http://bit.ly/AntiRacismResources
I make my living teaching music created by Black people. Blues was born out of struggle and some of the songs we love today were protest songs disguised as something else. Black people suffering violence at the hands of those in authority is how we got the blues. Period.
Their struggle is in the music I love.
White people like me, like some of my influences, and like some of you, have fallen in love with the blues, but we haven’t really fallen in love with where it came from. It's really easy to see the music we play today as "here and now", and not see any connection between its origins and our lives today.
I think that’s a mistake.
I grew up in farm country from a mostly white town. But this country boy fell in love with black music and my life changed forever after that. Life took some strange turns after college and today my beautiful wife is black, my two sons are half-black. Almost every close friend I’ve had for the past 20 years has been black. And many of my guitar heroes were black.
Why did a white country boy wind up with this kind of life? I have no idea. That my life is so intertwined with black music and black people doesn’t make me special, or better, but it does affect how I look at this world.
I have customers and viewers in over 100 countries, from every religion, race, and political background you can imagine. The music I love and teach has evolved into a universal language of expression, and it has reached every corner of the globe.
I don’t talk about politics or religion at Texas Blues Alley, but I am extremely vocal about these issues on my personal accounts. As such, I will not be discussing this further here or on any other TXBA account.
But because of the music I love, because of the people who created it, because of my friends, my wife, and my children, I have to say it here to make it perfectly clear:
I believe Black Lives Matter.
Exploring issues of race and equality has been a way of life for me since WAY before I started teaching guitar online. I've kept my guitar ventures purely guitar focused, and will continue to do so. But my personal life is very different than what you see on TXBA.
My entire life for the past 20 years has been deeply engrained with black people who have been my second family and my best friends. I've watched their kids grow up, I've attended their weddings, funerals, and shared counteless meals with them. They accepted me and loved me even when I was too ignorant to know the things I was saying were eye-rollingly ignorant. They are still my closest friends.
So while TXBA (and every other music related site/channel) will be back to regularly scheduled programming tomorrow, my life will not. I'm not going to lecture you here about white privilege or any of that stuff because I have accepted that I cannot force anyone to see or understand what they don't want to. But trust me when I say that the quality you see in everything I do is driven by the same worldview that brings you this video.
Thank you for your support for these many years, TXBA isn't changing, I'm simply sharing a tiny part of what has been my life for two decades with you today.
God bless,
Anthony