250 to 250: 60. The Banjo, Narrated by Alison Brown

Heather Cox Richardson and 250 to 250: The Banjo, Narrated by Alison Brown

Alison Brown is a Grammy-award winning banjoist, co-founder of Compass Records and recovering investment banker. Brown traces the history of the banjo, from its roots in enslaved Africans' musical traditions to its lasting influence on American music.

Enslaved Africans brought music to the United States.

• They made instruments from gourds and wood.
• One of these instruments became the banjo.
• Many enslaved people played the banjo in the South.
• Music helped people remember their culture.
• In the 1800s, more Americans learned about the banjo.
• Soon, the banjo became a popular instrument.
• The banjo became important in jazz, folk, and bluegrass music.
• Many musicians still play the banjo today.
• Singer Pete Seager famously said about the banjo, "This instrument surrounds hate and forces it to surrender."
• The banjo is an important part of American music and history.

POP Interview and Civics Quiz:

• N-400 Part 3:02. What is your race?
• USCIS 100:60. / 128:75. What group of people was taken to America and sold as slaves?
• USCIS 100:84.  What movement tried to end racial discrimination?
• USCIS 128:112. What did the civil rights movement do?

Family Fun:

• BBRP: Black Banjo Reclamation Project
• Ballad of America: The Banjo: A History of America’s African Instrument - Folk+ 2025
• Black Music Project: The Roots of the Banjo
• NPS: The Banjo
• PBS In the Making: Hannah Mayree: Songs of Reclamation: Reclaiming the Banjo's Hidden Black History
• PBS and Reel South: Boil that Cabbage Down
• Rhiannon Giddens: What Did the Blackbird Say to the Crow | releases | Great Courses presentation
• Smithsonian Folkways: Black Banjo Songsters of North Carolina and Virginia playlist | buy
• Teach Rock: The Banjo, Slavery, and the Abolition Debate
• Vox: Why this instrument explains Black American folk music
• Woody Guthrie Center: Inside the WGC: Pete Seeger's Banjo | education
• Woody Guthrie famously scrawled "This Machine Kills Fascists" on some of his guitars and instrument, a message that the communal act of making music can stop those who seek to tear us apart. Woody's friend Pete Seeger had a similar message for what his banjo "machine" did: "This Machine Surrounds Hate and Forces it to Surrender."
1. Give students cardboard cutouts (or coloring pages) of guitars or banjos (or any instrument or machine).
2. Write your own: 'This machine phrase:' 
3. What's your machine/instrument and what it's going what's it going to fight for or against?