Billy Kemp - Benjamin Banneker (3:51)

BILLY KEMP - BENJAMIN BANNEKER (3:51)

Contact: Billy Kemp
(615) 947-7183
[email]BillyKempMusic@gmail.com[/email]

Songwriter: Billy Kemp, Jeni Hankins, Alfred Hickling
Publishing & PRO: Willbilly Music / Lulu Wall Music, BMI 2017

"Benjamin Banneker is a medium, dirge-like shuffle on finger picking banjo and vocal with junkyard percussion and melodica. A lamentation for America’s first African-American man of science.

Just west of where I grew up in Baltimore, Maryland is a community called Oella. It is on the Baltimore county side of the Patapsco river just across from the 18th century mill town, Ellicott City. Oella had a famous resident named Benjamin Banneker. He was an African-American who lived there from 1736 to 1806. While on tour in Florida I picked up a book, The Life of Benjamin Banneker by Silvio A. Bedini at a library book sale. I had heard of him and went to where his grave was thought to be up in Oella when I was in high school. There was even a Benjamin Banneker elementary school in Catonsville. Now there is a Benjamin Banneker Historical Park and Museum in Oella near where he lived and worked." ~ Billy Kemp

Musicans:
Billy Kemp: Melodica, Banjo, Percussion, Vocal