Anthem: The Mixtape (2014)
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Anthem reveals how this genre, emblematic of Black solidarity and citizenship, contributed to the growth and mobilization of the modern, Black citizen. Tracing key compositions and performances—from James Weldon Johnson’s “Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing” that mobilized the NAACP to Nina Simone’s “To Be Young, Gifted & Black” which became the Black National Anthem of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE)—Anthem develops a robust recording of Black social movements in the 20th century.
This mixtape is a soundscape for the book, allowing for Black life and history to be displayed and contested through sound. Highlighting the songs analyzed in the text, as well as other relevant songs and speeches, the mixtape provides a sonic context for the complex reading of racial and political formations performed through the analysis of the composition, performance, and uses of Black anthems.