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NMAAM’s Celebration of Black Art Should Be a Call to Action for Country Music
The stories of co-opted Black musicians show everyone what needs to change with Music City’s biggest cultural export
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Photo: Daniel Meigs
After touring the National Museum of African American Music during a pre-opening press day, I stopped Henry Beecher Hicks III, the museum’s president and CEO, on my way out the door. I smiled and told him that I loved it — that the museum exceeded every one of my expectations.
As someone who fashions words into sentences and paragraphs for a living, I winced at my pitiful use of language, though it was the best I could offer at the time. When I ran into Hicks, my heart was still so full, my breath caught in my chest like a mother hearing her child say “I love you” for the very first time. I was speechless at the care taken to present this all-important history so thoroughly; my heartbeat qui ....

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