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Deke Sharon

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May 31, 2000, 3:00:00 AM5/31/00

February 14, 1984, Tuesday

SECTION: Arts & Leisure, Television Previews, Pg. 25

LENGTH: 615 words

HEADLINE: On PBS: a singing group's glorious TV debut - also, 'Popular
Neurotics'

BYLINE: By Arthur Unger

BODY:
Despite a seeming lull in on-stage appearances, not all of the 1950s, '60s,
and '70s type of protest singers have disappeared from the performing stage.
While Bob Dylan has turned mainly to rock and The Weavers have disbanded except
for occasional nostalgia reunions, one of the most unusual groups - Sweet Honey
in the Rock - is finally making its major national debut this week on PBS.
Simultaneously, this debut is gloriously nostalgic, delightfully naive, and
shockingly relevant.

Gotta Make This Journey: Sweet Honey in the Rock (PBS, Wednesday, Feb. 15,
10-11 p.m., check local listings for premiere and repeats) is an honest attempt
at concert television interspersed with documentary. Sweet Honey is a
five-woman
a cappella group (six, if you count the member who signs for the deaf). The
women work at various jobs, yet are so committed to the songs they sing and the
messages they bring that each weekend they travel to locations around the
country to perform before any group that requests them.

Although rooted in the civil rights movement of the '60s, the five-woman
group began in the '70s and has included 18 women as members at various times.
In interviews they explain how they teach one another and share their knowledge
with one another before they rehearse their political and personal songs, which
they sing in traditional and contemporary styles. In all songs, however, there
is a strong overlay of their religious revival and native African roots.

The songs, delivered with an overwhelming feeling of personal involvement,
range from ''Crying for Freedom in South Africa'' to ''We Bring Home More Than
a
Paycheck to Our Loved Ones'' (asbestos, radiation, etc.). The grand finale in
this concert, recorded at Gallaudet College for the deaf in Washington, D.C.,
was ''I Ain't Gonna Study War No More,'' and it brought the audience to its
feet
clapping in unison and singing along. An unforgettable camera shot at the end
shows two hands of a spectator raised in praise, signing ''applause.''

''Gotta Make This Journey: Sweet Honey in the Rock'' was produced by
Michelle
Parkerson, a poet and filmmaker, for the Independent Minority Producers
Laboratory at WETA in Washington. It is being presented, along with many other
fine black-oriented programs, as part of PBS's ''Black History Month.'' Whether
or not one agrees with the political orientation of the film and the group -
one
of the interviews is with Angela Davis - ''Honey in the Rock'' is a social,
political, and artistic phenomenon that demands recognition and appreciation.
Original drama

Can love survive in an era of automated banking?

That's the basic question posed in a quixotically brilliant, unevenly
hilarious, original drama, a Valentine's Day gift to ''American Playhouse''
viewers: Popular Neurotics (PBS, Tuesday, Feb. 14, 9-10 p.m., check local
listings for premieres and repeats).

New playwright Aubrey Williams reveals a finely tuned gift for writing
outrageous sketches which combines the non sequitur style of Pinter with the
pseudo-Freudian gobbledygook of Woody Allen. What results is a melange of
impressionist living in an abstract expressionist world where young singles
must
try to build ''meaningful relationships'' in a society of ''comparison
shoplifters.''

You may not be taken with the lovers - Jeff Goldblum and Mimi Kennedy - or
even with the symbolic sets and oddball direction of Lamont Johnson at the Mark
Taper Forum in Los Angeles. And many viewers may even find much of the
dialogue
incomprehensible. But it's hard not to recognize the fact that ''Popular
Neurotics'' is a fascinating attempt to create pungent social satire and
masquerade it as sitcom.

LANGUAGE: ENGLISH
Copyright 1984 The Washington Post
The Washington Post

September 7, 1984, Friday, Final Edition

SECTION: Style; Performing Arts; B8

LENGTH: 354 words

HEADLINE: Gospel Salute

BYLINE: Junette A. Pinkney

BODY:
The Museum of Natural History was rocked by a rousing gospel concert last
night, much of it sung by the audience. Sweet Honey in the Rock, The Voices
Supreme, the Boyer Brothers and J. Robert Bradley performed before a
standing-room-only audience as part of "A Salute to Five Black American
Composers."

The tribute, which continues at the museum today with a 2 p.m. colloquium
entitled "Gospel Pearls," was planned to coincide with the meeting of the
National Baptist Convention being held at the Convention Center through Sunday.

Bernice Reagon of Sweet Honey set the tone for the evening at the beginning
of the first number, "We'll Understand It Bye and Bye." After the a cappella
chorus quintet sang the first few verses, they stopped and Reagon told the
audience, "We're going to do this congregational style. That means that when
you
walked in the door, you passed the audition." That was all the encouragement
the
audience needed to join in whenever it wanted over the next three hours.

Halfway through the program, Pearl Williams-Jones led the audi ence in
singing the gospel classic "Precious Lord," asking them to try to "send the
vibrations to Thomas Dorsey," the song's composer, who is ill in Chicago.
Dorsey, considered by many to be the father of gospel music, was featured in
the
documentary film "Say Amen, Somebody," which chronicles the growth of the art
form, and was one of last night's honorees. The others were Rev. Charles Albert
Tindley of Philadelphia, Roberta Martin of Chicago, and Lucie E. Campbell and
Rev. William Herbert Brewster of Memphis.

Brewster, the most prolific of the composers, was in attendance last night.
Sallie Martin, who was Dorsey's partner, was also introduced to a standing
ovation.

The songs were grouped by composer, with each artist performing a selection
from each composer in their own particular singing style. The crowd seemed to
single out for praise The Voices Supreme's rendition of "He'll Understand and
Say Well Done," Sweet Honey's "Ol' Landmark" and "In the Upper Room," Bradley's
"Speak to Me Jesus," and The Boyer Brothers' "Surely God Is Able."

March 3, 1985, Sunday, Final Edition

SECTION: Style; Show; G3

LENGTH: 1235 words

HEADLINE: LIMELIGHT MOONLIGHTING DUO

BODY:
On Friday night, keyboardist Kim Jordan and singer Evelyn Harris will step
out of their normal contexts (the Gil Scott-Heron Band and Sweet Honey in the
Rock, respectively) to unveil what is reported to be a "hot" duo. They will be
part of an evening of song and poetry celebrating International Women's Day at
All Soul's Church.

Jordan, a Detroit native who graduated from Howard University in May, has
been playing with Scott-Heron for the past six months. "I met Gil about four
years ago when I first came to Howard, but we never thought about working
together musically until one day he asked me did I want to do a gig with him. I
told him I'd see if I liked it and he told me the gig was mine if I wanted to
keep it. I did it and I kept it." Jordan also performs solo at Cafe' Lautrec
and
Mr. Henry's Georgetown.

Evelyn Harris has been a mainstay of Sweet Honey, the wondrous a cappella
quintet that celebrates black culture in general and illuminates the strengths
and struggles of black women in particular. "I met Evelyn at one of Gil's
concerts," Jordan recalls. "She told me she was looking for a female keyboard
player and I told her I was looking for a female singer, so we started working
together. The music that we'll be doing encompasses songs written by both
Evelyn
and myself. They are message songs and it is message music, which it will
always
be, but it's also a 'hope' kind of music. The flavors range from funk and
gospel
to a low-key, almost classical piece for vocal and keyboards. It's going to be
a
hot show, and we're both excited."

The Friday night program, which will benefit next summer's Sisterfire
festival, also features the duo of Teresa Trull and Barbara Higbie and poets
Alicia Portnoy and Yolanda Mancilla. There will be interpreters for the deaf.
--
Richard Harrington FOR FUN, NOT PROFIT ----- "Back around 1972, I put an ad in
the Baltimore Sun and it said, 'Dixieland jazz for fun not profit,' " recalls
cornet player and band leader Paul Naden. "I got about 20 responses from as far
away as the Pennsylvania border. We used to get together at my house on
Wednesday nights and we just jammed. Whoever showed up -- if three tuba players
came we played with three tuba players, if two banjos or whatever. It wasn't a
very structured group, it was very loose.

"After we had done this about a year I got a call from my neighborhood
improvement association. I thought they were calling to complain about the
noise. Instead, they wanted to see if I wanted to represent the association at
the first Baltimore City Fair. One of the guys said, 'Why don't we call
ourselves Dow Jones and the Industrials.' " Naden discovered that the name had
already been nailed down by a rock group, so the group was dubbed the Falstaff
Five Plus Two, after the Pikesville street the leader lives on.
Since then the FF+2 has played several longstanding gigs at area clubs and
restaurants, for weddings, for the Baltimore Orioles, for the governor and at
the Baltimore Zoo. Next Saturday, noon to midnight, they will be one of 14
bands
from the Washington-Baltimore area performing at the 1985 Jazz Jubilee in
Market
Square, the Marvin Center at GWU. An American Cancer Society benefit, the
annual
event is sponsored by the Potomac River Jazz Club. -- W. Royal Stokes
THREE-FOR-ALL ---------- If you need a multiple dose of culture to rouse you
from hibernation, you can get poetry, music and drama all in one at the
Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden Auditorium tonight. The International
Poetry Forum will present a musical version of Edgar Lee Masters' "Spoon River
Anthology" as part of its Washington-based Word/Song III series.

"Spoon River Anthology" is a collection of poems recreating the members of
an
imaginary town in Illinois. The work first appeared in serial form in 1914 and
was published as a book the following year. In an original adaptation, the
International Poetry Forum's production incorporates music by Daniel Gregory
Mason, a contemporary of Masters.

Actor Marshall Mason, six-time Obie Award winner and four-time Tony Award
nominee will costar with Tammy Grimes, who has two Tonys among her many
credits.
Grimes says of the anthology, "It's not a play, really; it's a group of poems .
. . but it adapts very well to dramatic performance because each poem is about
specific personalities." It is a two-person cast with no costume or scenery
changes. "I play all the women's parts, and Marshall plays all the men's
parts,"
says Grimes.

The International Poetry Forum, based in Pittsburgh, is in its 19th season.
According to Anne Burnham, the Forum's Washington liaison, "It is the only
independent poetry forum of its kind in the world."

There will be a reception for the audience following the performance. "The
Forum is designed to create a platform for poets and writers all over the
world," Burnham says. "The Word/Song III series combines poetry and music." --
Lisa Serene Gelb LIVES OF 'LITTLE WOMEN' - "I've always loved 'Little Women.' I
used to read it about once a year all during junior high and high school," says
Iris Rose, a New York-based performance artist whose most recent work, "Of
Little Women," was inspired by Louisa May Alcott's classic tale of the four
March sisters.

"I loved the book not so much for the story, but for its detailed
presentation of women's everyday life," continues Rose, who, together with
three
other actresses, will present the piece Thursday through Sunday at d.c. space.
Everyday life is very much a part of this performance, which unfolds in a
kitchen setting and involves a number of domestic tasks: preparation of food
(to
be consumed by the audience), knitting, clearing the table, washing dishes. The
milieu, however, is thoroughly contemporary and laced with deadpan humor, as
befits its creator, a frequent performer in East Village night clubs and a
former member of a punk rock band.

Is "Of Little Women"'s all female casting and feminist themes typcial of
Rose's work as a whole? "Not at all," she replies. "I usually work with men."
--
Pamela Sommers MOVING INTO MUSIC ------ "I got sidetracked into music in an
absolutely ridiculous way," says James Horowitz. Soon after arriving here as a
paralegal almost a decade ago, Antioch graduate Horowitz was helping a neighbor
move an upright piano into her basement apartment in Mount Pleasant. "I need
an accompanist," the piano's owner, a jazz and blues vocalist, revealed upon
learning that Horowitz played the instrument by ear. " 'I really don't think
I'm
the guy for you,' " Horowitz says he insisted, "but this woman would not quit
and, before I knew it, we were working and within four or five months that's
all
I was doing."

Horowitz, who went on as a solo act and has played many area jazz venues
including the Embassy Row, the One Step Down and the Ice House Cafe, will host
a
"Jazz Party" in the Riverfront bar of Charlie's today at 3 p.m. Tommy Cecil
will
be on bass, Chuck Redd at the drums. Part of a series sponsored by Open
University, through which Horowitz frequently offers jazz appreciation classes,
the program will include standards, vocals, bossa novas and some "delightfully
obscure masterpieces."

"I was hooked immediately," says Horowitz of his jazz performance debut
after
the piano-moving job, "and I quit working for the lawyer and that was the last
time I did anything but play music." -- W. Royal Stokes

GRAPHIC: Picture 1, New duo: singer Evelyn Harris and keyboardist Kim Jordan.
BY
SHARON FARMER

November 15, 1985, Friday, Final Edition

SECTION: Weekend; Pg. 15

LENGTH: 589 words

HEADLINE: Sweet Honey Pours It On;
Two New Albums Brimming with Harmony

BYLINE: Richard Harrington

BODY:
GOOD NEWS is the release of a new album by Washington's a cappella wonders,
Sweet Honey in the Rock. Great news is the release of two new albums by the
group that celebrates its 12th anniversary Friday at the Warner Theatre.

"Feel Something Drawing Me On" is Sweet Honey's first collection of sacred
songs, while "The Other Side" offers a varied program of songs of conscience
reflecting not only the black American traditions and experiences that inspired
and still inform the group, but also the global communality that thrives on
connections, not distinctions.

There are only five singers (and one signer for the deaf) in Sweet Honey,
but
there are many more voices, constantly surprising in their rich textures and
rhythmic and melodic adventurousness, their intertwining of distinctive
individuality and common purpose. Harmony, counterpoint and embellishment are
cold, dull words to describe the warmth and brilliance of interaction between
group founder Bernice Johnson Reagon, Evelyn Maria Harris, Ysaye Maria
Barnwell,
Yasmeen Bheti Williams- Johnson and Aisha Khalil. Each singer is a powerful
soloist, but what's important are the possibilities of community inside each
song, and the healing powers such union provides.

"Feel Something Drawing Me On" may be the first tightly focused Sweet Honey
project, but evidence of the group's eclectic interests and dogged research can
be found in a program that's heavy with classic black Baptist standards sung in
supple variations on quartet tradition. There's Rev. Charles Albert Tindley's
"We'll Understand It Better Bye and Bye," Rev. William Herbert Brewster's
"Leaning and Depending on the Lord" and the title song, Lucie Campbell's "In
the
Upper Room" and Roberta Martin's "Try Jesus". But the album also includes a
reggae spiritual, a Woody Guthrie protest song and more.

The readings of the church standards are excellent, but the most memorable
moments come in Sweet Honey's introduction of two stunning West African songs.
"When I Die Tomorrow," uncovered at a Baptist church in Liberia and re-arranged
by Williams-Johnson, is a compulsive swirl of polyrhythms and congregational
communion. "Meyango," a funeral song paced by Khalil's raw exuberance, is
powerful in its mystery.

There are songs by Rev. Brewster and Woody Guthrie and a wordless West
African rhythm workout on "The Other Side," as well as a hymn-like reading of
the preamble to the constitution of the United Mine Workers, but the album's
finest moments originate with various group members. Harris' "Gift of Love" is
a playful, jazzy meditation on matters of the heart, while Reagon's "Mae
Frances" is a moving celebration of the spiritual strength of black women.

Best of all, though, is "No Images," with a haunting Barnwell melody set to
Waring Cuney's brief, shattering poem:

She does not know her beauty

She thinks her brown body has no glory

But if she could dance naked 'neath palm trees

And see her reflection in the river

Then she would know

But there are no trees in the street where she lives

And dish water gives back no images.

In Sweet Honey's wash of voices, some echoing, some anticipating, there is
sorrow and there is joy to be felt. There is immense pleasure and important
information to be gained from both these albums, and you'll come away thinking
there is nothing the human voice cannot do.

SWEET HONEY IN THE ROCK -- "Feel Something Drawing Me On" (Flying Fish
FF375)
and "The Other Side" (Flying Fish FF366); appearing Friday at 8 at the Warner
Theatre.

GRAPHIC: Picture, Sweet Honey

November 15, 1985, Friday, Final Edition

SECTION: Weekend; Pg. 15

LENGTH: 589 words

HEADLINE: Sweet Honey Pours It On;
Two New Albums Brimming with Harmony

BYLINE: Richard Harrington

Best of all, though, is "No Images," with a haunting Barnwell melody set to
Waring Cuney's brief, shattering poem:

She does not know her beauty

She thinks her brown body has no glory

But if she could dance naked 'neath palm trees

And see her reflection in the river

Then she would know

But there are no trees in the street where she lives

And dish water gives back no images.

SWEET HONEY IN THE ROCK -- "Feel Something Drawing Me On" (Flying Fish
FF375)
and "The Other Side" (Flying Fish FF366); appearing Friday at 8 at the Warner
Theatre.

GRAPHIC: Picture, Sweet Honey

December 18, 1983, Sunday, Final Edition

SECTION: Show; Recordings; G9

LENGTH: 1006 words

HEADLINE: Sweet Honey and Near & Gilbert: The Reconciliation of Gospel and
Politics

BYLINE: By Geoffrey Himes

BODY:
WHEN Mahalia Jackson thunders through the traditional gospel hymn "Just a
Little While to Stay Here," and when Ella Fitzgerald sashays through the show
tune "The Man I Love," they radiate a rare sense of style and confidence. This
assurance, though, is contradicted by the fatalistic content of the songs,
which
celebrate submission to heavenly afterlife and sentimental romance.

The women of Sweet Honey in the Rock and the duo of Holly Near and Ronnie
Gilbert have tried to reconcile this contradiction by combining assertive, even
political lyrics with traditional forms of gospel and show music. It is not
enough, however, to match the music's confidence; the lyrics must match the
music's stylish art, too. And new albums by Sweet Honey and Near and Gilbert
achieve this special chemistry--inconsistently, but often enough to be
satifying
and pleasurable.

Sweet Honey's fifth album, "We All . . . Everyone of Us," (Flying Fish
FF317)
begins with "Down by the Riverside," one of the few traditional hymns with
lyrics as bold as the music. The group's a cappella voices fill the antiwar
song
with low hums, high shouts and fervent testifying. The rest of the album is
filled with attempts to create new spirituals just as bold.

One of the best attempts is "Azanian Freedom Song," with lyrics by Otis
Williams and music by the group's founder-leader, Bernice Johnson Reagon. When
the chorus says, "somewhere there's a child a-crying, crying for freedom in
South Africa," the lyric conveys tears of pain and shouts of defiance. The
ambitious arrangement has a lead voice and a high-pitched choir shouting
against
the rhythm and melody of a low-pitched group chant with agitating effect.

Even better is "How Long," a swaying, swaggering blues, in which Reagon
declares her impatience with the slow pace of social change. Her "Ella's Song,"
written for civil rights activist Ella Baker, boasts an inspiring chorus, but
gets bogged down when it tries awkwardly to fit Baker's axioms into verses.
"I'm
Gon' Stand," written for the 1979 film "Wilmington 10, USA 10,000," is the kind
of sloganeering that's more effective on the picket line than on record.

Sweet Honey in the Rock has finally achieved a stable lineup in recent
years;
the quartet that made the 1981 album, "Good News," is supplemented by one new
voice on "We All . . . Everyone of Us." With her partners now more experienced,
Reagon no longer bears so much of the burden. Though her composition, "Battle
for My Life," is the album's one lapse into crude polemics, Evelyn Harris
excels
as the record's producer.

Ysaye Barnwell, who wrote two of the best songs on "Good News," wrote "More
Than a Paycheck," the catchiest song on the new record. Flavoring the gospel
stew with Caribbean spices, Barnwell sings about the diseases that we bring
back
from work with a sing-along melody as the group perfectly executes the
staggered
syncopation. New member Aisha Kahlil helps the group transcend its gospel
format
with an adventuresome scat jazz number, "Listen to the Rhythm," that the
quintet
pulls off with a flourish. It indicates that Sweet Honey In the Rock has hardly
exhausted its possibilities.

While the women of Sweet Honey grew up on church choirs, Holly Near and
Ronnie Gilbert grew up on Broadway musicals. Near and Gilbert made their
reputations in leftist folk music, but the basis for their phrasing and
intonation has always been rooted in show music. That's why they've often been
least successful at songs that call for a raw, informal feel and most
successful
at songs that utilize polished melodies.

Since she left the legendary folk quartet the Weavers, Gilbert has devoted
much of her time to the theater--she is now the narrator in "A Christmas Carol"
at Ford's Theatre. Before she became a feminist folk hero, Near performed in
summer stock and in the Broadway production of "Hair." She appeared with her
childhood idol, Gilbert in "Wasn't That a Time," a documentary about the
Weavers. That led to a national tour as a duo that concluded with a live album
of 19 songs recorded at San Francisco's Great American Music Hall last spring:
"Lifeline" (Redwood RR404).

Side 1 ends with a medley of five Broadway and Tin Pan Alley love songs
dedicated to Judy Garland. The medley proves that Near and Gilbert possess
fabulous vocal instruments and can use them to thrilling effect. The rest of
the
album contains attempts to match political lyrics to Garland's musical legacy.
With Jeff Langley supplying tinkling piano and Carrie Barton restrained bass,
the atmosphere is cabaret hootenanny.

Thus true folk songs--like Woody Guthrie's "Pastures of Plenty" and Sweet
Honey's "Biko," which require a gritty grain, are the least convincing. Much
better are those songs with graceful melodies and lilting tempos: "Two Good
Arms," Charlie King's cabaret eulogy for Sacco and Vanzetti; "The Activity
Room," Ruth Pelham's musical dialogue set in a senior citizens center; and
"Goodnight Irene," Leadbelly's sing-along lullaby.

Three of the best songs are in Spanish: "Si Me Quieres Escribir (If You Want
to Write to Me)," the Weavers' rousing ole' for the Spanish Civil War; "Gracias
a La Vida (Thanks to Life)," Violetta Parra's quiet, lovely ballad; and "Hay
Una
Mujer Desaparecida (There Is a Woman Missing)," Near's stinging denunciation of
the Chilean junta. Near's clumsy early songwriting is evident in the
sledgehammer rhetoric of "No More Genocide," but her better late work is
represented by "Perfect Night," a diverting little ditty, and "Singing for Our
Lives," a simplistic but effective anthem.

Near's past work has been marred by a tendency to rely too much on her big
voice and to overstate everything. "Journeys" (Redwood RR405), a brand new
anthology of a dozen songs from her first six solo albums, illustrates the
limits of this bald approach. Working with the older, wiser Gilbert has
evidently taught Near a new subtlety as well as a better sense of what she can
and can't do well. It could give Near a new second career.

December 2, 1983, Friday, Late City Final Edition

SECTION: Section C; Page 24, Column 2; Weekend Desk

LENGTH: 899 words

HEADLINE: POP/JAZZ ;
SWEET HONEY IN THE ROCK, A CELEBRATION AT TOWN HALL

BYLINE: By JENNIFER DUNNING

BODY:
THE choice seemed to be, in the words of Ralph Ellison, ''to live with music
or die with noise.'' Sweet Honey in the Rock chose song. And tonight, at Town
Hall, the group of five black women singers will celebrate its 10th anniversary
with a program of new and traditional music.

Singing a cappella to the accompaniment of tambourine and shekere, an
African beaded-gourd rattle, Sweet Honey draws on jazz, rock, soul and rhythm
and blues music for its unusual style. ''But my sense is that you come away
from
the theater feeling we're grounded in the black church,'' Bernice Reagon,
founder of the Washington-based group and director of the black American
culture
program at the Smithsonian Institution, said the other day. Sweet Honey sings
about social and political issues as well as familiar spirituals, but the
effect
is often that of the communal pain and joy of a gospel-revival meeting.

''The songs I write have the thick, dense harmonies of hymns and slow songs
out of the black church,'' Miss Reagon said. Ysaye Maria Barnwell, another
member of Sweet Honey, writes songs for the group that require ''airy,
dancing''
harmonizing. ''The music must be powerful and and intense,'' Miss Reagon added.
''And the range must be wide, from above the highest C to bass. I insist that
in
the course of the evening we shatter people's concepts about what should come
out of women's throats.''

How Sweet Honey Started

Sweet Honey is an outgrowth of Miss Reagon's work with the D.C. Black
Repertory Theater Company, where she trained young black actors and actresses
to
develop vocal and performing techniques by singing a cappella in the manner of
black church song. Several of her students suggested she organize a performing
group. Only four, all women, turned up for the first rehearsal.

''I was disappointed,'' she recalled. ''But we started singing, and the
sound
just fell into place. We looked around at each other and said, 'This is it.'
And
the power and energy that was present in the singing had to do very clearly
with
what the music was to the women singing it. The music served us in similar
ways.''

One of the songs they sang was called ''Sweet Honey in the Rock.'' Miss
Reagon had sung it as a child in Albany, Ga., but hadn't paid much attention
to its words. She called her father, a Baptist minister, who told her the song
was based on a parable about a land so rich that when rock was cracked, honey
flowed from it.

''That song came to mean what I understand about black women in the American
experience,'' Miss Reagon said. ''So often we are perceived as mother rock. We
are a strong, unyielding, dependable force carrying people through the storms
and always standing for our children. But I've always thought that was one
sided, and that the song represented the combination of things we really are.
Yes, we're strong. But we're also very sweet. Hot honey runs. If it's cold, it
congeals.''

Help With Sign Language

Only Miss Reagon remains from the original group. Three of the present
members - Evelyn Maria Harris, Yasmeen Bheti Williams and Miss Barnwell -
joined
in the 1970's, and the group was completed by Aisha Kahlil in 1981. Shirley
Childress Johnson often functions as a sixth member, interpreting the songs in
sign language for the hearing-impaired, as she will do at Town Hall.

All have other jobs. ''Sweet Honey does not pay bills,'' Miss Reagon said.
But the group has just released its fourth record, ''We All . . . Everyone of
Us.'' And today, Sweet Honey performs at everything from political rallies to
clubs and theaters throughout the country. Its ties to Washington's black
community remain strong, however, and the women conduct weekly workshops
locally
and a concentrated, monthlong workshop every year for auditioned singers.

Miss Reagon is a veteran of the Freedom Singers, a group that was involved
in
the civil-rights movement of the 1960's. She compiled ''Voices of the Civil
Rights Movement: Black American Freedom Songs 1960-66,'' a three-record set
available through the Smithsonian. Its songs are drawn from tapes made in
churches and on protest marches and picket lines.

Betty Carter's Influence

She has learned much, Miss Reagon said, from the singing of Betty Carter,
and
her work with Sweet Honey has been influenced by such writers as June Jordan,
Toni Morrison, Alice Walker and Ethelbert Miller. Mr. Ellison's words on the
meaning of music remain an inspiration. ''When I read that, it made me
understand why I sing,'' she said. ''You do have choices.''

Sweet Honey aims for more than simple entertainment. ''We want to engage
audiences in a way that they have a visceral experience, raising questions not
just about us and how we sound but also about themselves,'' Miss Reagon said.
''We want the listener to be troubled, as the waters are troubled by God in the
spiritual 'Wading in the Water.' That song was sort of attached to Harriet
Tubman. Harriet urged people on the Underground Railroad to go into areas that
threatened them. If you want to grow, head in the direction of trouble and go
through it. You must go through troubled waters for change.''

Sweet Honey in the Rock will perform at Town Hall, 123 West 43d Street,
tonight at 8. Tickets are $10 and $12, available at Town Hall or at Womanbooks,
Amsterdam Avenue and 92d Street. Chargit: 944-9300. Information: 840-2824.

GRAPHIC: photo of Bernice Reagon of Sweet Honey in the Rock
Copyright 1983 The Washington Post
The Washington Post

November 19, 1983, Saturday, Final Edition

SECTION: Style; Performing Arts; C5

LENGTH: 194 words

HEADLINE: Sweet Honey in the Rock

BYLINE: Geoffrey Himes

BODY:
Even in their usual configuration as a street corner quintet, Sweet Honey in
the Rock can make a big, joyful noise. Last night at the UDC Auditorium, their
numbers swelled to 15--the size of a choral ensemble or more accurately a
gospel
choir--and the waves of a cappella harmonies came from three times as many
directions with three times as much power.

It was like the difference between a jazz combo and a big band. Standing in
brilliantly colored gowns along a long crescent line, they improvised on
Langston Hughes' poem, "A Dream Deferred," with gospel hums, blues shouts,
rumbling moans and piercing falsetto cries, all held together by a swaying
beat.
The group's 10th anniversary was as emotional for the singers as for the
longtime home-town fans in the sold-out hall.

The group's unchanging core through 10 years has been Bernice Reagon, who
supplied the chilling political narrative to "Fannie Lou Hamer" and the tour de
force rhythm and blues solo to "Hey, Man." For the finale, 21 workshop
participants joined the 15 members on the "Azanian Freedom Song."

Sweet Honey in the Rock's 10th anniversary concert will be repeated twice
tonight.

July 2, 1982, Friday, Final Edition

SECTION: Style; Performing Arts; D7

LENGTH: 245 words

HEADLINE: Sweet Honey

BYLINE: Richard Harrington

BODY:
Songs and speeches filled Constitution Hall last night as embers of the
burnt
dream of the Equal Rights Amendment were used to fire a new coalition of
women's
organizations who perceived July 1 not as the day after defeat, but the first
day of a new era. Between the lessons of yesterday, and an impatience for
tomorrow, a new resolve was evident in speeches by Mary Purcell, Dorothy Height
and Bella Abzug. Songwriter Margie Adam was direct and optimistic in her
closing set.

But when the speeches were done, when the hearts were open, it was Sweet
Honey in the Rock that most eloquently captured the range of roles and communal
interests and political responsibilities that has emerged around women's
rights.
The five women in Sweet Honey are all astounding singers individually, but it's
their heart-rending a capella harmonies that elevate them to a special place as
one of the most powerful vocal ensembles in America today. From a whisper to a
scream, they perpetuate the most striking aspects of church and street-corner
singing.

Last night, Sweet Honey took its presentation one step further, stringing
its
songs together with moving poems, always looking at themselves as mothers,
protectors, lovers, teachers, friends. The most telling moment came on June
Jordan's "Poem for 10,000 South African Women," half-spoken, half-sung, wholly
engaging and totally devastating in its emotional impact. Sweet Honey sounded
as
strong as sisterhood itself.

March 18, 1982, Thursday, Late City Final Edition

SECTION: Section C; Page 16, Column 3; Cultural Desk

LENGTH: 239 words

HEADLINE: POP: SWEET HONEY, A QUINTET

BYLINE: By Stephen Holden

BODY:
SWEET Honey in the Rock, the Washington-based black women's collective
formed
in 1974, has released three albums that carry blues and folk-or-iented a
cappella singing to a peak of refinement. Unlike the Persuasions and 14 Carat
Soul, a cappella groups that come from an urban doo-wop tradition, their roots
are half in church and half in the Balkan folk-singing tradition of the
Pennywhistlers, which involves long-lined nonpercussive vocalizing. And at
the
Bottom Line last Friday and Saturday, this quintet, led by Bernice Reagon, sang
songs for all occasions, using only light percussion and handclaps for backup.

The concerns of Sweet Honey in the Rock are frankly political, blending
racial, feminist and humanitarian issues into a militantly humane sensibility.
Anger is always subsumed to an awesome group solidarity.

At Friday's late show, the wide-ranging program included Senegalese songs,
Gospel songs, spirituals and original protest songs. If Sweet Honey in the Rock
were just another eclectic folk group it would not be so impressive. But
everything its members do, from dressing in matched African robes to singing in
a consistent five-part a cappella style, is part of an effort to demonstrate
the
kind of unity that can come from diversity. Stephen Holden

September 24, 1986 Wednesday, SPORTS FINAL EDITION

SECTION: TEMPO; Pg. 3; ZONE: C

LENGTH: 922 words

HEADLINE: 'HONEY' IS AS SWEET AS EVER

BYLINE: By Lynn Van Matre, Pop music critic.

BODY:
In Sweet Honey in the Rock's 13-year history, no fewer than 20 different
women have lent their voices to the a capella quintet's gospel-rooted sound of
social consciousness. With the exception of founder Bernice Johnson Reagon,
none of the women in the current lineup were there when the group was founded;
chances are that some of them won't be there a few years from now.
That kind of turnover could wreak havoc with a lot of groups, but for
Reagon it's simply business as usual.
"Sweet Honey always was meant to operate on a professional level, but it
never was meant to be a full-time thing," explains the singer, who also heads
up the Black American Culture program at the Smithsonian in Washington. "The
group was set up so that people could give two or three years to it, then move
on as their careers or family responsibilities changed."

Sweet Honey, which headlines Sunday at People's Church, 941 W. Lawrence
Ave., has endured largely because its collective spirit transcends individual
personalities. Gifted singers may come and go, but in its gospel music and its
songs of social relevance, the voice of Sweet Honey as a whole remains
constant: Black women, operating out of the black American vocal tradition,
trying to articulate a system of values held by what Reagon describes as "a
very wide community of people--people who would be on the 'progressive' side
of issues like South Africa, sexual discrimination, nuclear expansion,
military intervention in Central America.
"When we sing, we are speaking from a position as black women,"
acknowledges Reagon, "but those positions end up being shared by most
progressive women, no matter what racial or cultural group they are from--and
by progressive men, as well."
"We have been always been fairly consistent and very outspoken, with no
fear about taking a stand," she adds. "Some artists make a real distinction
between art and propaganda, but I feel that all good propaganda should be art.
We work very hard to maintain a strong level of vocal music as well as to try
to cover issues that concern us."
Reagon's political activism began in the early 1960s in Albany, Ga.,
where she marched for black civil rights and later toured the country with the
Freedom Singers, an a capella folk-protest group affiliated with the Student
Non-Violent Coordinating Committee. When she founded Sweet Honey in the Rock
in 1973, she took the name from a gospel song by the same name she had learned
as a child.
"After I decided on that name, I called my father, who was a Baptist
minister, and asked him what it meant," Reagon recalls. "He said the song
was based on a parable about a land so rich that when you cracked a rock,
honey flowed from it. And over the years, I have come to believe that black
women are like that land. The properties of honey and rock represent the
complexities of sweetness and strength that we struggle to offer up in our
lives."
What does it take to be a member of Sweet Honey in the Rock? "The women
have to be strong singers to begin with," says Reagon. "We don't teach
people to sing. And they have to be accomplished in at least one black music
form. But it's also important that they be weak in something, too, because
that way they can be taught by us as well as teach us. The women who have
stayed with us the longest and had the most productive experiences have been
the women who came into the group with those qualities."
In addition to Reagon, the current Sweet Honey in the Rock lineup
includes Evelyn Harris, who joined in 1974, Ysaye Maria Barnwell, Nitanju
Bolade, and Aisha Kahlil. A sixth, nonsinging member of the group is Shirley
Childress Johnson, who speaks sign language and signs Sweet Honey concerts for
the hearing-impaired.
"Around 1978, when we started doing concerts produced by women, a lot of
them asked us if our shows could be signed for the deaf," Reagon says. "I
had never thought about that before. I didn't want to be a bigot about it, but
it was very difficult to come into town, meet someone who's going to sign your
show, and then go on stage with them right away. And if we would ask if there
were any black women who could sign for us, we would be told, 'deafness isn't
a racial issue.' It wasn't until Maria Barnwell came into our group in 1979
that we really decided to make an effort to share our performances with the
deaf."
Reagon first saw Barnwell, who has a Ph.D. in speech pathology,
performing in a church--singing and signing at the same time.
"I was struck by the way she signed," says Reagon. "There was
something black about it. Later, she told me that within the deaf culture
there are other (sub)cultures, including a black one. And after she joined
Sweet Honey, she basically helped us move to a (musical) place where we could
work with a sign language interpreter who taught us what our songs looked
like.
"You know, I'm always trying to get our audiences to sing along, and I
don't like anemic singing," says Reagon with a laugh. "I remember once at a
concert there were two rows of deaf people, and they all had their eyes fixed
on Shirley Childress Johnson. All of a sudden they began to 'sing' with their
hands. There were so many of them, it was like a chorus. It was the most
powerful experience I can recall in terms of an audience responding to our
music."

Arts at large

GRAPHIC: PHOTO
PHOTO: Sweet Honey in the Rock (from left): Ysaye Maria Barnwell,
Nitanju Bolade, Aisha Kahlil, Shirley Childress Johnson, Bernice
Johnson Reagon and Evelyn Harris.

November 8, 1988, Tuesday, Final Edition

SECTION: STYLE; PAGE C4; PERFORMING ARTS

LENGTH: 189 words

HEADLINE: Sweet Honey in the Rock

BYLINE: Alona Wartofsky

BODY:
Washington's own Sweet Honey in the Rock celebrated its 15th anniversary
Friday night at the Warner Theatre with nothing extraordinary -- just another
of
its typically stunning performances. Singing with passion about the downtrodden
and the oppressed, the a cappella ensemble at the same time illustrated the
legacy of black American accompanied choral singing.

In a generous three-hour, greatest-hits type of set, the group explored the
sources of its inspiration both during and between numbers. As usual, team
visionary Bernice Johnson Reagon offered revealing explanations of song origins
and the group's motivation, delivered with wry commentary on social and
political issues.

Each of Sweet Honey's five (or in Friday night's case, six, with the
addition
of alumnus Yasmeen Graham) members is an exceptional soloist, and together
their
vocal interplay was often breathtaking. Whether building the complex, textured
patterns of "No Images," bursting with the emotional power of "Biko" or
interpreting the simplest spiritual, Sweet Honey's performance was the kind
that
gets in one's soul and sticks around awhile.

D The House Jacks • http://www.housejacks.com
E American Vybe • at Disneyworld's Epcot Center Tues-Sat
K Ultimate A Cappella Arranging Service • (415) 336-3210
E Contemporary A Cappella Society • http://www.casa.org

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