New Orleans looks good from the bus, and better on the streets in the French Quarter. You can say a prayer at the Cathedral or have your palm read, tarot cards cast, caricature sketched right outside in the plaza. Promises of beignets, po boy sandwiches, gumbo, jambalaya and chicory coffee come from cafés lining the narrow streets, overhung by balconies adorned by lacy ironwork.

A shadow lies behind it all--a consciousness that Katrina destroyed lives and homes and neighborhoods invisible from this pretty tourist part of town. The French Quarter and the business district and the more prosperous parts of the city have been/are being rebuilt, but the Black and poor sections of the Ninth Ward still suffer and struggle. Driving through Mississippi, I sensed the same shadow lurking just beyond the trees. Ther has been great progress, but segregation persists, as it does in Chicago, as it does in the Twin Cities. Schools are integrated in name, but segregated in fact because whites attend private schools or move out of the cities.

There's still work to be done, all over this land. On Saturday, the CCC members move from the cultural work of song to the carpentry work of Habitat for Humanity. They are a beacon of hope for the future.

Jasmine Henderson

So, my experience has been amazing. I couldn't have asked for more than what I've gotten. To know that I've somewhat been exposed to my own history in a text book is very important to me, but to see it with my own eyes makes everything come alive for me. My favorite part of this tour, yet, was the slave museum. I've never know anything to come more alive for me. It was amazing. I am truely grateful for everything that my elders have done for me to get me to the point of where I am.

From Julia

My experience with this tour so far has been so amazing. My favorite part is when we went to the slavery and civil rights museum, the Stax Records, and singing for Waveland. Oh yea, I finally got Motown down, yay. This tour has been good so far, but I hope to get better as it goes on.

Four museums, three performances, 200 miles -- the choir's stamina and energy are awesome! (And much greater than mine.) Today we shared the intensity of the Slavery Museum, the walking-in-great-footsteps across the Edmund Pettus bridge, the power of Rosa Parks and the movement she grew in and mothered at the same time. And the choir kept singing, and the audiences kept getting into their songs.

In Montgomery, as in Birmingham, the audience cannot stay just an audience. When the choir sings "We need you to survive" -- we believe it. You are singing to us. And we need you, too. The whole-souled singing of the choir, their flashing smiles, Phillip's hand to his heart, Josephine's intense energy dancing through her hands ... and then hands lift up out of the audience, fingers point to heaven, prayers get physical, and the spirit breaks free.

Yasmeen, of Sweet Honey in the Rock, writes of growing up singing "with a gospel growl and struttin' at the same time" so that the congregation was "standing and shoutin' every time." She goes on to say:

Singing is always giving and taking and giving and taking. The lyrics supply the focus. They determine how the song is sung each time it's sung and those same lyrics may have a different meaning from one day to the next. Each of us [in Sweet Honey in the Rock] knows our perspective on the topic and that perspective will reveal itself to the audience in five different ways... The listener has at least one of us she or he can relate to, which is powerful for me, and yes, we do talk to the audience while we sing, and yes, the requirement ... is that the audience responds during the singing, not only afterward. I told you--give-and-take.

From Birmingham to Selma to Montgomery, the songs and the singers keep giving and taking.

You Did It Again

I must echo Ed's comments on the Carnegie Hall performance. It was truly the best presentation of the choir I have seen on film, in print, or in pictures. I viewed it a few times and was awestruck by all of the singers (not just Kyra). I certainly hope someone can work on getting us copies for those of us who didn't capture it on DVD. Keep up the great work!
Tanya

On this Sunday, we visited the 16th Street Baptist Church, where Addie Mae Collins, 14. Denise McNair, 11; Carole Robertson, 14; and Cynthia Wesley were struck down by hatred and racism. On September 15, 1963, Ku Klux Klan bombers killed four young girls and wounded more than two dozen other people in a church on Sunday morning. Their deaths came just a few weeks after Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. led the March on Washington and gave his famous "I have a dream" speech.

Today in the 16th Street Baptist Church, the choir sang "Birmingham Sunday."

On Birmingham Sunday a noise shook the ground.
And people all over the earth turned around.
For no one recalled a more cowardly sound.
And the choirs kept singing of Freedom.

I know we were standing on sacred ground. This is the very church where Denise and Addie and Carole and Cynthia prayed and sang and went to Sunday school. This is the very church where, on Monday night after Monday night, brave people gathered from 1958 onward to plan and work and organize to win freedom and justice and equal rights. Their heritage and their energy was with us as members of the congregation and guests and two choirs all linked arms and sang "We Shall Overcome" in the same church where Dr. Martin Luther King and Dr. Ralph Abernathy and Dr. Fred Shuttlesworth sang the same anthem.
Read more here.

CCC@Carnegie Hall!!!!!!!

Just saw the choir at Carnegie Hall on WTTW today! What an incredible performance and testimony to the hard working staff and choir! Elijah Rock was truly inspirational and I'm sure that all of people who are witness to this marvelous group's performances on the tour will feel the same.

Birmingham, July 15

Everyone arrived last night, and by 8 a.m. the adults on the tour were already organized and heading for the first concert at the Unitarian Universalist Church. That's where today -- and the tour -- really begin.

This afternoon we head for Birmingham's historic 16th Street Baptist Church. According to A Blues for the Birmingham Four:

On September 15, 1963, a savage explosion of 19 sticks of dynamite stashed under a stairwell ripped through the northeast corner of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. The four girls killed in the blast: Addie Mae Collins, 14;. Denise McNair, 11; Carole Robertson, 14; and Cynthia Wesley, 14, also died, and another 22 adults and children were injured. Meant to slow the growing civil rights movement in the South, the racist killings, like the notorious murder of activist Medgar Evers in Mississippi three months earlier, instead fueled protests that helped speed passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

From 1947 to 1963, the Birmingham area suffered 41 racially motivated bombings. "The 16th Street bombing left an indelible image all over the world of what Birmingham was like," said Wayne Flynt, a historian at Auburn University. "It established once and for all an international reputation for Birmingham as a city that was never too busy to hate." Yet the tragedy of the church bombing pushed blacks and whites to work harder at integration --- especially white moderates who had been silently tolerant of measures to quash attempts by blacks to achieve equality.

To see the faces of Addie Mae, Denise, Carole and Cynthia, and for more of the story, click here.

The identities of the Ku Klux Klan bombers were known very early on, but the FBI hid evidence and refused to pursue them. The first bomber, Robert Chambliss, was not convicted until 1977. Two others, Thomas Blanton and Bobby Frank Cherry, were finally tried and convicted in 2001 and 2002.

Tired in Atlanta

Molly, Macy, Ron and I arrived in Atlanta this evening and, after dinner and about three hours of work on the Daily Planet, I finally checked in and found TWO POSTS FROM CCC people! I am excited/delighted/overjoyed that you are on this blog! And now I'm going to sleep.

Good morning CCCeeeeeeee!

Great work CCC staff (and Beth) planning an awesome tour for our children. You've put a lot of work into this year of jubilee and this tour represents the culminating event of the choir's 50th year. Special thanks to Christina for catapulting the choir to the next level!

I just wanted to wish all of you a wonderful and safe journey. Learn a lot and sing well. I think that for many of you lucky enough to have this experience you will find that you will look at the world in a different way after this. Reading stories in a history book and watching snippets of film on the news during the month of February is really not enough to offer a true appreciation for how profoundly race relations in this country affects us all. Kudos to you and your families for saying yes to this tour. You'll be hot, sticky, tired, energized, saddened, jubilant, and come back exhausted and a little more mature as a result of what you'll see and hear.

I was disappointed to hear that while in New Orleans you won't visit Dillard University, a historically black university which has a long rich history going back to 1869. You will also miss visiting and seeing the infamous 9th ward of New Orleans that you've heard so much about in the news. New Orleans most assuredly represents a current modern day example of how relevant the civil rights movement still is. But the rest of the tour will certainly give you more than enough to ponder and appreciate.

On a lighter note, get tanned to a crisp in Alabama, take a great picture of the Gulf if you can, and eat lots of beignets and cafe au lait in 'Nawlins. I miss all of you already and look forward to seeing you off at the airport in the morning!

Its a race against the clock

Wow....I really should be doing other things but i'm just not there yet. As one of the first singers to post, I want to say thanks mary for everything! This tour is going to be great. As a fair warning, bus rides can be very crazy. We're already energetic when just at rehearsal, but when u keep that energy locked up on a bus for several hours, its becomes that much more exciting. I think this amount of time that were going to be spending with each other-along with the places that we're going to visit- is going to get alot of singers thinking and open up some interesting conversations.
I've spent too much time on the internet, I've got to start getting my things together!
Kyra w.

Friday morning

Airline e-tickets printed -- check
Mapquest directions between cities on tour printed -- check
Dog-sitter arranged -- check
Invitation to blog sent to all choir members -- check
TC Daily Planet editing work done for this morning -- check
Wake up family and get packing -- gotta run!

Two more days

We leave on Friday, flying into Atlanta in the afternoon. Between now and then, there are meetings, writing, Macy's drum lesson, Molly's calculus class, packing, printing e-tickets, putting together the trip book, talking with the house/dog/garden sitter ... how am I going to get it all done?

Juana

I met Juana in May. She was one of the people who fasted for ten days to try to move the conscience of the nation toward comprehensive immigration reform. I wrote an article about Juana and the fasters then. A few weeks later, I saw another article about Juana, this one written by a student in a journalism class at St. Thomas.

Yesterday the immigration agents found Juana and took her away in handcuffs. Today I saw her nine-year-old daughter crying. Today I stood with Juana's friends, and I cried, too. Patrick Ness, a stalwart young activist, said, "Our hearts are broken tonight." And not just for Juana Reyes, but for every immigrant mother torn away from her children because the laws give her no way to be here legally. A few weeks ago, another immigrant mother who had lived in Minnesota for more than a decade was deported, leaving behind her husband and children. They have legal status. She does not.

For Juana and for Sarah, the law gives no way out of their predicament and no way into the United States. For millions like them, there is no line to stand in to become legal residents.

In a few days, I will be going on a Freedom Tour of cities where the battle for civil rights was waged four and five decades ago. I believe that the plight of immigrants like Juana and Sarah challenges us to another battle for human rights.

Countdown

Five days until Freedom Tour 2007 begins! I'm backing up computer files, checking camera batteries, and trying to finish at least two chapters before Saturday. I want to be ready to meet all of the Choir members.

When I was a kid on the farm, I watched the civil rights movement unfold on the evening news, horrified and fascinated and inspired at the same time. I wanted to go south then, to march with Dr. King and with James Meredith, but I was too young. Now, 40+ years later, I will walk where they walked.

When Youth Protest

From an oral history interview with Lucille Green.

G: I think the Youth Movement was very effective in those days. During those times the Youth Movement was very effective because I think it took the young people because they were brave and they were unafraid. I don't believe we could have used anyone else that would have been that brave and courageous other than young people because these were students that came from Tougaloo College and truly from all over; because there were high school students too; because at that particular time my brother was in high school at Brinkley. They were part of the sit-ins with the Freedom Riders. Sure they were arrested. Most times they were. My mom went and got them out of jail.

H: Did she have to pay to get them out or she just went and signed them out?

G: She went and signed them out. And then as soon as she did that those kids went right back. That's when they were hauled off in the paddy wagon down to the Fairgrounds. So these were the experiences that they had. They went through the fire hoses and all of this stuff. I didn't have any of those experiences but my sister and brother did. And I really think that those young people really made a very, very strong impact because they were brave and courageous and they weren't afraid and they weren't easy to turn away.

This oral history is part of a collection from the Jackson Civil Rights Sites Project, Margaret Walker Alexander Research Center, Jackson State University, Jackson, Mississippi. The interviewer was Dr. Alferdtine Harrison. The date was 1998. To read the full interview, go to When Youth Protest

Sweet Honey in the Rock

From We Who Believe in Freedom by Bernice Johnson Reagon and Sweet Honey in the Rock

All of the energy of our living goes into our singing during our concerts. We are sharing so much more than a concert of songs. We are calling our people together. As a singer and a song leader, I draw upon the singing I sang in jail when singing was a bond. Singing gave us something to use as a weave and a connection.