It’s June 1 st , 2020, and Jazz singer and activist Aaron Myers joins thousands of demonstrators in
Washington, DC’s Lafayette Square. “I saw people running,” he related. “I started coughing and
crying.” Myers couldn’t think why security forces fired tear gas. Then he saw government
officials walking to a nearby church for a photo op. At that moment, he said, he committed to
raise his voice of resistance even louder.
As protests continued, other Jazz musicians have raised their own voices. Robert Glasper, Ben
Williams, Ambrose Akinmusire, and Terri Lynn Carrington are just some of those who’ve joined
the chorus. Bassist Luke Stewart, co-founder of CapitalBop – a DC non-profit advocating Jazz
performance and activism – was, he said, “pretty much at a protest in some fashion every day.”
Although fearful of the COVID pandemic, Stewart felt it was his responsibility to be a witness to
the movement.
Music executives launched “Blackout Tuesday,” a call for the industry to halt new releases and
close business for a day to protest the killing of Black Americans. Bandcamp – an online
marketplace – donated a portion of its sales on Juneteenth to the NAACP. The Warner Music
Group launched a $100 million fund to help groups promote social justice, and speak out
against violence and racism.
Aaron Myers celebrates the growing resistance movement toward real social change. But he
does, however, recognize that even big steps are still just steps on a long march to equity and
equality.
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