White House Commemorate Concert to Civil Rights Movement

"Jazz speaks for life," said Martin Luther King Jr. at the Berin Jazz Festival. "The blues tell the story of life's difficulties — and, if you think for a moment, you realize that they take the hardest realities of life and put them into music, only to come out with some new hope or sense of triumph. This is triumphant music."

During difficult times in the Civil Rights Movement, people would often sing to give themselves a sense of hope.

As a part of Black History Month, to celebrate music's effect on the Civil Rights Movement, the White House held a concert: “In Performance at the White House: A Celebration of Music from the Civil Rights Movement.”

Performers included Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Bernice Johnson Reagon with the Freedom Singers, Smokey Robinson, Jennifer Hudson, John Mellencamp, Yolanda Adams, Natalie Cole, the Blind Boys of Alabama and the Howard University Choir.

“The civil rights movement was a movement sustained by music was inspired by the movement and gave strength in return.” said President Obama, our first African-American president.

Sources: nytimes.com, NPR
by Brigette W.