The month of June provides a time to appreciate and celebrate African American musicians, composers, singers, and songwriters. This observation began on June 7, 1979, when President Jimmy Carter decreed June to be Black Music Month.
Audio
European slave traders brought Africans to the New World on ships as early as the 1400s. These voyages across the Atlantic Ocean are called the Middle Passage. It was a terrible experience for the...
Audio
Reggae music is a Jamaican style of music that has roots in African music and rhythm and blues, or early rock and roll. Reggae songs are usually about social issues, politics and the Rastafarian...
Audio
After the Civil War and emancipation, freed men and women struggled to find work and make a new life for their families. The songs about these difficult times were called the blues, a musical style...
Audio
Country music as we know it today grew out of blues and folk music. In country music’s earliest form, southern musicians both white and black, created music for the working class that told stories...
Audio
Jazz music was born out of the blues. The key element was syncopation (syn-co-pa-tion) that stressed the off beats of the rhythm. In the same way that Gullah language is a mixture of African and...
Audio
Spirituals developed at the same time as work songs on the plantations. Although they were religious songs with a Christian message, spirituals were also heartfelt expressions of the slave experience...
Audio
After slavery ended, some African American churches shifted from traditional spirituals to a new kind of religious music called gospel. This style of music brought together the elements of the “shout”...
Audio
Rhythm and blues was an early form of rock and roll but it also contributed to a smoother sounding musical style called soul. In 1960, Berry Gordy, Jr. began a recording label in Detroit, Michigan...
Audio
Music was an important tradition in Africa centuries before Africans were brought to America. Singing was a part of everyday life when people were at work, worship or play. The drum was the most...
Video
Jazz king John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie was born in Cheraw in 1917. Dizzy was a founder of modern jazz, an innovative trumpeter known for his bent horn and bulging cheeks. The South Carolina Jazz...