The Gullah Geechee people are descendants of those enslaved in the Sea Islands of Florida, North Carolina, Georgia and South Carolina. Because of the remoteness of the plantations, the Gullah Geechee were able to retain some of their African traditions, including the ring shout. It’s a ritual in which participants move counterclockwise in a circle while shuffling and stomping their feet and clapping their hands, in call and response fashion. The tradition is rooted in West African culture, mixed with elements of Christianity. The Gullah Geechee Ring Shouters from Darien, Georgia have preserved this ancestral heritage through performance and education since 1980. They joined us on stage at the New Orleans Jazz Museum where they started with a song you will probably recognize, that came from the Gullah Geechee culture.

Lil Wayne raised eyebrows when he announced dates for his upcoming Tha Carter VI Tour earlier this month. New Orleans, his hometown, was nowhere on the list of 35 dates.

Charley Pride was the first great African American star of country music. Born in Sledge, MS in 1938, Pride left farm life behind and had a budding baseball career in the Negro and minor leagues. He worked by day in a Montana steel mill and sang country music at night. That got the attention of Nashville producers in the mid-‘60s, and he went on to a career that included 29 number one country hits and induction into the Country Music Hall of Fame. Charley Pride passed away in 2020, and his story remains a special one that begins back down home on the Mississippi tenant farm he came to own.

Want to honor and celebrate Juneteenth in New Orleans? You can enjoy live music, celebrate with friends and learn about Black heritage at a number of events happening around the city this month.

We have a guide to help you keep track of all the happenings.

On this week's episode, we zoom into Clarksdale, Mississippi, where Ryan Coogler’s latest blockbuster "Sinners" is set.

The late guitarist and singer Richie Havens was raised in the Bed–Stuy section of Brooklyn, home to many West Indians, a kind of urban village where his grandmother from Barbados presided. Havens’ Native American grandfather had ridden horses in Buffalo Bill shows and lived on the Shinnecock reservation on Long Island. Growing up, Richie Havens played in the neighborhood with friends from all over the world. He sang doo-wop on the corner and gospel in the church. But he credited his father, a factory worker, as the primary influence in art and music.

Shemekia Copeland's dad, Texas guitarist Johnny Copeland, moved his family to Harlem, where Shemekia was born and grew up surrounded by hip-hop, but dedicated to the blues. She's been in the blues scene since she was a little girl singing at her dad's shows. We began back in those early days, on stage, with her father.