Performed by the Cornelius Eady Trio, this cycle commemorates the injustices and wrongful deaths of many Black Americans. We will share two a week over the month of February.
Cornelius Eady TRIO
National Book Award-winner and Pulitzer Prize-nominated poet Cornelius Eady has set his poetry to song with the Cornelius Eady Trio. Eady’s songs tell the story of passing time, the Black-American experience and the Blues in the style of Folk & Americana music. Guitarists Charlie Rauh and Lisa Liu join Eady to create layered and graceful arrangements to bolster Eady’s adept craftsmanship as a songwriter, lyricist, and poet. Cornelius Eady Trio has performed at Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, AWP Conference, Peabody Essex Museum, and Hill-Stead Museum and recorded at Sun Studio in Memphis, TN.
Cornelius Eady so well captures the spirit of RIFF–and especially the topic of “Jam Session”–taking us beyond poetry, beyond music, and into that hallowed place of meaning.
“(Eady’s music is) in the vein of Taj Mahal when he’s at his metaphysical best, Keb’ Mo’ when he’s most squarely located at the crossroads of tradition and innovation, or Eric Bibb when he’s at his most soulfully transcendent.” — Joe Francis Doerr
As Cornelius says, the first song, “Mississippi Summer,” came into being as “An imagining of the last car ride of Emmett TilL.”
(Read the tragic story of Emmett Till’s murder here.)
The next song, “The dead mother,” is dedicated to korryn gaines.
(Read about the shooting of korryn gaines and her son in her home here.)
MISSISSIPPI SUMMER
Words and Music: Cornelius Eady
You don’t think it’ll happen
til it happens to you.
You thought what you said meant nothin,
But those tires are comin’ for you.
Mississippi Summer
Chicago boy wakes up in surprise
Mississippi Summer
Now you’re the apple of these old boys eyes.
This is the way we make a point
This is how a point gets made
They pull you out a nice, warm bed
And toss you in a watery grave.
Mississippi Summer
They’ve been searching for you for days
Mississippi Summer
Cash you out as the debt gets paid.
Now they got you in
The back of the car
They’re laughing and you know you’re the joke
Won’t stop as you start to cry
Won’t stop as your bones get broke
Mississippi Summer
One-way trip under a murderous sky
Mississippi Summer
Rattler’s hunt and the hoot owls fly.
This is the way we make a point
When a White gal takes offense
Dirty Negro thinks he’s white
Dirty Negro ain’t got no sense
Mississippi Summer
Emmitt Till won’t see the sun
Mississippi Summer
On the bus to see the way things’ done.
Headlights spears on an empty road
Whiskey and hate on their breath
How many miles til the deal goes down?
How many minutes til a dead boy drowns?
Mississippi Summer
Off to meet
Who you’re ’posed to be
The last Mississippi Summer
In D-I-X-I-E.
Listen to “Mississippi Summer” here.
The Dead Mother
Words and Music: Cornelius Eady
They shot me
For a question
While I held
My child
Like a dog
That you put down
When she barks
Too wild
My black skin
Was resisting
In a cop’s mad eye
They shot me
For impatience
While I held my kid
Like a monster
From a swamp
Rising from the Id
Surrounded
Defiant
Look at what they did
My soul and
Gunpowder
Rising in the air
My assumptions
And my boy
Lying wounded there
My black skin
Was poison
Was a losing hand
Oh people
Good people
See what they have done
Smashed my home
And took my breath
And stole me from my son
Took my name
And misspelled it
As the crazy one
Bring a sharp axe
To the mountain
Tear that mountain down
Scream my name out
Like a siren
Though every street in town
Don’t bury me
Plant my story
Like a seed in the ground.
Listen to “The Dead Mother” here.
Cornelius Eady Trio
Cornelius Eady: Vocal;
Charlie Rauh: Acoustic Guitar & Electric Bass;
Lisa Liu: Electric Piano & Guitar.
Arranged by Rauh & Liu.
Mixed by Charlie Rauh.
Words and Music: Cornelius Eady
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