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Family Is Important To Susan Tedeschi And Derek Trucks

Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi
Shervin Lainez
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Courtesy of the aritst
Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi

These guests represent the definition of a family band. Susan Tedeschi and Derek Trucksformed Tedeschi Trucks Band after they got married and had kids. They curated this collective of some of the finest musicians around who have been living together on tour for long enough that they count as relatives. So does their bus driver, Bobby Bolton, who has driven the band over 1.3 million miles.

Needless to say, family — where members are connected by birth or by choice and time — is important to Susan and Derek. And in the lead-up to making the group's latest album, Signs, Susan and Derek lost a few important family members. That includes mentors Leon Russelland Colonel Bruce Hampton. Derek was actually on stage with Col. Bruce when he collapsed and died. Derek also lost Gregg Allman and his uncle, Butch Trucks, drummer and founding member of The Allman Brothers Band. Derek had played with The Allman Brothers Band since 1999. Since we recorded this conversation, Tedeschi Trucks Band also lost their longtime keyboardist and flutist, Kofi Burbridge.

I spoke to Derek and Susan about how processing loss shaped the band's new album from their recording studio, Swamp Raga, in their backyard in Florida, and the band performed live. Listen in the player.

Copyright 2019 XPN

Talia Schlanger hosts World Cafe, which is distributed by NPR and produced by WXPN, the public radio service of the University of Pennsylvania. She got her start in broadcasting at the CBC, Canada's national public broadcaster. She hosted CBC Radio 2 Weekend Mornings on radio and was the on-camera host for two seasons of the television series CBC Music: Backstage, as well as several prime-time music TV specials for CBC, including the Quietest Concert Ever: On Fundy's Ocean Floor. Schlanger also guest hosted various flagship shows on CBC Radio One, including As It Happens, Day 6 and Because News. Schlanger also won a Canadian Screen Award as a producer for CBC Music Presents: The Beetle Roadtrip Sessions, a cross-country rock 'n' roll road trip.
Since 2017, John Myers has been the producer of NPR's World Cafe, which is produced by WXPN at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. Previously he spent about eight years working on the other side of Philly at WHYY as a producer on the staff of Fresh Air with Terry Gross. John was also a member of the team of public radio veterans recruited to develop original programming for Audible and has worked extensively as a freelance producer. His portfolio includes work for the Eastern State Penitentiary Historic Site, The Association for Public Art and the radio documentary, Going Black: The Legacy of Philly Soul Radio. He's taught radio production to preschoolers and college students and, in the late 90's, spent a couple of years traveling around the country as a roadie for the rock band Huffamoose.