How a Song Can Reveal What a Debate Never Will – DTH Episode 323 with Shaka Mitchell
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Shaka Mitchell is a lawyer and education policy veteran who built something unusual out of a pandemic-era habit: getting friends together once a month, picking songs tied to a theme, and talking about why. That casual ritual became the Come Together Music Project, now a podcast and live event series Shaka's run with friends, strangers, and colleagues across the political spectrum.
One story stands out. At a session with two judges who'd never met - one a conservative libertarian state Supreme Court justice, the other a newly appointed progressive appeals judge - the prompt was simple: name a song that reminds you of where you grew up. The justice picked a Billy Joel song about a town he'd never even lived in, got visibly emotional, and started talking about a working-class childhood that nobody who'd read his opinions would have guessed at. Forty seconds of music got further than years of case law ever could.
Shaka and Wilk dig into why this works - why asking someone what song reminds them of home lands so differently than asking who they voted for - and why Shaka insists on keeping the project upstream of politics rather than trying to resolve any actual policy fight. They also get into what's shifted in the relationship between music and politics since the Dixie Chicks and Lady Antebellum era, and why most musicians want nothing to do with the crossfire.
If you've ever wondered how to get past the labels people wear online and actually find out who someone is, this might be your blueprint.
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