Black Opry to Host Country Music Event in Winston -Salem – Metro QCity

As a fan of Country Music, Holly G. says she often felt alone, wondering if others like her – black people, that is, a quiet vibration of country tunes. So, in the spring of 2021, the former flight attendant released a blog to share her thoughts about country music.

Within months, her blog has acquired a significant studies and creates an online community for Black Country fans.

On Saturday, Holly’s efforts will be exhibited when the black Opry, which he later founded, puts a live performance at the North Carolina Museum of Arts in Winston-Salem.

Holly.

Since its founding in 2021, the team appeared on the stage in 2023 in Luck Reunion, held on Willie Nelson’s ranch and launched a recording, Black Opry Records, in October 2024.

“I started Black Opry to see if there was someone else like me,” she said. “Everything just happened so quickly that I had the feeling that I didn’t have time to blink.”

Today, she says on average she chooses three to five artists to perform about 70 shows a year. She hopes to continue to maintain and expand the opportunities for black side artists. “I just hope we can maintain the things we have built and continue to grow in any way best serves artists,” said Holly G.

Holly G.’s efforts to raise the artists of the black rural come in a happy weather. More than 50 years after Charlie Pride became the first black superstar of Country Music, an increasing number of black artists make entry.

At the Grammy Awards in 2025, Beyonce, most famous as the ruling wild pop, took a home album of the year about Cowboy Carter, which was strongly treated with country music traditions. And South Carolina -born Darius Ruker, a former leading singer with the rock band Hootie & The Blowfish, has a string of hit singles in the country’s music charts.

Holly G. said that the main success is not always reduced to the smaller artists, especially mostly independent with whom he works.

“Three chords and the truth”

The performance on Saturday will include three independent performers-Aaron Vance, Julie Williams and Roberta Lea Halmond-Walters-who write and perform their own music.

The members of the audience, said Halmond-Walters, can expect “some fun” and “three chords and the truth”. Each artist will play his unique country style of music-from the traditional to “fit comfortably between Shaniya Twain and Tracy Chapman,” says Halmond-Walters, 39 years old. All three also write their own songs.

Katie Cranford, a music coordinator at the NC Museum of Arts in Winston Salem, said the upcoming concert will be held in the official audience of the museum. She told Qcity Metro that she chose the group to “show black perfection and black art, black artistry, while unpacking incredibly complex but interesting dynamics of country music.”

The 44 -year -old Vance from Mississippi said he was raised in churches and on the same farm as his father. He said he grew up, listening to legends about the province like George Right, Johnny Cash and Eric Church. One muddy day during shooting, he thought, “I can tell stories pretty well” and got the idea of ​​becoming songwriting. In 2012, Vance learned how to play guitar and later began to adapt and improve his songwriting skills. “And it went from there,” Vance said.

Halmond-Walters has not been raised in country music in Norfolk, Virginia, but she has always been a fan and often listened to country classics like Faith Hill and Tim Mcgraw. Her journey to the industry began to learn how to play guitar – because the keyboard she originally used for open microphones was “very difficult to get home.” At first, she was “limited to basic chords”, which she called the “foundations of country music.” As she continued to write songs and learn the guitar from 2018 to 2021, she said she was beginning to have more than country sound in which she “naturally tilted.”

Original members

Holly G. said she had chosen the artists because all three are original members of the Black Oppri. She said she wanted to gather “All OGS again together.”

Halmond-Walters said she has joined the Black OPRO through X’s relationship with Holly D, which encourages her, despite her worries that she is a black woman in country music. “I didn’t see many references to black women like me in country music,” said Halmond-Walters. From there, Holly G listed her on the blog and she said her career “started to take off.”

Halmond-Watlers emphasized the importance of telling stories in country music. “I love telling stories,” she said. “I like to be able to accept a very simple circumstance that I feel and turn it into a song.”

She told the QCity subway that her goal is to achieve “sustainable success”.

Vance said he joined “Artists just like me.” Ever since he joined, he said Opry helped him find a community of black country musicians and provide professional opportunities, such as helping him with reservation shows. “This is a place where we can connect, to appear several drinks, to tell some crazy stories,” Vance said.

Vance said he hopes the members of the audience on Saturday will see how diverse and inclusive the genre of the country can be.

“I preach that this country is everywhere and is welcoming,” Vance said.