WASHINGTON – President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden will host a Juneteenth concert next week as part of a “celebration of community, culture and music,” the White House announced Wednesday.
The concert will take place on June 13 on the South Lawn of the White House. During the event, the White House says it will “highlight American art forms that sing to the soul of the American experience” as part of Black Music Month.
Artists featured include Tony Award-winner Audra McDonald, singer and talk show host Jennifer Hudson, and Cliff “Method Man” Smith, a member of legendary hip-hop group Wu-Tang Clan.
Juneteenth marks when The last enslaved people in the United States learned they were free—which happened on June 19, 1885, when Union soldiers broke news of their freedom to enslaved blacks in Galveston, Texas. In 2021 it became a national holiday.
“This is a day of great importance and power, a day to remember the moral stain, the terrible toll that slavery has taken and continues to take on the country,” Biden said two years ago when he signed a lawsupported by an overwhelming bipartisan majority in Congress, which designated June 19 as a federal holiday.
__
This story has been corrected to change the date committed by Juneteenth to June 19, 1885 and not 1985.
Copyright 2023 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, transcribed, or redistributed without permission.
