Juneteenth is just around the corner, and on Thursday (May 30), President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden announced the lineup for their second annual concert in celebration of the holiday.
The event, which will take place on June 10 on the White House’s South Lawn, will feature Patti LaBelle, Gladys Knight, Charlie Wilson, Kirk Franklin, Anthony Hamilton, Brittney Spencer, Trombone Shorty, Raheem Devaughn, Doug E. Fresh, Patina Miller and Roy Wood, Jr. This year’s performers were selected for “their mark on the culture in studios, pulpits, and stages over their successful careers,” per a White House press release.
The celebratory concert comes three years after Biden signed bipartisan legislation establishing Juneteenth as a federal holiday. Juneteenth, celebrated on June 19 annually, commemorates the end of slavery in the United States. “Juneteenth marks both the long, hard night of slavery and subjugation, and a promise of a brighter morning to come. This is a day of profound — in my view — profound weight and profound power,” Biden said at the time of signing the bill. “A day in which we remember the moral stain, the terrible toll that slavery took on the country and continues to take — what I’ve long called ‘America’s original sin.’”
The Juneteenth concert will take place during Black Music Month. Also known as African-American Music Appreciation Month, Black Music Month was formally recognized as a national monthlong observance in 2000. “I call upon public officials, educators, and all the people of the United States to observe this month by honoring Black musicians and raising awareness and appreciation.”
