Show Title: “PRESERVING DETROIT'S LEGACY”

Interview: Singer, Storyteller, Writer, Dancer, Percussionist, Lyricist, & co-Founder of the women’s oral history vocal group “Hakamma”, Jarah Michelle McKinney is an Archivist & Librarian working as Education Program Producer at The Charles H Wright Museum & is also the new Executive Director at Detroit Sound Conservancy (DSC): A nonprofit community-based archive documenting Detroit music through preservation, education, performance, & place keeping.

DSC will preserve the musical recordings of Harold W. McKinney (1928-2001).

The collection contains numerous audio & cassette tapes documenting the music of “The Baron” from the 1960s to his death in 2001. DSC plans to inventory, digitize, & make accessible the recordings at their soon-to-be-open-to-the-public museum, library, & archive in the heart of the West Side neighborhood where McKinney grew up & later, raised his family. Preserving McKinney’s recorded legacy is part of a larger effort to document Detroit’s rich sonic legacies beyond Motown. 

These recordings include broadcasts, live events, studio recordings, evaluation dubs, a metal ‘mother’ for disc album production, concerts, lecture-demonstrations, studio & home rehearsals of various groups of players/singers of original compositions, lyrics, & original lyrics set to cover material, home recordings of archival personal family moments & recorded conversations about the history of the musical development of African American music. 

Some of the studio recordings at risk have been released for the mass market as long-playing 33 rpm & 45 rpm discs and CDs now out-of-print.