Kim Harris Biography
Musician / performer, storyteller, educator. b. 1957
“We become who we are through our songs and our stories, as much as through our kin, our communities and our countries.
So sing out!
And let our songs ring of justice and guide our feet into the ways of peace."
Kim Richards Harris does, in fact, “sing out for justice”. She has been doing this since she was a young girl in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Lucille, Kim’s mother, dreamed that she would have two daughters who would sing and play instruments. She made that dream come true, exposing Kim and her sister to folk music, who in turn performed as soloists and with groups, encouraging people to sing together in their churches and schools.
Kim loved school, and in each one she attended she was not only a dedicated student but an active participant in plays, choirs, and orchestra. She even insisted on playing the drums so that she could get into a marching band. At age nine, Kim attended a summer overnight camp, which she found to be ‘great fun’. Resonating with folk music, the camp attracted people like Kim who played the guitar and sang. There she became a counselor and, just after graduating from high school, met Reggie Harris. The two of them gave their first dual performance for the camp’s closing campfire. Kim has said that making music together seemed to come easily to them, and they continued to do so at Temple University in Philadelphia, which they both attended.
On Temple’s campus, Kim and Reggie entertained crowds by singing folk songs, which led to performances at coffeehouses and downtown clubs. They were an effective duo as they started writing their own songs and singing those of folk and pop musicians who had gained popularity on the radio. After marrying in 1976, the two began road trips in 1980, singing at college coffeehouses around the country, often encountering racism in hiring for the performances, as well as on the folk festival circuit, which reminded Kim of the racism she experienced as a child.
When she was in the third grade, Kim had been chosen to integrate an all-white school a few miles from her home. She learned later that before she entered this school, her parents had attended a number of emotionally-charged meetings with white parents, some of whom cried that black children would ‘mess up the school.’ Fortunately, Kim said, her entrance into the school “did not involve screaming parents the way Civil Rights pioneers such as young Ruby Bridges in New Orleans did.”
As they traveled the country in the early 1980s, Kim and Reggie were frustrated that white students and administrators could not imagine that Black people would present anything of interest to them. Hence, they achieved only moderate success on the college circuit. In response to their frustration, they began to develop educationally-oriented programs using songs such as ‘Wade in the Water’, ‘Let Us Break Bread Together on Our Knees,’ and ‘Steal Away’ from the Underground Railroad and Civil Rights movements. By the late 1980s, many schools became engaged in or were mandated to include Black history in their curricula. At the same time elementary schools, high schools and colleges, church groups, and performing arts centers such as the Kennedy Center became interested in Kim’s and Reggie’s work. This motivated the Harrises to delve further into the music they had sung growing up in church, realizing that these songs were integral to freedom movements in the 1860’s and 1960’s. Remembering and learning anew the secret codes in the songs added to their historical knowledge and inspired them to present the traditions and history of their communities to others.
Today, in 2011, at concerts, assemblies, and folk festivals, in churches, workshops, and classrooms, Kim and Reggie continue to present the traditional music and stories of their people. Their mission is to tell the stories and sing the songs about the legacy of race and racism in this country and to teach people that they have the spirit, courage and decency to rise above it and heal. Kim believes, “The stories [of those who have changed history] we hear and tell help us to know who we are... and to find our way in the world,” But, she says, we must make sure we that we present these people not solely as heroes, but as ordinary people who have done extraordinary things so that they are not regarded “so far above and away from all of us ‘lowly’ people, that we stop thinking of ourselves as capable of doing great things or even aspiring to do so.” Kim is particularly interested in helping African-American traditions of freedom singing get passed along. Because songs and stories have sustained people throughout history in difficulty and oppression, Kim hopes that present and future generations will be helped in their challenges to use the songs and stories they hear from Kim, Reggie and others. She says, “Then I’ll know that I’ve done some good work...and it will be for the next generations to pass on the traditions as they see fit.”
