“The reality is that Black people have been involved in every stage of country music’s development and in every facet.”[1] The contributions of African Americans have been essential to the creation and sustained success of the country music genre; however, broad public awareness of their contributions has been silenced by the larger music history industry. This is especially true regarding the contributions of Black women. Few Black women are remembered on Nashville’s commemorative landscape for their contributions to music; rarer still are memorial sites for Black women in country music. Leona Douglas-Chambers and Eugenia JoAnn Sweeney were two of country music’s earliest Black female recording artists, and their lives and work deserves to be a part of the larger historical narrative around country music. This thesis acknowledges the vibrant social memory of Black Nashvillians as they share recollections of Ms. Douglas-Chambers and Ms. Sweeney and explores the structural racism and sexism that has blocked wide-ranging public awareness of these women. This project is designed to encourage present and future generations to think critically about issues of social justice and civil rights and create inclusive commemorative spaces.
The central goal of this research is to bring the contributions of Black women in the field of country and western music to broader public attention. This is achieved through the development of ethical partnerships with community members to co-create histories, supplemented by archival research. These partnerships resulted in the creating of two biographical portraits that combine oral histories with primary and secondary documentation to reconstruct the lives of Leona Douglas-Chambers and Eugenia JoAnn Sweeney. This biographical data was used to identify sites of memory for Mrs. Douglas-Chambers and Ms. Sweeney, and photo editing software was utilized to imagine potential landmarks specific to each of the women’s contributions.
Since the beginning of my research, I have consulted on a regular basis with project community scholars Lorenzo Washington, owner and operator of the Jefferson Street Sound Museum, Iona Douglas, daughter of Leona Douglas, and Eugenia JoAnn Sweeney. I identify as an Anglo-American male and fully acknowledge my outsider status both racially and in terms of gender. I will reference the work of all community scholars throughout this thesis and have asked the university to include an honorarium for them. I realize this will not in any way address the depth and breadth of their knowledge about the topics but will be a small expression of respect for their assistance.
[1] Pamela Foster, My Country: The African Diaspora’s Country Music Heritage (Nashville: My Country, 1998), vi.
Of Music and Memory 