As some of you know, I have been thinking about workshops as a paying music/info gig. The church gigs I have pretty well scoped out, at least as concepts.

For schools, though, one workshop idea I am working on is, "Your Black Heritage." Cuz white folks have a black heritage-- we can claim that music as OUR culture too, because it WAS there to be soaked up! (In the same vein as "black history is EVERYONE's history.")

I think it's time white folks stopped feeling bad for "ripping off" black culture--- and a lot of folks do. Embarrassed, apologetic. But it was there in its purely black form to be gobbled up, and we did, and we also made it our own in a million ways, too. Going from the spirituals up to the present, in gospel music, for example, would take us right through all the music we all know. (The gospel counterparts to the popular music were created in those same time periods.)

So these are all fodder for the mind mill as I mull it.

Butch, how do you approach talking about all the race issues, in promoting what you do as well as in doing it?

~Susan