Among soul music fans, few things are as emotionally charged as comparisons between Stax Records and Motown. And now the Stax Music Academy has created a Black History Month production with an educational companion study guide: “Stax Meets Motown.” Educators and students can register HERE for the video production and BHM study guide.
The highly entertaining video and companion study guides delve into the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s and 1970s. It explores everything from Black radio to race, the recording industry, fashion, and the 1967 Detroit Riots.
Some prefer the rawer, grittier sounds of Stax Records and some like the smooth, polished tunes of Motown in the Stax Music Academy’s “Stax Meets Motown,” but viewers can see why both are important in this original Black History Month production by the Stax Music Academy.
The plot twists and turns as the rival students begin paying homage to the two labels that created some of the most riveting music of the 1960s and 70s.
Viewers will hear such familiar songs as hits recorded by Rufus Thomas, Otis Redding, Johnnie Taylor, Diana Ross & The Supremes, Stevie Wonder, the Jackson Five, and Sam & Dave.
Current Stax Music Academy student Anaya Murray, an award-winning filmmaker, wrote the show’s script along with the Stax Music Academy’s filmmaking award-winner Andrew Green and SMA student Rickey Fondren III, who CNN recently interviewed about his acting and role with the Tennessee Shakespeare Company.
The 2024 Black History Month production was filmed entirely at historic Booker T. Washington High School, which dates to the 1800s and is one of the first high schools in Memphis for African Americans.
The Stax Meets Motown video and Black History Month study guide is created for students, teachers, schools, youth groups, YMCAs, YWCAs, Boys & Girls Clubs, and other organizations with a focus on groups that typically lack access to the arts, and is free to all viewers starting in February 2024.
