Music Maker Relief Foundation – a non-profit organization that supports traditional Southern musicians by documenting and presenting their music will be premiering their photography exhibit, We Are the Music Makers! on September 5th, 2018 at the Downing-Gross Cultural Arts Center in Newport News, VA. On September 28th at 6:00pm a reception for the exhibit will be held to coincide with the Elder Anderson Johnson Visionary Arts Festival.

We Are the Music Makers! delves deeply into the living musical culture of the South and the musicians who make it. The exhibit premiered at the the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts in 2014 and has since traveled to the Birthplace of Country Music, BB King Museum of Art, Levine Museum of the New South, the Earl Scruggs Center and many more.  Folk artist, musician, and Newport News native Elder Anderson Johnson was a Music Maker Relief Foundation partner artist and released his album Roots of Sacred Steel through the nonprofit’s record label.

“Throughout We Are The Music Makers, the viewer is granted access to worlds that are beyond reach and off limits to most. There is less than a razor’s edge of difference in royalty and rogue at the bedrock of American roots music.”

– GRAMMY winner Marty Stuart

“Music Maker is a fabulous project; real evidence that the music I have always loved is alive and well”.

– Eric Clapton

About the exhibit:

Visitors will experience thirty panels that feature photographs of traditional Southern musicians taken by Music Maker founder and Executive Director Timothy Duffy over the past twenty years.  The exhibit panels speak to the significance of each musician’s style and have a storytelling quality, putting each figure in the context of their community. Audio and video are also included which further enhance the content of the panels.

The panels on display feature musicians from all over the Southeast, from GRAMMY winning group the Carolina Chocolate Drops to the lesser known, like Bluesman Guitar Gabriel and Snake handler/circus performer Willa Mae Buckner. The exhibit draws attention to musicians that have shaped our uniquely American culture through their music.

What: We Are the Music Makers! Reception

Where: Downing-Gross Cultural Arts Center | 2410 Wickham Ave. Newport News, Virginia 23607

When: September 28th, 2018 | 6:00pm – 8:00pm

Cost: FREE

More info: http://downinggross.org/events/2018/9/28/we-are-the-music-makers-gallery-reception