As another year comes to an end, Black Banjo Reclamation Project celebrates 5 years of this growing organization!

As we enter another year we are in both reflection of 2023 accomplishments as well as excitement for the year ahead. 

Currently, I want to share that I, Hannah Mayree, am currently in New York where I have been performing music in a really wonderful show entitled Arena which accompanies the visual gallery work of Artist Derek Fordjour. The show is free to the public so if you’re in the area you still have 2 weeks to catch it! Details provided in the photos below! I play a wide array of music that very much included and centers the banjo alongside 5 amazing dancers, choreographed by Sidra Bell. Performances Tuesday through Saturday at 2 and 5 pm. 

All of 2023 we have been creating and collaborating with each other and our many community partners to share our music, cultural ideas and to craft in community settings with earth-based materials in ways that reflect our intentions. 

All of our work is highlighted in our blog but we want to name and list as many as we can here from the last year:

Events

Media Highlights & Features

Banjo Builds

All of this and more plus the birth of my baby Starling, who did attend a banjo build and song circles as well!

There is so much that we are excited to keep building. 

-live music events 

-online educational resources 

-scholarship program

-banjo building workshops 

-ongoing folk music gathering spaces

-leadership development

-gourd cultivation 

-youth programming

Thank you all so deeply and dearly for keeping this project close to you. Whatever your cultural and racial background, we aim to involve the greater community in this work and continue to center the beloved Black community across the diaspora and the world as we move forward. We appreciate all your patience as we expand and take on more angles and integrate more systems to streamline our work to you. Thank you for understanding that we are a small team of people who are extremely dedicated to ensuring a future where communities can function with the honoring of their cultural ways, spirituality, practices and music in order to liberate and free ourselves from oppression and create opportunities for care in this world. Music is the vessel we are riding into our future and it continues to open doors and take us many places. Thank you so much for being on this journey with us! Don’t hesitate to reach out if there’s a collaboration you want to explore, have questions, concerns or we forgot something and we may need a small reminder to follow through. 

Thank you to Open Collective for being our fiscal sponsor and providing this platform and an amazing staff who supports our work through administration. We are so glad for the last 2 years of working with OCF. 

Praying for liberation and freedom in the new year. Keep learning, keep challenging, keep blessing the land with positive intention and action. 

In the spirit of collaboration, 

Hannah