Top Five Favorites of 2024!
You won’t find lists like this anywhere else!
Well, well, well, it’s coming to the end of 2024, and I’ve decided to rank contenders for a bunch of my favorite things this year: books, publications, honors, experiences, and country love/heartbreak songs I got into.
Books I enjoyed in 2024
5. How Women Made Music: A Revolutionary History from NPR Music, ed. Alison Fensterstock (2024)
This book is by no means a history, but it provides ample evidence about the significance of women’s contributions to music around the world. The essays were a delight, and I learned a lot.
4. Reel to Real: Race, Class and Sex at the Movies, bell hooks (1996)
This is at least the seventh book I’ve read by the late cultural critic bell hooks, and because I am nowhere near a film buff, I found this text particularly useful and thought provoking. It made me want to see many of the movies under discussion.
3. This Woman’s Work: Essays on Music, ed. Kim Gordon and Sinéad Gleeson (2022)
I’ve written before about this book as a text I’ve loved, and every time I reread it, I find copious amounts of useful interpretations and profiles of female creators to learn from. The focus on physicality and labor is refreshing when compared to most music writing these days.
2. Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within, Natalie Goldberg (1986)
Writing Down the Bones is the most useful and inviting book I’ve seen on getting started and working through perfectionism with writing. I may have to reread this book yet again in the new year.
1. 60 Songs That Explain the ‘90s, Rob Harvilla (2023)
I’ll say it yet again: this is easily the funniest music book I’ve ever read, and its astute critiques make it all the more impressive.
2024 Publications
5. IWPA Awards Luncheon Keynote speech
I worked hard to synthesize my gratitude for being selected as the Illinois Woman’s Press Association’s 2024 Communicator of Achievement with insights about the state of the communications field for a speech that spoke to both professional communicators and high school students at the IWPA awards luncheon alike.
I workshopped this story as part of the “Hands Up! Body” show for Tellin’ Tales Theatre in March, and I was very proud of the result, as I worked hard on the “show, don’t tell” aspects of storytelling. I was told that many people were buzzing about my story after the show.
3. “A Royal Beeyotch-and-a-Half”
For me, this story for Tellin’ Tales Theatre was even more revelatory to write and perform, especially with a song as part of it. Forgiveness is tough for me, but performing this piece was healing.
2. “25 of the Best 1990s Country Songs”
Of all the music history and criticism pieces I worked on this year, I was proudest of this one. Yes, my picks might be idiosyncratic, but having read and researched as much as I had on 1990s country music, the piece was a labor of love. The piece even got praise from a scholar I’d cited in it.
1. “Ella Fitzgerald and the Acoustics of My Autism”
This is my favorite piece I wrote this year. The journey from rough drafts to polished product, later reblogged at the Good Men Project and posted on Facebooko by a big jazz page, was more intensive, but after cutting out unnecessary quotes and such, I am exceptionally proud of the results.
2024 Honors
5. Commissioned for essay on queer country
In June, the publication Rainbow Rodeo, for which I’ve written two pieces, published a joint issue with Good Country, the newsletter for The Bluegrass Situation, for Pride Month, and they commissioned me to write an essay on what queer country means to me.
4. Storytelling for Tellin’ Tales Theatre: “Hands Up! Body”
Being selected for this show and working on the at times gutwrenching story “He Didn’t Beat Me Up” was not only cathartic; it felt especially rewarding when I performed the story.
3. Bowling Green State University Summer Research Institute
Traveling to northwest Ohio for a pop culture-centered Summer Research Institute was such fun to be a part of. It was like nerd camp, having access to huge pop culture and music archives as part of Bowling Green State University’s library.
2. Speaking at a middle school for Autism Awareness Month
In April, I got to speak at the middle school where my brother teaches in Chicago. Kids’ enthusiastic response to my ideas and work was more than a little heartening.
1. Nominee for National Federation of Press Women Communicator of Achievement
In March, I received a phone call from the President of the Illinois Woman’s Press Association that I was the organization’s nominee for the National Federation of Press Women Communicator of Achievement for 2024. Though I didn’t receive the NFPW’s national award, I was exceptionally proud of being at the NFPW conference as a nominee. It’s been a long journey to get where I am, and I’m very proud
2024 Experiences
5. Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association conference
Being at my first PCA/ACA conference was like nerd heaven, absorbing all kinds of fascinating ideas and presentations. I presented my journal article on James Baldwin’s writing about music.
4. Cheryl Wheeler concert
A few years ago, a friend introduced me to folk singer-songwriter Cheryl Wheeler’s work, and I was able to attend a concert with her and the pianist Kenny White in April. It was great, and I even got a picture with Wheeler!
3. National Federation of Press Women’s conference
Going to my first national communications conference, as both a nominee for Communicator of Achievement and an affiliate Contest Chair, in St. Louis was fantastic. I hope to go back next year to the NFPW conference in Colorado!
https://joshfrmusic.substack.com/p/an-exceptionally-eventful-june
2. Embedded tutoring
This year I worked with eight different classes as an embedded tutor at one of my jobs–basically a teaching assistant role, but gratefully I don’t have to prepare lessons or grade. Embedded tutoring has deepened my commitment to tutoring as a profession. I’ve enjoyed it so much, and I’ve even gotten some kudos on social media from professors I’ve worked with!
1. Bowling Green State University Summer Research Institute
Researching music and freedom as part of a cohort of pop culture scholars at a Summer Research Institute was beyond fun–it was transformative, and it led to me applying for a Ph.D. program at Bowling Green State University in American Culture Studies (decision pending!).
Country Love/Heartbreak Songs I Got Into in 2024
5. “The Way You Look at Me,” Bryan White
This blissful love song from 2000 made me want to be in love.
4. “Cop Car,” Keith Urban (2013)
This soaring country hit from 2013 did not make me want to fall in love in a cop car, but it is a great story song that made me want to sing along the first time I heard it.
3. “Don’t Take the Girl,” Brett Young (2024)
Brett Young’s nasal voice may sound considerably different from Tim McGraw’s, but this cover of a 1994 McGraw classic was one of my favorite new (or newish) things I heard all year.
2. “Can’t Go Down That Road,” Chris Housman (2024)
Chris Housman has more talent than most country stars today have combined. His debut album, Blueneck, has been a listening favorite for me since its release. This has to be one of the best country songs of this year.
1. “Best of Intentions,” Travis Tritt (2000)
The most powerful song and video that I got into this year, period.