This video features Mark Puryear, curator of the 2011 Folklife Festival program Rhythm and Blues: Tell It Like It Is. Mark is a Lecturer in the African American Studies Department at the University of Maryland, College Park, and he has worked in public programming in a range of institutions including the National Endowment for the Arts (National Heritage Fellowships), the National Council for the Traditional Arts, and the Arts and Humanities Council of Montgomery County. Most recently, he conducted a survey of the Smithsonian Folkways catalog for the African American Legacy Series, a co-production with the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. Mark holds an M.A. in ethnomusicology from the University of Maryland, College Park.

Video produced by Charles Weber and Brandon Callahan, graphic treatment by Aurelie Beatley.