Rails, Roots & Resonance
Join Súle Greg Wilson and Greg Johnson for an educational and entertaining evening exploring the African roots of the banjo and its influence on the development of country music.
Located along the historic rail line where Jimmie Rodgers overheard the rhythmic chants of Black gandy dancers, The MAX, the Meridian Railroad Museum, and the future home of the Jimmie Rodgers Museum sit near the site where the banjo—a West African instrument—fused African American work songs with Anglo-Celtic ballads to forge the foundational sound of country music. In celebration of the 100th anniversary of the discovery of Jimmie Rodgers, the three organizations are partnering for this event, which was conceived by Terrence Roberts.
An “American Griot,” master multi-instrumentalist, author, and cultural historian, Súle Greg Wilson has dedicated his life to tracing the African roots of American music. A co-director of the historic 2005 Black Banjo Gathering and a founding member of Sankofa Strings—the precursor to the Grammy-winning Carolina Chocolate Drops—Wilson bridges deep scholarship and performance to illuminate the banjo’s living heritage through the principle of Sankofa.
Greg Johnson is Head of Special Collections and Blues Curator at the University of Mississippi’s Department of Archives and Special Collections, where he preserves one of the world’s preeminent collections of blues recordings and historical artifacts. A musicologist and seasoned archivist, Johnson bridges scholarly preservation with the living traditions of the American South by playing traditional instruments like a one-stringed cigar-box banjo, demonstrating how early Black folk traditions shaped Mississippi music. He illuminates how African diasporic traditions shaped the foundational soundscapes of Mississippi music and early blues heritage.
