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I went to Full Gospel Tabernacle and couldn't find it. I went to the home of the King of Rock and Roll and couldn't find it. But in the poorest neighborhood I've ever seen...I found it! I found just what I'd been looking for all day...something real.
'Soulsville USA' it is nicknamed and a truer title couldn't be had. For the better part of a decade STAX records recorded some of the most amazing music since the Classic Pre-War blues period. The Staples Singers, Otis Redding, Al Green, Isaac Hayes and the list goes on and on. Uptown beat and room to pour every ounce of emotion into a song. That's what it is all about!
I was noticeable again today and was welcomed by Al Green himself right outside the studio. Pretty cool! (Man these guys know how to dress.) The museum itself is a treat filled with a rural Mississippi Baptist church (transported and preserved inside), a history of gospel and blues and all the memorabilia you could fit in on the STAX years. The main lessons today:
1. Gospel is singin' for God and Blues is singin' for the People.
2. Religion is the main method for shaping the character of a child in the South.
3. Music is all about community!
I admit that I went to Graceland not because I felt a pull to it, I didn't. I went because I truly happened to be in the neighborhood. I view Elvis as a bluesman but there was no mention of that at Graceland. There was also no mention about his mentors like Mahalia Jackson and there was no mention that many of his hits had already been released on 'Race Records'. For example...Big Mama Thornton's "Hound Dog". Case in point. What I saw was a lot of 'smoke and mirrors'. Souvenir shops, 24 carat gold plated sinks in an airplane no less and a home frozen in 1977. Imagine how amazing Graceland could be if his early artistic development in Mississippi had been explored? It could serve as an education for the people who will never really understand that Elvis was mentored by the African American artists of his day!! (Okay, rant now over.)
But after all was said and done on the day I was reminded that staying open and following a thread really can lead somewhere really fine. Thanks to STAX and Soulsville USA for an amazing and real day!
Peace & Love,
Kat
