Of Thee We Sing: Music and the Civil Rights Movement artwork

Of Thee We Sing: Music and the Civil Rights Movement

3 episodes - English - Latest episode: about 9 years ago -

While students are probably told Civil Rights marchers sang We Shall Overcome, there is not much focus on the import role music played in the fight to secure equal rights for African-Americans. This series tells three important stories about the role of music on the road to equality.

Courses Education Arts Performing Arts civil rights mlk martin luther king black african-american marian anderson billie holiday education kennedy center artsedge
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Episodes

Of Thee We Sing: Civil Rights on the B-Side

February 18, 2015 14:01 - 14 minutes - 16.5 MB

The Baylor University’s Black Gospel Music Restoration Project has a massive collection of phonograph records made by African Americans in the '40s, '50s and '60s. The curator, Dr. Robert Darden, found that on the flip side of many of these 45 RPM records, there are Civil Rights songs that no one has ever heard.

Of Thee We Sing: Strange Fruit

February 11, 2015 14:01 - 12 minutes - 14.1 MB

The lynching of black men in the American South was an all-too-familiar occurrence in the 1930s, even though it rarely made news. So when Billie Holiday had a hit record with the song Strange Fruit, it brought attention to this important issue in unusual ways.

Of Thee We Sing: Marian Anderson

February 04, 2015 14:01 - 15 minutes - 18.1 MB

On Sunday, April 9th, 1939, a huge, mixed race crowd gathered at the Lincoln Memorial to witness an extraordinary event. At a time when African-Americans were not allowed vote, go to school or use the same toilet as white people, black contralto Marian Anderson stood in front of 75,000 people and sang classical music – a sign of Civil Rights victories to come.