by Kandiss Edwards
February 10, 2025
Black Music Month was not initially created to have fun the artform.
Black Music Month, celebrated each June, was created in 1979 by the legendary Kenny Gamble, of Gamble and Huff, and different collaborators. The month affords Black People an opportunity to have fun the genius and artistry of their ancestors. It supplies a possibility to attend festivals, workshops, artwork displays, and extra, permitting contributors to show and have interaction.
Whereas the celebration performs an vital function in remembering the pioneers of a number of American music genres — jazz, blues, rock and roll, nation, rap, and R&B — it doesn’t mirror the preliminary intent of the month’s creators.
Black Music Affiliation
Co-owner of Philadelphia Worldwide Information, Gamble dreamed up the thought of Black Music Month as a member of the Black Music Affiliation. The affiliation was created as a community of radio DJs, promoters, present hosts, artists, and Black executives. The collective’s aim was to place Black artists on the forefront of Black music. Whereas African American music was common, positioning artists on nationwide platforms was nonetheless a troublesome feat. The affiliation aimed to alter that. Gamble noticed the facility wielded by the Nation Music Affiliation and started to query why Black people hadn’t adopted the identical methods. Nation Music Month is in October. Gamble got here up with the identify Black Music Month and declared June the opportune time.
Black Is Inexperienced
As a businessman and music inventive, Gamble wished to make — and simply as importantly, promote — Black music. Working with Cleveland radio DJ Ed Wright and media strategist Dyana Williams, Gamble got here up with the slogan “Black Is Inexperienced.” The slogan was meant to strengthen “the economics” of Black music.
“With Black Music Month, we got here up with a slogan: Black Music is inexperienced, which suggests economics. It’s about cash,” the legend stated in an interview.
“There was a time when Huff and I had been arising while you couldn’t put an album or single out with Teddy Pendergrass on the quilt as a result of report retailers and promoters wouldn’t even put him within the window.”
He continued, “Black music was an financial situation. Younger folks had been shopping for these albums left and proper; it wasn’t simply singles that Black folks had been shopping for.”
Music historian and member of the Black Motion Coalition, Naima Chocrane, spoke to the AP concerning the authentic intent of the month.
“Black Music Month was initially created to advertise, defend, and perpetuate the enterprise of Black music, not simply to have fun Black music,” she stated.
Black Networking
The agenda to dig into the financial features introduced in Black Music led Gamble and his compatriots to faucet their community, connecting with among the strongest males of the day. The Black godfather, Clarence Avant, was one of many predominant figures in making Gamble, Wright, and Williams’ motion a actuality nationally. Avant, recognized for his unlikely connections, helped facilitate a gathering with President Jimmy Carter, based on Gamble.
“Clarence Avant knew this man in Atlanta who knew President Jimmy Carter. He requested Carter if he would entertain Black Music Month on the White Home. Carter did it; all of us went down there [in 1979]. Huff and I went down there with all of our crew from Philly. I don’t assume they ever had that many Black folks within the White Home. We had the entire Black disc jockeys like Frankie Crocker. We had all people: Billy Eckstine, Evelyn ‘Champagne’ King performing, and Barry White. It was an incredible factor to see our folks working collectively. Jimmy Carter was sitting on the grass. It was good. It was lovely.”
Because the gathering on the White Home in 1979, the month of June has been acknowledged by the federal government, yearly, by way of presidential proclamation. On the floor, the unique message “Black is Inexperienced” might seem misplaced, because the occasions don’t heart report gross sales. But, the quantity of Black commerce generated by way of Black Music Month initiatives align closely with the preliminary objective. Black bookstores, promoters, venues, report shops, eating places, dwell musicians, and a bunch of different creatives and businesspersons collaborate to have fun and capitalize.
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