Black Country Music ‘Renaissance’ Forces Genre to Reckon With Racial History

The growing popularity of Black country artists, spurred in part by Beyoncé’s “Cowboy Carter,” has sparked a conversation around the history of the genre and the past and present racial tensions surrounding it.

Beyoncé, who has spoken out about the hostile response she received after performing at the Country Music Association (CMA) Awards in 2016, made headlines this year when she became the first Black woman to top the Hot Country Songs chart on Billboard.

On Wednesday, she performed a medley of her new country-inspired songs during halftime of the Christmas Day NFL match-up between the Houston Texans and the Baltimore Ravens. The performance featured Black cowboys, two-stepping and the first Black rodeo queen.

“There is a Black country renaissance going on … that has been a long time coming, and ‘Cowboy Carter’ is very big part of that, but not remotely the only part,” award-winning songwriter producer and novelist Alice Randall told The Hill.

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“This type of renaissance is a good time to remember that Black people didn’t just show up in country music now,” Randall said. “Black people have been in country music for almost 400 years.”

But Black country artists are now making history.

Virginia native Shaboozey, who is featured on Beyoncé’s album, made history with “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” when it became the first ever single to reach the Top 10 on all four of the Country Airplay, Pop Airplay, Adult Pop Airplay and Rhythmic Airplay charts and only the second ever single by a Black artist to top both the Billboard Hot 100 and Country Songs charts. {snip}

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But Black Americans have long struggled to be embraced by the larger country music community.

In 2019, Billboard removed Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road” from its Hot Country Songs for not embracing “enough” country elements. Actor Anthony Mackie, an avid country music fan, battled racist remarks for co-hosting the 2022 CMT Music Awards.

More recently, Shaboozey’s name was repeatedly mocked at this year’s CMA Awards in what critics called racist microaggressions. And Beyoncé was criticized by artists including Luke Bryan, who co-hosted the CMA Awards, for not spending time in Nashville ahead of her “Cowboy Carter” album release despite the racist viewer reception to when she performed at the awards. {snip}

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But despite the deep connection between Black people and country music, Francesca Royster, a professor at DePaul University, said the backlash should be unsurprising.

“In some ways, it’s the genre where there is, to me, the most protection of a narrative of white originality,” Royster said. “The narrative of originality is partly connected to the way that country and western and hillbilly music was formulated as a genre that was aimed at white audiences, and also that reflected the racial segregation of the Jim Crow South.”

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“There is a kind of cultural shame for Black audience members, partly connected to the way that country music has become, for some Black people, kind of a code for white segregationist thinking and conservative thinking and racism,” Royster said.

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