Little Rosetta and the Talking Guitar

December 1, 2022
A small girl gets a big guitar...and the rest is history. Pinkney Barlow, third generation of the renowned and artistic Pinkney clan, offers a tribute to Sister Rosetta Tharpe, "Godmother of Rock and Roll," in swinging words and paper collage scenes featuring a child eagerly absorbing the love and harmonies of her African American community. Having listened to Momma strum a mandolin and danced to music each week with others in her hometown of Cotton Plant, Arkansas, Little Rosetta is thrilled to get a guitar of her very own and is determined to learn how to play it in time for next summer's church anniversary. She carries it everywhere, listening to the sounds of her town, plucking the strings until her fingers are raw--and, when the time comes, letting loose with pure notes that "poured over the crowd like summer rain washing the dust off a new day." Angled visual elements and occasional curved lines of narrative give a lively sense of musicality to the presentation, with lengths of actual string on the guitar and unglued paper edges around the dark-skinned human figures to add texture and dimension. Tonya Bolden and R. Gregory Christie take a longer look at Tharpe's subsequent 50-year career in Rock, Rosetta, Rock! Roll, Rosetta, Roll! (2022), but both of these picture books offer high-stepping views of a child who taught herself how to make a new kind of music, one that "held the story of her people." (This book was reviewed digitally.) Speaks to all children with music in their heads while introducing an unjustly little-known pioneer. (author's note) (Informational picture book. 6-8)

COPYRIGHT(2022) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

February 1, 2023
Grades 1-3 The formative childhood years of Black American music legend Sister Rosetta Tharpe takes center stage in this pitch-perfect picture-book biography. Little Rosetta grows up listening to her momma play the mandolin, and dancing and singing with her Cotton Plant, Arkansas, church community. When the child gets her first guitar, she is excited to make music and create her "very own story." The musical prodigy practices, strums, and plucks in earnest, emulating the sounds she hears around her neighborhood. The text sings with well-orchestrated onomatopoeic sounds: "The low gruumm of a train rolling along the tracks. The sharp squeeeak of wagon wheels." Little Rosetta's debut performance at her church's anniversary shines a spotlight on her hard work, determination, and sheer love of music. Pinkney Barlow's cut-paper collages feature snippets of sheet music and guitar strings, while an afterword provides information about Tharpe's trailblazing career. This upbeat, harmonious portrait of the "Godmother of Rock and Roll" as a child hits all the right notes.

COPYRIGHT(2023) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

January 1, 2023
In her time, some said Sister Rosetta Tharpe could make her guitar talk. Today, many credit her unique mix of gospel, jazz, and blues as the foundation for what would become known as rock-and-roll. Born in rural Arkansas in 1915, young Rosetta received her first guitar at four and mastered the instrument in just two years. She performed on the gospel circuit as a child and eventually in nightclubs as a hit-record-making adult, but her contributions to music were often ignored because of her gender and race. Barlow's picture-book biography focuses on Tharpe's childhood, depicting her guitar as echoing the sounds she encounters in her small African American community and debuting in her triumphant first performance at church. The lyrical text is rich with sound words ("The vibrations hummed through her body like bees through a garden"). Movement-filled, whimsical mixed-media illustrations have a folksy feel; the soft pinks, purples, blues, and yellows that recur throughout the pages convey the security and support of Tharpe's tight-knit community. An author's note provides further details about her rise to stardom as well as her lasting, if ignored, impact on many musical genres. An inspiring story that may encourage others to pick up an instrument and make it speak. Eric Carpenter

(Copyright 2023 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

Starred review from February 6, 2023
The sounds of early 20th-century Cotton Plant, Ark., contribute to a child’s musical innovations in this sensory early life portrait of Sister Rosetta Tharpe (1915–1973), godmother of rock and roll. When young Tharpe receives her first guitar, she resolves to create a story to tell at her church’s anniversary. Inspired by the sounds of her African American community as she practices (a sewing machine’s whirrrr, a rolling train’s gruumm), the girl works “to match the town’s song,” growing more confident until, at the anniversary, “the notes poured over the crowd like summer rain.” Final spreads note that as Tharpe’s unconventional style revolutionized popular music, she would continue telling stories of “the joy and trials/ of those who came before her./ ... the story of her people” for more than 50 years as she traveled the globe. Framing the figure’s musical stylings as an outgrowth of community and place, Pinkney Barlow smartly uses lively onomatopoeia and crisp, textured collage art to layer the origins of the subject’s sound onto every page. An author’s note concludes. Ages 3–7.

January 1, 2023
In her time, some said Sister Rosetta Tharpe could make her guitar talk. Today, many credit her unique mix of gospel, jazz, and blues as the foundation for what would become known as rock-and-roll. Born in rural Arkansas in 1915, young Rosetta received her first guitar at four and mastered the instrument in just two years. She performed on the gospel circuit as a child and eventually in nightclubs as a hit-record-making adult, but her contributions to music were often ignored because of her gender and race. Barlow's picture-book biography focuses on Tharpe's childhood, depicting her guitar as echoing the sounds she encounters in her small African American community and debuting in her triumphant first performance at church. The lyrical text is rich with sound words ("The vibrations hummed through her body like bees through a garden"). Movement-filled, whimsical mixed-media illustrations have a folksy feel; the soft pinks, purples, blues, and yellows that recur throughout the pages convey the security and support of Tharpe's tight-knit community. An author's note provides further details about her rise to stardom as well as her lasting, if ignored, impact on many musical genres. An inspiring story that may encourage others to pick up an instrument and make it speak.

(Copyright 2023 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)