In Memoriam: Bernice Johnson Reagon

 

[purchase Breaths, a compilation of two Sweet Honey in the Rock Albums]

The first In Memoriam post that I wrote here (in 2011) was my second post ever, before I was even an “official” member of the SMM team.  It was about singer and civil rights activist Matt Jones who was, at one point, a member of the SNCC Freedom Singers.  Jones wasn’t one of the founding members, but the subject of this piece, Bernice Johnson Reagon was.  And she was much more.

Born in 1943 in southwest Georgia, she was the daughter of a Baptist minister and showed both academic and musical talent at an early age.  In 1959, she enrolled in Albany State College to study music, but the imperative of the civil rights movement led her to be active in the NAACP and SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee).  Bernice became involved in the “Albany Movement,” which aimed to desegregate Albany and ensure voting rights for Black residents.  As part of the Movement, protestors, including Reagon, sang at rallies as a sign of unity.  Reagon was jailed in 1961 for participating in the protests (as was Martin Luther King, Jr.)  Not only did the Albany Movement fail in its initial goals, Reagon was expelled from college as a result of her imprisonment.  She briefly attended Spelman College but dropped out to focus on civil rights work.

Along with Rutha Harris, Charles Neblett and her future husband Cordell Reagon, she founded the SNCC Freedom Singers, which began touring in December 1962 to raise money for SNCC.  In 1963, Bernice married Cordell, and in 1964, she left the SNCC Freedom Singers to give birth to her daughter Toshi, who became a powerful performer in her own right.  Son Kwan Tauna (who is a chef) was born in 1965, and the couple split in 1967.  Reagon returned to Spelman and graduated in 1971.  At Spelman, she formed the Harambee Singers, an all-female group which focused on opposition to South African apartheid.

After graduating, she received a Ford Foundation Fellowship, allowing her to obtain her Ph.D in History from Howard University in 1975.  While in grad school, Reagon was the Vocal Director of the Black Repertory Theater in D.C. and in 1973, she created an all-female and all-Black a capella group, Sweet Honey in the Rock.  She was the director of Sweet Honey in the Rock until 2003, and the group became world-renowned, recording albums that spanned genres, touring globally and earning three Grammy nominations, while continuing their focus on social justice and equality.

The video above is Sweet Honey in the Rock’s, “Ella’s Song,” written by Reagon in honor of civil rights pioneer Ella Baker, originally released on their 1983 album We All…Everyone of Us,” and it’s a powerful song of courage and struggle.

Reagon has published a number of books, released several solo albums and contributed to award-winning documentaries.  For years, she worked with the Smithsonian and National Museum of American History and was a distinguished professor of history at American University.  Among other honors, Reagon was awarded a MacArthur Foundation grant, a Peabody Award (for “Wade in the Water: African American Sacred Music Traditions” a NPR series on Black church music), the Charles Frankel Prize and Presidential Medal (presented at the White House by President Clinton, and the Heinz Award.

Reagon died on July 16, 2024 at the age of 81, survived by her children, a granddaughter, her life partner, Adisa Douglas, and her siblings.

In Memoriam: Matt Jones

 Matt Jones: Ballad of Medgar Evers
 [purchase]

The civil rights movement peaked during my childhood. I vaguely remember reading about it in the newspapers and seeing things on TV, and I remember hearing that Martin Luther King, Jr. had been assassinated. On my mother’s birthday. Of course, growing up in the 70’s in a liberal suburban New York family, the civil rights movement was always there, always something that I was aware of, but not something that directly affected my life.

Fast forward to about 10 years ago. My wife and kids and I are living in a small village on the Hudson River, and we get invited to a “music party” at a neighbor’s beautiful brick house. The owners lived in Manhattan and used this house on the weekends. We were told that they had friends who were folk singers, and that we should come, bring a bottle of wine and be prepared to sing, if we wanted to.

Over the next few years, my wife and kids and I attended a few of these parties. There was a rotating group of singers and musicians—playing guitars, mandolins, banjos, concertinas—and singing old labor songs, anti-Vietnam War songs, Civil Rights songs, as well as classic and modern folk songs, and original compositions.

It was an amazing experience. The clear leaders of group were two brothers, Matt and Marshall Jones. Using the power of the Internet, I learned that they were true heroes of the Civil Rights movement—members of the SNCC Freedom Singers and participants in many of the famous marches and demonstrations. Being in the same room as them made me feel a connection to something that I had only previously read about, and hearing them sing songs that they probably played at demonstrations gave me chills. I was also glad that my children, who have grown up in a multicultural community where the legacy of the Sixties is, often, taken for granted, got a chance to get a personal connection to some of the people who put their comfort and safety on the line and fought for equality and peace. Matt Jones once said “I don’t think of myself as a cultural worker, I am a freedom singer; a freedom fighter. I’ve always been a freedom fighter; I’ll probably go down that way, too.”

A few years ago, one of the hosts had a stroke, and the parties ended. Earlier this year, I read that Matt Jones had died. I haven’t seen his name on any lists of musicians who died this year, and maybe that would be OK with him, but he left an amazing legacy. Listen to his Ballad of Medgar Evers, sung by the SNCC Freedom Singers, a tribute to the civil rights leader who was assassinated by a KKK leader in 1963.

Guest Post by J David