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Bernice Johnson Reagon, Sweet Honey in the Rock Singer and Civil Rights Activist Dies at 81

Bernice Johnson Reagon, the founder of Sweet Honey in the Rock and longtime civil rights activist has died at 81.

“But what they began to write about… no matter what the article said, they talked about singing.” Those revamped church songs, which Reagon would say often swapped “freedom” in for “Jesus,” as well as her activism got the singer expelled from Albany state after her arrest for protesting. That led to Reagon founding the a cappella Freedom Singers in 1962, whose songs often served as a record of the civil rights struggle, from tributes to fallen leaders (“They Laid Medgar Evers in His Grave”), to a revamp of the movement’s anthem, “We Shall Overcome” and “Free At Last,” which took its name from a quote in Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech at the March on Washington. In addition to her work singing in and producing Sweet Honey in the Rock, Reagon released solo efforts, including 1975’s Give Your Hands to Struggle and 1986’s River of Life.

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