Dear Friends and Music Family!

It’s what I seem to love to do… so I looked it up!
Collaboration: the process of two or more people or organizations working together to complete a task or achieve a goal.  

I’ve spent most of my life working in collaboration. It started in childhood, living with my grandmother, my single-parent mom, and my sister, living in a house that my mom “Midge” and her sister “Sweetsie” helped my Nana and Grandpop to buy. They were the first Black family on the block, in a house bought in a collaboration with a White realtor and the first Black female judge in PA, The Honorable Juanita Kidd Stout. Through those years, we didn’t always have what we needed, but we had love. With the help of our church and neighborhood, we got by.

That effort continued in my adult life as I discovered that music was my inspiration and my way to express all that I love and hope to represent. As part of the duo Kim and Reggie Harris and many satisfying collaborations including with Pete Seeger, Matt Jones, Scott Ainslie, Pat Wictor, Magpie and many others, we raised our voices to stamp out hate and lift up hope.

I have also come to love the joy and power of singing and performing as a solo act. Music speaks to hearts and minds in ways that transforms our lives and makes our planet more safe, more sane, healthy and just. But working in collaboration remains one of my great joys.

Most of you know of my collaboration with Greg Greenway, my friend of 30 years. Deeper Than the Skin is a story/concert/dialogue that takes on the subject of race. We’re at a new and exciting place and are happy to announce that we are recording a CD of the presentation that will be available later this year! This CD comes at a challenging time in our nation, and has allowed us to engage in critical conversations with audiences from Maine to Florida, Oklahoma to Virginia.

Born 3 days apart we have forged a friendship that merges our different beginnings, White and Black, North and South, a descendant of slaves and a descendant of slave owners, into a collaboration that invites people to recall their stories and hear the stories of others. This is the only way that we will heal the racial divide. We invite you to watch for ways to purchase the CD (not yet available). We welcome you to join us when we’re in your area (see dates below, Reggie’s website, or visit the Deeper Than the Skin website) or you can invite us into your community by visiting this link (https://deeperthantheskin.com).

Malcolm X said, “We need more light about each other.” You can help us in our efforts to open hearts and create more light.