Quartet For Serving While Black Program Notes

Program Notes, text by Carol Williams

We were here for you when this country started; we were here with you, and we still are.

With features all our own, we remain absolute individuals. That's who we are, who we need to be, how we need to stay. We have weathered a storm that has not ended. 

At every national threat, we were there, begged to be there, volunteered, demanding to do the worst of what was needed to be done, wearing the nametags of our plantations on our chests, next to the collar brass of the Eagle standing guard over the Latin "out of many, one."

Why? Because that's what it means to be an American to us. We rose up, with no question or hesitation, to wear the uniform designed to make us identical and equal.

But not quite. It's not finished. The ideas were perfect, but they were not nearly finished. In a crisis, we are together but then always torn back apart. Our images here are a gift to the recollection of us, our dignity, our place among all, next to all, and, at times, above us all.   

So, what does it mean to us? It is part risk, part humiliation, and rejection, part pride and distinction, all combined and distilled from many parts into one experience: To serve

while black.