Berea College professor of Japanese and faculty sponsor of the Berea Japanese Taiko & Culture Club, Nathan Patton, and his students will share the Japanese musical and dance form known as taiko and discuss its past, present, and potential future.
Sule Greg Wilson, founding member of the Carolina Chocolate Drops, will perform at Ballad Night at Berea College on Friday, April 22 at 7:30 P.M. in Gray Auditorium, Presser Hall. The evening is hosted by the Berea College Folk-Roots Ensemble.
Mr. Wilson will present a half-hour set of African-American ballads which will be followed by a ballad round robin. The evening is free and open to the general public. All audience members must be masked as per college policy due to the ongoing covid 19 pandemic.
With fifty plus years as a community musician, inter-cultural healer, and storyteller, Súle Greg Wilson, mines tradition for the power and wisdom within. He has shared at bembés, block parties, boardrooms, ceildhs, festivals, horas, jooks, shouts, and symposia.
Born and raised in Washington, DC, with university time in Ohio and New York City, Súle received his Masters in History/Archival Management from NYU; served as Director for the Smithsonian Institution’s Afro-American Index Project (precursor to the NMAAHC), from 1991 to 1994; and co-led 2005’s historic Black Banjo Gathering. Súle has careered as an archivist (New York Stock Exchange, Schomburg Center, World Bank, Pueblo Grande Museum) and an educator (New York, Phoenix, Tempe Public Schools; Maricopa County Community Colleges; Arizona State University).
Wilson’s work as a composer, writer, and performing artist has graced stage and screen, print and the street, taking him from Antrim to Kumasi, Newport to Bahia, Juneau to Hermosillo.He has produced numerous Folk and World albums, and his award-winning book, The Drummer’s Path: Moving the Spirit with Ritual and Traditional Drumming, is an international standard in the field.