British Folk Music: Where Are All The Black People?

Why are Black people so rarely seen in British Folk Music, apart from the apparent & questionable guise of the Blackface traditions still practiced today? Musician and researcher, Marie Bashiru, looks into the question of why Black people are so rarely seen in British Folk Music, and their absence in the English body of folk song, compared to their counterparts in the US. It revisits and shines a lens on the phenomenon era of Blackface Minstrelsy in Britain, engaging current Black British folk music practitioners in conversation on belonging, England’s colonial past, & folk history.