By Patricia Thrushart, Cofounder, Poets Against Racism USA
“You can take my body
You can take my bones
Take my blood but
Not my soul …”
—Rhiannon Giddens, “At the Purchaser’s Option”
Singer, songwriter, and instrumentalist Rhiannon Giddens wrote these lyrics after reading an advertisement that had been placed in a Kingston, New York, newspaper in August of 1797. “For Sale,” the advertisement announced, “A remarkable smart healthy Negro Wench, about 22 years of age; used to both housework and farming, and sold for no fault but for want of emply [sic].”
The advertisement went on: “She has a child about 9 months old, which will be at the purchaser’s option.”
Let that sink in.
Giddens, who has made it her life’s work to reclaim the contributions to folk and country music by African Americans, wrote “At the Purchaser’s Option” in response to the emotions these cold words evoke. She recorded it on her album Freedom Highway (Nonesuch Records) in 2017. I have heard her sing this haunting poem twice—once during a lecture given at the Chautauqua Institute in mid-August and once more recently at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music’s Finney Chapel. At Chautauqua, she performed the song while accompanying herself on the 5-string banjo, playing in the clawhammer style used by Black string bands in the 1820s. Their music she has done so much to reinvigorate, especially through the trio she cofounded, the Carolina Chocolate Drops. Her lecture that summer afternoon on the lake was about the history of the banjo itself—an instrument created by enslaved Africans and their descendants in the Caribbean and colonial North America. (Her instrument is a replica of banjos from the period.) The banjo’s simple accompaniment kept Gidden’s interpretation stark and defiant. During the concert at Oberlin, she changed it up, adding the power of Francesco Turrisi on piano and bassist Jason Sypher. Their sensitive treatment of the piece helped Giddens further express the untenable future this mother faced.
I am not ashamed to say I wept.
Another emotional moment at Oberlin came when the trio turned to the spiritual “I Shall Not Be Moved.” Long associated with the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, its origins are disputed. The blues singer Mississippi John Hurt recorded it in 1965; Ella Fitzgerald, Sweet Honey in the Rock, Johnny Cash, and Taj Mahal all covered it. At Oberlin, GIddens invited the sold-out audience to join her, and we did:
“On my way to Justice
I shall not be moved,
On my way to Justice
I shall not be moved,
Like a tree planted by the water,
I shall not be moved.”
When the singing stopped, there was a hush before the audience erupted in the wild cheering that punctuated the concert.
Giddens is a 2000 graduate of the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, and she was obviously touched by the support and enthusiasm of the crowd. But she had a request of us—one that I wish to reinforce. She took time to talk about her activism and the importance of acting “in the micro.” She asked us: “What next? What will you do after this concert? Who is this banquet for?” Her message was clear: “Everybody needs to tell these stories. We all need to be doing the work.”
Her words galvanized me. I felt fortunate that I had a means to answer her challenge: the power of poetry. I came away from the concert more dedicated than ever to Poets Against Racism USA as the way we are “doing the work.”
If you are unfamiliar with the work of Rhiannon Giddens, please give yourself the gift of learning about her. The native of Greensboro, North Carolina, was named a MacArthur Fellow in 2017—just one of the many awards her prodigious talents have earned her. Her most recent album, They’re Calling Me Home, won a Grammy for Best Folk Album this year. Trained as an opera singer, she has composed an opera, Omar, based on an autobiography written in 1831 by an enslaved Muslim man in America. The opera’s debut performance was offered during the Spoleto Festival in May 2022. In July she was named the artistic director of Silkroad, the ensemble conceived by cellist Yo-Yo Ma. Giddens wrote and performed the music for Black Lucy and the Bard, a ballet danced by the Nashville Ballet and broadcast on PBS’s Great Performances series. She is about to publish a children’s book based on her composition “Build a House.” In addition to these career milestones, she tours and lectures extensively across the United States and beyond, offering programs such as “Songs of Our Native Daughters,” “Freedom on the Move,” and “Indigenous Connections.” And take a moment to find the video of her performing Paul Simon’s “American Tune,” with lines he changed for her, at the Newport Folk Festival in July. You will wonder, like I did, how you didn’t know about her. Even more importantly, you will be inspired.