Della Perrone Photographs, ca. 1920-2015 | The Sousa Archives and Center for American Music

Della Perrone's career as a photographer is closely tied to the Urbana-Champaign community where she grew up and its local music scene. Perrone's maternal grandparents, mother, father, and two uncles were photography enthusiasts for decades and made frequent use of their cameras to capture family events and other activities within their community. When Della was in her early 20's, she purchased her first camera in the summer of 1980, a CanonAT1.

Perrone first photographed the Elvis Brothers at Chico's on September 26, 1981, and the members of the band immediately felt that her photographs captured the essence of their music ensemble at the time.  According to Perrone, her photographic approach was a match with the band. The following month, the Elvis Brothers asked her to take promotional photos of them, and on October 22, Della set up her first studio shoot in her home. 

Between 1981 and 1989, Perrone photographed live concerts of local bands and national acts performing in such Urbana-Champaign venues as Chico's, Mabel's, and the University Auditorium, as well as other performance spaces throughout the Midwest.  The musicians and music groups she photographed included Adrian Belew and the Bears, John Kellogg and Combo Audio, Captain Rat, George Faber, The Rave/Invaders, Smokehouse, Mystery Dots, B-Lovers, the Vertebrats, Nix 86, U2, the Ramones, Jason & the Scorchers, Robin Trower, Stevie Ray Vaughan, the Fabulous Thunderbirds, Brian Setzer, and Wendy O. Williams. Throughout these years, Perrone's photographs artfully capture the on-stage, and sometimes back-stage, and off-stage exploits of these groups' performances and provide a vivid illustration of Urbana-Champaign's dynamic music scene.