s. This enlightening account of how Ernie fields navigated the hurdles of racial segregation during the Jim Crow era gives a before now missing account of American popular music and African American history.

About the Speakers

A fixture in the greater Boston journalism community for over 30 years, Carmen Fields has broad experience in both print and broadcast journalism; journalism education and corporate and non-profit media relations. Additionally, Fields is a SAG-AFTRA affiliated actor and voice-over artist. The Tulsa, OK native earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Lincoln University (MO) and a master’s degree in broadcast journalism from Boston University. Other achievements include Harvard University’s Nieman Fellowship and an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from Salem State University.

Joyce Kulhawik, best known as the Emmy Award-winning arts and entertainment anchor for CBS-Boston (WBZ-TV 1981-2008), is an arts critic/advocate and cancer crusader as a 3X survivor. The first arts reporter/critic in the U.S. to appear every weeknight as part of a local TV news team, she gave journalistic stature to arts reporting, covering local and national events live from the red carpet including the Oscars, Emmys, and Grammys, from Boston and Broadway to Hollywood and beyond. Kulhawik was inducted into the Massachusetts Broadcasters Hall of Fame, received the N.E. Emmys Governor’s Award for her distinguished career, and an Honorary Doctorate in Communications from Simmons University. Joyce is currently President of the Boston Theater Critics Association, a member of the Boston Society of Film Critics, Boston Online Film Critics Association, and appears on Boston’s local NPR station’s The Culture Show (GBH radio 89.7) weekdays at 2PM. Find her reviews at JoycesChoices.com.