The Martin Luther King Jr. Concert

For class we were required to participate in a multicultural activity, all in honor of Unity week. The activity that I chose to participate in was The Martin Luther King Jr. Concert. This concert was held in Sursa hall, which is newly completed music hall on campus. As I sat through the performances, I began to realize how much different cultures were incorporated in the ensemble. There were Asian performers singing in their own language, and even though I couldn’t understand what they were saying I really liked how their music spoke for them. Whether it was sad, happy, or silly, for the most part you could understand. Aside from the Asian performers, there were a couple of instrumental pieces and choir contributions. Also in between the performances there were excerpts from an interview on the retractable screen.
These interviews were mainly with people who lived during the Civil Rights Era in Muncie. It was interesting to see how things have and haven’t changed when it comes to segregation. To go a little more in depth about, a few of the people interviewed spoke of how they had to move to a certain part of town just because of their ethnicity, and also how going to school during that time was. A lady (whose name escapes me) was an honor student who was never recognized for her academic achievements, even though people who were ranked in front of and behind her in class rankings were acknowledged. Even now I still see segregation of sorts even on Ball State campus. Being that I am part African American, I am still counted as a African American. So those interviews were intriguing in the sense that now I know that Muncie (being such a tiny city so to speak) is a bit behind in becoming culturally diverse.
Some of things that shocked me when I was at the concert were how many people of different cultures seemed to be there. Even more shocking was how many people got into the spirit of the evening. People got up and clapped their hands if the performances moved them to and many people bobbed their heads to the music. My favorite performance of the night besides the instrumentals (which I really liked) was the Voices of Triumph Choir, because a few of my friends were performing and I had no idea. It was a nice surprise and they were really good. All the music by the various performers, gave me goose bumps and I normally only get goose bumps when the music is really good and sort of speaks to me. The whole was really great in the sense that there was good music, a good audience and it was all in celebration of a great man.