look open up. and open up. open your mouth and you start to push. i know. it's her see way told. there's a. human side last night here in. change about the place. i do not hear the same.

level this old dog and the little dog. was a happy time in maine was the. dogs you saw. going out with a little boy and what i do not play anymore. is all of us and those. plans i. told them what this old dog and that little.

it is to the times changes constantly. trying to be. in the middle.

so tell me what was the first moment your life or your you truly found your passion for music. well i discovered my passion for old time music like after high school when i had been playing saxophone from the age of five until freshman year i started playing cello and bass in high school and i went to in a math and science engineering school and was like really i'm enjoying music like i'm going to take a year off from college and and in that year is when i discovered country blues and it was like ok i think i want to play music i think that's what it is for me and. it was like hearing skip james for the first time and thinking how otherworldly it was and not yet having any of the historical or social contacts yet but just like enjoying the music. and so that was like my my entry into the world of music

bombed and all that kind of stuff. and it's sort of like inherent with old time music is is learning and learning history you know like you know it's not like pop music where all the references are easily available and right there for you so just learn more about the music and start to learn. about the banjo being a black and about you know what really happened after slavery and how that contributed to our growth in music and. you know train lines and jim crow and you start learning about all these things in the song start having heated meetings and other meetings and. it's not just entrenched me in the music more and more what led you to the banjo and tell me a little bit about how the banjo is the black ansermet because i don't think very many people know that history because i think most people assume you know now that i. have had a nickel for a number of times you will ask me to play that yeah. so there you know history the

banjos you have slaves coming from you know africa mostly west africa cetera and they they either bring with the instruments like the a continent and other you know gourd instruments with a skin stretched over it with strings or when they come here they end up making replicas of it. and so. slaves are creating the instruments are these amalgamations of you know their stringed instruments in the creating the banjo and it becomes known as a black instrument as a slave instrument for whatever one hundred years or some like that why people don't touch it and it's like you know if you can find old text of like oh it could be the banjo melodies coming from the plantations at night or remember seeing an old article saying like oh you know the first holy american music is being made on the plantations right. we're slaves you know we're playing violin and are learning songs to entertain the masters and their friends but they're also you know combining it with their own thing and what is that thing that thing is. you know

that drone string that you see me playing that fifth string that i never fret that . that's that's africa that's black people's is that you know you have john philip sousa. we come along and we're like no it's you know if we change it and that becomes kind of what american music you know grows into so the banjo is a black instrument for a hundred years white people start getting into it. and of course they do it in the most are not of course rewind three to one. but you know they start doing it and a very racist way which is blackface michel c. you know part of it is you know an appreciation of the music and these early michel songs you find you know you know there's like this is a real negro song like learned from a real black person like you know at the end of shows sometimes they'd wipe off the makeup like surprise we're not black you know but it was you know appreciation for this music and it was while most popular form of american music for. ages right

generations because of that think a patient was like rock and roll back that you know but it's all based on. you know the black experience and black music so learning that fact really got me into the banjo made me want to be a part of it and i would hear like clarence actually or uncle dave make. you know whatever recordings and be like i don't know what they're doing i don't get it at all and when i learned that fact of the banjo being black it seems like i want to pick up a banjo and then someone threw one in my hands taught me how to claw hammer and i it clicks like i picked it up immediately and the banjo in me for life you know as we go to break don't forget to let us know what you think of the topics we've covered and if you would like to learn more about the artist who's featured on the show today check us out on facebook and twitter and you too can see our poll shows that are. coming up we go deeper into the heart and soul of american music as

watching the hawks strikes a chord. still exist. ricos treated as one. of. the islanders controlled by the u.s. government and. crave independence. even. still many do wish to join the u.s. hundreds more leave every day.

with the country. is on the rise. i think. and. put out a set of facts that simply do not accord with reality you have constructed. that makes it difficult for you to cooperate with others. travel destinations so it must be nice to live there or is it. going to. go to disrupt the city's economic and social life before this on the scene.

of the. us i am somebody. as weak as my money. on the city's tried desperately not to collapse. of. the will probably a. couple. in the bushes up the on sobs and the supposed to mean a. lot. is a tourist phobia fulfill identity. please hold on. welcome back. now let's head to the stage for more from happy chick.

thank you. thank you. thank.

you. thank you you. thank

.

you know one of the big i think issues today that a lot of people and it's interesting you talk about them like playing a song like that or your shows do you get pushback from from both sides saying like oh that that's you know that has a history of being a racist song or you have the other side saying oh why are you you know changing the lyrics of a classic song represents a certain year because i could see how both sides of that should be like we shouldn't play that song today because of the you know were removed beyond it you know or the other side saying well we don't change the song or make it your own because it belongs to us and what are you know forefathers wrongly thought at the time there are maybe we still secretly do you know that kind of thing do you see that kind of pushback when you play excuse me yeah i get all kinds of responses playing even you know when i joined up with carolina chocolate drops the main tenant of carolina chocolate drops was you know this is black people's music the banjo is a black instrument which was like not. you know whatever eight years ago not widely

known even within old time world and so we'd play shows and people come up to me hey my granddaddy played the banjo you know f. you like you're wrong and so you just have to deal with that. as i've gotten older now like just you know historically infiltrating and giving people the visceral reaction of seeing a black person play the banjo has become kind of normalized for me now and so it becomes more of integrating these more political ideas social attacking everyone to call it and so when that happens i get responses like what was one of my favorites . that nothing's going to change hey this music is supposed to be fun and easy why are you doing that or on the flipside i'm glad you didn't get all angry about it i'm glad you can say nigger because i care to hear. that gets mixed up i've had people leave shows. at a show. you know i think like ten people left and try to get refunds for we seem to

get a place for it we know how to get great we know that we can people can get enraged about what's happening and see things and get angry how do we use things like music and use the banjo how do you see that going into communities and helping them deal with that anger and finding a productive way to help our community. ok have a few things say that. so you like so you're asking about like how do we use this music and this banjo stuff to get people really to grow and really to change their communities and hopefully change the country. and then also like you know. but the beginning of course was like the response of the anger like response to the images and all that sort of stuff and i like to think about. you know. sorry given what's going to get my thoughts together and. you know you have like the turn of like nine hundred century twentieth century one nine hundred s.

. and you know around the beginning one thousand nine hundred six there are these work prison farms that are happening and this is a you know after the compromise of eight hundred seventy seven soldiers leave the south and the redeemers take over the south and they're able to just go hog wild fire all the black people from government and they start the black laws which are the birth of jim crow. and it's this is a legal way of it becomes legal but this sinister way of imprisoning mostly black men and you know farming them out to coca-cola dredging swamps in florida all these sorts of things around this time. there's a train of prisoners that breaks that going through florida and usually they transport these prisoners at night but they train breaks down they get there during the day and all these people mostly white people see all these prisoners who are about to go out and dredge the swamps and they're covered with marks and they remain seated and they're people like oh my god this is horrifying we have to stop doing this this is terrible still happens today fast forward thirty years lynchings a big thing lynchings a problem people start seeing it you know lots of black newspapers are trying to

put it out there oh my god this lynching thing is terrible we have to stop it fast forward civil rights movement like you know oh my god cops are brutalizing people and all this stuff terrible bloody sunday happens when people are outrage. rodney king happens l.a. riots. almost seems like every thirty twenty eight years this is happening and you keep going and i think this is that of our generation you know i mean i was about richard pryor where he tells his joke you know you know you get paid on friday night you take your girl out then you get pulled over by the cops you know hands up drop your pants spread your cheeks and he's like you know who feels like having fun after something like that because white people don't believe this happens because they know the cops differently that's a job from the seventy's that works today. so yeah you know. white people getting outraged by the injustice the black people had to deal with in this country for hundreds of years does nothing for me. it doesn't aspire me any way and it doesn't it's not something that i would bet on something and i wouldn't

put my eggs in that basket. and that being said i think that there is something to this thing that i like to. think that inspires me more or feel more optimistic about is a cultural shift this is the idea of you know this cultural shift towards like you know what that pop music that i've been digesting forever i'm done with that you know watching a movie called the great wall starring matt damon i think i might be done with that you know i mean a movie or a show set in new york with no puerto ricans i think i'm done with i'm like that's the kind of thing that. i feel moved towards growing because it's changing the concept of how you look at a person yes everyone going to be outraged by seeing something violent but it's like how can i change my change your cultural shift so i hope you know when when the banjo craze sort of happening people started playing banjos you know a lot of that credit went to like mumford and. taylor swift or and whatever well

people might have been grabbing banjos up or they were they were playing their own things or running their own things they were starting to grow vegetables again in their backyards and canning or whatever it might be and so. i don't know i think. this is where you know i start to get conned conflicted but i think that it's. if you can. i don't know i just think if you can understand something culturally and understand its roots and like if i pick up a banjo and i understand that you know if i don't know to play it if i can destroy what i understand in a deeper level but that brings about some sort of change small ripples but whatever it is american to me in the music especially in the music you talk about is it's really about. poor are working class americans and it speaks to a lot of different people it's one of those universal things like music do you see new forms of that or do you see that coming and the new music that's that's coming

down the pike. there there are you know now americana music is kind of like this big all encompassing thing like. i was at the american awards like two years ago and like booker t. was there performing and like you know under that umbrella. and you have wads you know like dylan welch and. dave rawlings and up that stuff you know there are a lot of those guys in the americana john or were influenced by the people from the sixty's and seventy's who were influenced by a lot of this music that i you know feel more connected to and like to play old time country blues all that sort of stuff and you know so it's not uncommon to hear . you know an old timey line or an old timey phrase in a modern song put into a modern context you know. i think. the money was the question you asked me. that was

a question of like how is this people today sort of creating are people still creating that new thing yeah and so like i think through you know the singer songwriter thing it's becoming a new thing you have like when i hear like electro swing at some point like in europe you were like making beats out of old swing music and. yeah you know i think i think that it is being it is. integrating and influencing people and i think you know part of my thing is you know yes know about black people like all day and but also just know the roots of your thing know the roots of what you believe and know the roots of what you're into. and then find a way to express it and so people getting into the old time thing that old time thing does have that history of protests and activism and community. and telling the news and telling the stories and expressing it so you know people just get influenced by that that's great you know. where would you see.

as a musician and then as a man in the future like where do you see yourself going as a man. you know so you know every day changes you asked me yesterday the answer might have might be different you know. i like playing music i'd like to play more of it i'd like to add some point to get a way to get more instruments into kids' hands you know like music programs closing all over the place and doing things with that i also really like the radio. i actually like that before i came out here i've been working on a project of talking to homeless people in new york and like interviewing homeless people and trying you know more and more buildings are going up in new york city but the homeless population is rising so i want to do something with radio. my old high school brooklyn technical high school has a defunct radio tower on top of it so my big like pipeline dream i hope no one steals it it's like reopen the radio station and do something with kids and music on the radio stuff like that as a man. hopewell know how to like fix

a diesel engine. on a car like i think that would be good for me and i've never like needed bread i've never like used east to make bread and i think it's a man those two things would probably get the whole thing. same same. countdown time zone was going i. thought i'd seen. seen five maybe. get on back. restore

my. scene seen my baby get on. the phone and. find out on my phone. that some. sun was shining. on my phone. and that. on top of all i. can back home cam on top but. call me.

a name and. don't. go. not i'm going to go in some way. i never. been before i. said now. come on. somewhere i'm the. man.

and that is our show for you to day remember everyone in this world we are not told we are loved and up so i tell you all i love you i am tyrrel them and on top of the wall lists keep on watching those hawks and have a great day and to. release her mum. would love. to be a doozy a saint but i think there will be cheap buses and then we went through all the countries so let's idea is really their right to scold us come to that he said

cheerfully give them everything let's look to the past. you leave this country. this is what we don't understand how we are poor in such a country it's. the nurse until the month of the same time to make up your saying i'm going to. the soon to run off with a similar symbol to john that i feel like a good one. because if you feel. the minarets of own will and not that god can we believe again in the world with the phone about the future without the plane . would come back to the three story you have to see. it at least best. if you move the. blue moon do you. think you're new to the game this is how it works now

the economy is built around corporations corporations run washington washington controls the media the media the. voters elect the businessman to run this country business equals power you must it's not business as usual it's business like it's never been done before. what we see on television left wing say advocates left wingers out there and they're shutting down professors from speaking at colleges so the shutting down colleges. this is an example of them being or acting in an author terry terry and passé become little dictators yes and this is were linked to the fact that as children they were completely shielded from any of the so-called dangers of life kept in a bubble and so when they become young adults anything that disrupts that bubble

a loud sound like a professor saying something that doesn't agree with them they go into shock they go into stuff like meltdown. do colon is still exist. rico's treated as one. hundred forty three cool. little can i do a lot of. the island is controlled by the us government and some puerto rican screw even dependents. either we. were taking a game with the earliest. still many do wish to join the us hundreds more leave every day. i'm a long way from india. beings. with the country at a crossroads anger of the island is on the rise.

but they deserve the world's greatest economic time is beginning arriving in the german city of hamburg for the g. twenty summit we'll look at the challenges facing the. trying to overcome. the host cities braced for mass protests with his many is one hundred thousand activists expected to turn out if they are promising to disrupt the summit under the slogan welcome. and ahead of the g twenty the u.s. secretary of state invites russia to cooperate on no fly zones in syria.