Museum on Main Street: New Harmonies
Beginning in March 2011, Minnesota will host a new exhibit titled
New Harmonies. Part of the Smithsonian Institution's Museum on Main Street exhibits,
New Harmonies focuses on America's music and the story of freedom that is heard when one listens carefully. It is the story of people who were already here, but whose world is remade. It's the story of people in a New World, places they have left behind, and ideas they have brought with them. The distinct cultural identities of all of these people are carried in song—both sacred and secular. Their music tracks the unique history of many peoples reshaping each other into one incredibly diverse and complex people—Americans.
Watch The New Harmonies Preview:
The music that emerges is known by names like blues, country western, folk ballads, and gospel. The sounds are as sweet as mountain air, and as sultry as a summer night in Mississippi delta country. The instruments vary from fiddle to banjo to accordion to guitar to drum. But a drum in the hands of an African sounds different than one in the hands of a European. And neither is the drumbeat of an American Indian. Yet all the rhythms merge, as do the melodies and harmonies, producing completely new sounds -- new music. The music merges because this is America. New waves of music ride ashore in the hearts and heads of new immigrants and they create still new sounds from what they have brought with them and what they find here. And nothing expresses the tensions -- or the triumphs -- of this journey into democracy quite like the music that it spawns.
Click here for more information on the Smithsonian's Museum on Main Street program and New Harmonies.
SCHEDULE
March 12, 2011 – April 23, 2011
Arts Center of Saint Peter, Saint Peter
April 30, 2011 – June 11, 2011
Evansville Arts Coalition, Evansville
June 18, 2011 – July 30, 2011
Wilkommen Heritage and Preservation Society of Norwood Young America, Norwood Young America
August 6, 2011 – September 17, 2011
Dassel Area Historical Society, Dassel
September 24, 2011 – November 5, 2011
Roseau County Historical Society, Roseau
November 12, 2011 – December 24, 2011
New Harmonies is part of Museum on Main Street, a collaboration between the Smithsonian Institution and state humanities councils nationwide. Support for Museum on Main Street has been provided by the United States Congress, with additional support provided by a Minnesota Historical Society Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund Partnership Grant.
For more information, please contact Elizabeth de Soto, Outreach Specialist,