Foundations

by Ateha Bailly

	/

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about

Foundations was composed as the final project for the MIT class Musical Aesthetics and Technologies.

The song nudges at the questionable foundation story of this country. It juxtaposes the words of Benjamin Franklin with the words of Angela Davis and Mos Def. Franklin writes' "That it is better that one hundred guilty persons should escape than that one innocent person should suffer is a maxim that has long and generally been approved." The stories told by Davis and Mos Def destabilizes the extent to which we can claim the sentiments expressed in Franklin's quote as a founding principles of the United States. They also challenge the assumption that our founding narratives are written from a general American perspective. The piece is structured such that the words of Davis and Mos Def provide the foundation on which the final verse is written.

lyrics

How could you ever really id me
You cannot know what you refuse to see
And how can you found what you refuse to support
Revolutionaries souls of a darker sort

Sophisticated intellect in a perpetual war
Never could I tell a lie
That's trouble you see in my eyes
But my prayer muscle exercised

And that's the only time I choose submit
Its a cancer and I don't want the cysts
I'm only hunting for the tumors
But malignancy can look benign until the go and try to feed it to you
That change the tide almost like something lunar
now can I get a hallelujah

I've made some pale white faces when they see what I do
I seen some poor black faces make the strangest of fruit
That took me to some dark places but I'm stable in truth
Won't bow to any old master and won't work in a noose
proof.

When that storm pass over
Won't look round my shoulder
I been dreaming something grand
This black star keep shining
Built on gold and diamond
Rastafari take my hand

credits

released December 22, 2020

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Ateha Bailly Portland, Oregon

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