The inaugural North Philadelphia History Festival, a celebration of African American and Puerto Rican heritage through art, music, film, history and culture, will be held July 24-27, 2025.
I want to close out Black Music Month with hometown hero Stanley Clarke. Born in Philadelphia on June 30, 1951, Clarke is a groundbreaking acoustic and electric bassist known for revolutionizing the role of the bass in contemporary music. His virtuosic technique, whether on acoustic upright or electric bass, helped elevate the instrument from its traditional supporting role to a dynamic lead instrument.
To celebrate Black Music Month, I will give a gallery talk highlighting some of the items in the Historical Society of Pennsylvania’s exhibit, “Message In Our Music.” The items span the 1770s to the 1970s.
It was illegal for the enslaved to learn how to read or write. Stories and cultural practices were passed down from generation to generation in the music. In the prelude to gospel legend Bobby Jones’ “Just A Closer Walk with Thee,” Maya Angelou said, “They sung us all the way out of slavery.”
Music was the first draft of Black history.
One of the items in the exhibit is a collection of spirituals sung before the Civil War, including Free At Las’, compiled by Edward Avery McIlhenny whose family enslaved hundreds of Black people.
“Free at last” has resonated with African Americans for hundreds of years. The significance of the phrase was lost on Kroger. The supermarket chain came under fire for selling Juneteenth cakes decorated with AI slop.
TikToker Blaq Monalisa posted images of the cakes saying:
Y’all decorate everything else around here cute, everything else around here cute. But for Juneteenth, you wanna just throw something on a freaking cookie cake and expect someone to buy it.
The video went viral. After the backlash, Kroger said the “products have been removed” from the store.
The phrase “free at last” is known for being a prominent part of Martin Luther King’s “I Have A Dream” speech, borrowed from the title of a Negro-Spiritual song. And now the phrase, which represents a hard-fought struggle, is being featured on a supermarket cake, casually scribbled in internet shorthand.
As you will see in the “Message In Our Music” exhibit, the phrase predates Julia Perry’s 1951 composition.
My gallery talk is free and open to the public. To register, please go here.
UPDATE: Check out 6abc Action News’ report about the exhibition.
In his 1697 play “The Mourning Bride,” William Congreve wrote: “Music has charms to soothe a savage breast, to soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak.”
Ever since the ancestors were brought here in the bowels of a slave ship, songs gave voice to their suffering and longing for freedom.
The experience of the enslaved is “the wellspring of Black music” (h/t Amiri Baraka).
From Black Suffering to Black Joy, there is a message in our music.
It was an honor and pleasure to tell the story of Black music using music scores, documents, photographs, books and ephemera in the archives of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania for their new exhibit, Voices of the Community: Local Black Preservation.
The exhibit “explores the history, migration, and preservation” of African American communities in Philadelphia, and Lawnside, New Jersey.
The opening reception will be held on Thursday, June 12, 2025, from 6pm to 8pm. The event is free and open to the public. To register for the reception, please go here.
Memorial Day is a time to remember and honor military personnel who paid the ultimate sacrifice to protect the nation’s freedoms and democratic ideals.
The DEI – Didn’t Earn It – crowd that’s attacking diversity, equity and inclusion likely doesn’t know the origin of Memorial Day. Originally called Decoration Day, Memorial Day was first observed on May 1, 1865 in Charleston, South Carolina.
Thousands of African Americans, including formerly enslaved, the 54th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment, and the 34th and 104th United States Colored Troops, were led by children as they gathered to honor 257 Union soldiers who were buried in a mass grave behind the grandstand of the city’s Washington Race Course. The ancestors exhumed the mass grave, reburied the bodies and decorated their graves; hence, Decoration Day.
Check out the history of Memorial Day that President Trump wants to erase.
The Historical Society of Pennsylvania will unveil a new exhibit, Voices of the Community: Local Preservation in Philadelphia, on June 12, 2025. The exhibit explores the history and preservation of Black communities in Philadelphia and Lawnside, New Jersey. I am one of the community curators, along with Shamele Jordon.
The exhibit focuses on four themes:
Black Joy: Development of Lawnside, the only historically African-American incorporated municipality in the Northern United States
Sounds of Freedom, Resistance and Resilience
Fulfilling America’s Promise: Founding of the Association for the Study of African-American Life and History (ASALH)
All Power to the People: Local community efforts to preserve and restore Black Philadelphia
With the “Sounds of Freedom, Resistance and Resilience,” I use archival materials to tell the story of Black music from the 1770s to the 1970s.
Voices of the Community: Local Preservation in Philadelphia will be on view June 12, 2025 to September 26, 2025. To be added to the mailing list for the exhibit opening and my gallery talk, send your name and email address to phillyjazzapp@gmail.com.
March is Women in Jazz Month, a time to celebrate the contributions of women to jazz. Truth be told, those contributions are often unheralded and overlooked. But as the National Museum of African American History and Culture notes, women were “present from its [jazz] inception”:
Jazz evolved from ragtime, an American style of syncopated instrumental music. Jazz first materialized in New Orleans, and is often distinguished by African American musical innovation. Multiple styles of the genre exist today from the dance-oriented music of the 1920s big band era to the experimental flair of modern avant-garde jazz. The radically new genre of music, originally seen as socially unacceptable, often called “the Devil’s music,” grew into an expression of high art, and as a result of many pioneering African American women. And while present from its inception, African American women are often omitted from the larger narrative in the history of the genre. Black women musicians fought harsh stereotypes levied against their gender, race, and musical abilities.
The Mellon Foundation is hosting a virtual discussion about jazz creativity and innovation featuring two women in jazz — Terri Lyne Carrington and esperanza spalding.
The event is free and open to the public. To register for the livestream, visit the Mellon Foundation.
