Keeping the Beat Alive

Local music organizations are developing creative ways to fund programs and artists.

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While many cities have suffered shrinking budgets for school music programs and local arts funding, Memphis is home to a dedicated coterie of educators and music lovers who are helping us keep the beat swinging in the nongovernmental sector, beginning with three organizations that are helping to carry on the iconic “Memphis Sound” both inside this city and around the world.

Stax Music Academy

Stax Records was more than a record label. It was a bastion of multiracial teamwork and community uplift that fed the entire Soulsville neighborhood — which made its 1975 shuttering due to involuntary bankruptcy that much more tragic. But from the start, when former Stax publicist Deanie Parker began talking with interested parties in the ’90s about ways to honor the Stax legacy, she wanted to preserve that ethos.

“What’s wrong with a museum and a companion school of some sort, an academy or a performing arts center?” she recalls telling potential investors. “I’d like for people to study and preserve and promote what we did. And pass it on, with an educational component and a museum that people could come and see.”

And so, while the Stax Museum of American Soul Music seemed to be the main attraction, an accompanying music academy was baked into the concept from the start. Indeed, as plans for both came to a head in the early 2000s, the Stax Music Academy (SMA) grew in importance.

“We were driven by building the Stax Museum of American Soul Music,” says Parker. “But then I became reacquainted with that community and realized how that area had decayed after Stax was closed. It had deteriorated beyond recognition. People didn’t give a damn because they felt that they had been thrown away and that nobody cared. So it was good that the board decided to switch horses, and you know what we finished and cut the ribbon on first? The Stax Music Academy. That was opened a year before the museum.”

In the two decades since then, the Stax Music Academy has educated a new generation of musicians well-schooled in the art of music, grounded in R&B and soul but with a firm grasp of music theory and multiple styles. And their alums have excelled. In September 2022, when Booker T. Jones performed at the Stax Museum to celebrate the 60th anniversary of “Green Onions,” he was accompanied with great finesse by “the Franklin triplets,” three brothers playing drums, bass, and guitar who had learned the music of the MG’s well during their time at SMA. Other students routinely perform with Stax greats like William Bell, Carla Thomas, or Mavis Staples, either at the Overton Park Shell or while touring in Europe, Australia, or Asia.

The sheer creativity of Stax overlaps with the SMA’s fundraising activities. Who else has partnered with the city’s venerable Dinstuhl’s Fine Candies and Memphis Record Pressing to produce a limited-edition, co-branded chocolate record? Then there’s their brilliant red tennis shoe, sporting a design inspired by the tile mosaic outside the Stax museum building. Of course, one can always donate directly, and even send your kid to study there. Find out more at staxmusicacademy.org or on social @staxmusicacademy. — Alex Greene

Memphis Music Initiative

Memphis Music Initiative (MMI) offers opportunities for Black and brown young people to learn about music and equip them with professional and personal skills to help them later in life.

“Our mission,” says President and CEO Amber Hamilton, “is to provide young people across Memphis with equitable access to high-quality, transformative music engagement. We just want to make sure that people, with music really being the heart of Memphis, can access music instruction, song-writing, creative liberation, all kinds of things to keep them motivated and interested in the arts.”

She defines creative liberation as “the idea that you’re free to make and be whoever you want to be, and how that manifests in your creative practice.”

This can be done inside and outside of school, through music lessons, grants, and paid summer internships with art organizations across Memphis. “Songwriting is an important social and emotional outlet,” Hamilton says. “These times are very uncertain and challenging for young people in terms of their emotional health, so we need to give young people as many creative outlets to discuss their feelings as possible.” By teaming with local professional artists and creative organizations, MMI works hard to ensure Memphians are getting the outlets and learning opportunities they need to thrive.

The results are impressive. “They are doing everything from going on to college to pursue degrees in music, or getting advanced scholarships from playing in band at a university level, to becoming musical entrepreneurs and building their own businesses to really be the ground-level for the next generation of Memphis music,” she says.

Those who benefit from these opportunities are also more engaged in school, more confident in their creative abilities, and more likely to advocate for themselves and seek even more opportunities. Interns with MMI Works are able to gain professional experience in the arts and work in teams to create their own projects.

“It’s professional and personal development,” says Hamilton. “We work with organizations across Memphis to create a robust, full ecosystem of music. We support Black- and brown-led organizations, who are regularly underfunded, so that we can preserve the culture of music in Memphis.”

Currently, MMI is working on a campaign called 25x25, where they’re aiming to raise $25 million by the end of 2025. These funds would significantly boost not only MMI, but 17 additional Black-and brown-led creative development organizations, such as the Memphis Jazz Workshop and Cazateatro, with a whopping $1 million each.

These organizations typically work with annual budgets under $250,000, so 25x25 would allow them to go above and beyond their normal goals. They would be able to pour money into vans, help with transportation needs, and invest in infrastructure to reach more Memphian youths than ever. Hamilton notes that the biggest contributions so far have come from individuals in Memphis.

“Every little bit helps,” she says. “We really are hoping that the Memphis community can come together to support this one effort, which will help a very wide range of organizations.”

MMI will have an end of the year event to celebrate what they’ve accomplished in 2024 (date TBD), so be sure to follow their Instagram @mmusinitiative or check out their website at memphismusicinitiative.org for updates and ways to help their cause. — Samantha Cooke

Music Export Memphis

Music education benefits students is multiple ways, teaching “skills in leadership, teamwork, and discipline,” as the Stax Music Academy website notes. But those select students who pursue music careers can have a rocky road ahead of them. That’s where Music Export Memphis (MEM) comes in. Founded by former publicist Elizabeth Cawein in 2015, it’s dedicated to promoting and supporting Memphis music across the world and here at home. And MEM puts its money where its mouth is.

Take MEM’s Ambassador program, which re-frames touring Memphis artists as representatives of their city, and duly subsidizes their tours. As the organization explains, such touring bands are “playing for music lovers who might be interested in planning a trip to Memphis or may add Memphis to their list of cities for job searching after spending an evening with one of our artists.”

Often, just a small leg-up from MEM can make all the difference for a band playing clubs on the road with very narrow profit margins. Best of all, the nonprofit clearly understands the touring process, judging from the manifold ways that an artist can become an Ambassador. These include unrestricted cash tour grants, scholarships for attending conferences or professional development events, grants supporting the creation of merch to be sold on tour (as long as those shirts, hats, and stickers are made in Memphis), and even a catch-all called Ambassador Access, a six-month cohort-style program that offers education, mentorship, cash grants, and booking and marketing support to Memphis artists touring for the first time.

Beyond that, MEM also advocates for musicians on the home front, even conducting market research about audience preferences and musicians’ thoughts on fair pay, to further stoke support for local players. And, thanks to Cawein, the organization also fosters collaboration between local artists with what may be the city’s most creative fundraising event. Sure, one can always visit musicexportmemphis.org to make a direct donation, but it’s even more fun to attend one of the organization’s live showcases or the annual Tambourine Bash.

For the Tambourine Bash, a ticketed benefit concert (the latest one was held at the Overton Park Shell on October 10th), Cawein mixes and matches groups of solo artists and bands, creating ad hoc, collaborative ensembles to perform together for one night only. Cawein’s passion for the actual music being made in Memphis is obvious from her curation, clearly a labor of love.

“Curating this lineup is one of my absolute favorite things that I get the privilege to do,” she says. “And artists around the city know about it, so they get excited. I send that email saying, ‘Hey, are you available on October 10th?’ And they get pumped. I love that.”

To learn more about Music Export Memphis and get involved, readers can visit musicexportmemphis.org or follow them on social media @musicexportmem. — Alex Greene