The Music Maker Minute was created using interviews from the Music Maker Relief Foundation Archive. Each episode features a Music Maker partner artist and their personal experience with race in America to celebrate Black History Month.

Music Maker Relief Foundation is a 501(c)3 nonprofit dedicated to helping the true pioneers of American music by directly supporting the artists who make it.

About Rufus McKenzie:

Rufus McKenzie was born to a sharecropping family in Perry, Georgia, in 1927. As a child he worked in the cotton fields, singing to his mule to pick up the pace. Rufus reflects, “I learned my music through sadness and coming up hard. I had to wear white people’s worn out shoes. I had little clothes to wear.”

Rufus was an amazing harmonica player and singer. His singing represented the field holler tradition.

Learn more about Rufus McKenzie here – musicmaker.org/artists/rufus-mckenzie/

Produced by: Music Maker Relief Foundation & Jake Hochberger

Please consider making a tax-deductible donation to Music Maker Relief Foundation – HERE