Date/Time
Date(s) - January 12, 2020
2:00 pm - 4:00 pm
Location
Urbana Free Library
Categories
“They raised their voices in song against inequality and racism. They gave the civil rights movement its anthems and its soul. They were the singers and songwriters who fought for change and gave us songs like Blowin’ in the Wind, Oh Freedom, People Get Ready, Respect and Fight the Power. Those songs and many others are at the core of this exclusive feature-length movie edition of Let Freedom Sing: How Music Inspired the Civil Rights Movement.
There are dramatic first-person accounts by Mississippi Freedom Riders who sang to give themselves courage in the face of grave danger. There are the songs from the 1963 March on Washington when Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. gave his “I Have a Dream” speech. And there are award-winning artists and musicians whose songs inspired a generation to take up the struggle for civil rights and human rights throughout America and the world.
Let Freedom Sing retells one of the greatest stories in American history. Billie Holiday’s song about lynching, Strange Fruit, and the scalding bitterness of Big Bill Broonzy’s When Do I Get to Be Called a Man, take us back to the era of brutally enforced segregation. But the story sweeps us to the heart of the movement in the 1960s and explores its continuing impact on music, politics and culture in the decades that followed. With never-before-seen historical footage and remarkable new interviews with Gladys Knight, Ruby Dee, Chuck D., Andrew Young and Pete Seeger, among many others, Let Freedom Sing tells the story of the civil rights movement as never before!”
We Wanna Woke Community Justice Choir will be on hand to lead attendees in songs. Join us!