The Current launches new Carbon Sound music stream
The Current is launching a new music stream, website and app on Thursday. Carbon Sound is described as “dedicated to celebrating the depth, breadth and influence of Black musical expression.”
Carbon Sound will include a range of genres including hip-hop, R&B, Afrobeats, funk and electronica.
“The mission and the vision here are my passions. It’s showing the depth, breadth and beauty of Black musical expression and showing how it's foundational to the whole canon of musical expression in this country,” Carbon Sound content director Julian Green said in a news release.
Carbon Sound launches at noon Thursday. It joins several other music streams from The Current, including Purple Current — celebrating the musical legacy of Prince — and Rock the Cradle, offering music for kids.
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The Carbon Sound stream will be available at carbonsound.fm; the app will be available in the Google Play and Apple App stores.
Sanni Brown, host of “The Message” on The Current, will be the voice of Carbon Sound; “The Message” will also air on the new stream.
“What’s most important to me is that we’re bringing something to the community — we’re public media, we’re here to give more than we get,” Brown said in a news release. “I want Carbon Sound to feel how I feel when I walk up on a barbecue I was invited to. I want it to be like that feeling of, ‘It's safe here.’”
Carbon Sound also has a community engagement specialist, Andre Griffin.
The project was developed in partnership with "The Ice," carried on the HD2 signal of Minneapolis' KMOJ 89.9 FM.
KMOJ general manager Freddie Bell said the partnership "will help extend and help elevate what we’re doing on The Ice and beyond. Now listeners who are looking for a wider variety of Black music in the Twin Cities will have a destination to find all these different sources of programming.”
Carbon Sound is funded by a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.