Created in April 2021, Black Opry has become “a home for Black artists and Black fans of country, blues, folk and Americana," and brings Black talent to stages all over the country.Since mid-February, Holly G’s email inbox has been filling up with at least half a dozen press requests a day.
I think I’m gonna help you guys count down to the album by sharing a Black country artist with you all every day til it drops. Would that be alright?Beyoncé’s foray into country music has ignited a discourse about race and the seemingly lily-white genre.
These experiences have happened countless times to numerous Black folks in country music spaces. We’re trying to change that atHolly said it was a daring decision for CMA to bring “three liberal” Chicks back to country music’s main stage (after they werecould feel that kind of hostility at the 2016 CMA Awards,That’s where Holly and Davenport’s organization has been doing the work. Holly knows all too well what kind of racism and hostility can be found in the country music space.
“It’s just a very insane evolution from somebody who was just a fan of something and wanted to see it be better,” Holly said. But when forced to either deny his personhood or live proudly as a gay man of faith, Davenport chose himself — and ultimately sacrificed his career. Little did he know that meeting Holly online would result in opportunities much greater, such as managing artists.“Six years ago, I had to quit out of the necessity of being authentically myself,” Davenport said. “And now, it’s essentially part of who we are as an organization, to authentically be ourselves to exist in this genre.
Black Opry is trying to counteract that institutional red tape by directly connecting Black country artists to Black audiences, effectively navigating the historical racial divide in country music. The conversation dates as far back as the 1920s, from the commercial divide between “race records” and “hillbilly music,” toas noted by Billboard staff writer Kyle Denis
“I spoke at the Country Radio Seminar, which is a big thing where all the country radio programmers come and pat each other on the back for four days,” Holly said. “They were like, ‘Oh my God, we are so proud of the progress that we made as an industry because there’s a Black woman at No. 1.’ I’m like, ’No, there’sown career, not how accepting the industry is. But what they see now is, ‘Well, we’ve gotten a Black woman to No. 1, so the work is done. Let’s move on.
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