Interview with Senghor Baye, April 09. 2022

Okay. Today is April 28th, April 9th 2022. We're in Petworth. Have Paul Robeson Memorial event. And could, you could do I have permission to record this interview?

Yes, you do.

Could you tell us your name?

Yes, my name is Senghor Baye.

And would you mind telling us a little bit about how you might consider yourself an artist or an activist?

Right, Well, I'm an activist. I work for the Garvey movement, but for years, I've been studying not only Paul Robeson's work but our ancestors work and my mother...I was raised in Washington DC and I'm 70 now. I've been here all my life. My mom's is now an ancestor, but she was actually here when we unveiled this particular art that my good brother Uzikee has done. And I've known Uzikee and Januwa since they've been here in D.C. Came from Baltimore.

That's terrific. And could you tell us a little bit about your mother?

Yes. Well, my mom actually got to meet Paul Robeson, on a humbug. She worked for a real-estate company on Florida Avenue and saw Paul Robeson across the street, you know, with a lot of people surrounding. So she ran out and went to introduce herself to him. And of course he shared some words with her, and she was just so excited, went back in the office, about two hours later, two agents came in and questioned my mother about her talking to Paul Robeson. And and the question they asked her is a what is your affiliation with Paul Robeson? She said don't you know who Paul Robeson is? Everybody should know who Paul Robeson is. In fact, Paul Robeson could probably teach y'all a few things. She knew who they were. And so she knew how to answer but she told that story here a little bit about how she was so motivated by The Works of Paul Robeson.

Oh, That's beautiful. And could you tell us a little bit about your activism?

Yes. Well, basically some of the work that Paul Robeson was doing for Humanity. That's the same word Garvey and a lot of other ancestors have done and We striving to raise our people up to our traditional greatness around the world. We work with Youth. We do all kinds of different things but more importantly, we're striving to get back to our traditional greatness and we are a great people. Paul Robeson was one of the best athletes, best vocalist, best actors of all time. And unfortunately, he was castigated, he was attacked and he was pushed away because of his affiliation with Communism. Now, I don't support communism, knowing my support of capitalism, but I am a supporter of humanism and that's Paul Robeson was, so he did this book "Here I Stand" to kind of clarify his positions because he was known all over the world and was great and everybody loved him, until they started character assassinating him and put things out about him and he couldn't get gigs anywhere, but he was principeled and he was consistent and he was a humanitarian.

And, uh, how would you say that inspired you?

Oh, it inspired me because as as I said, most... most, the most of our ancestors that I work with, they have done great works and it's important for us to emulate them and carry on that work with what we do. So, even though I retired from the National Association of Social Workers after 22 years, in 2008, I've been working to do community service work worldwide.

And what kind of...could you tell us a little bit about that work?

Of course, getting our young brothers and sisters more on track. Because too many of them have been caught up in so much confusion with media and the internet that they have lost track of family ties and they've lost track of how important they are. Because all of us are important. No one is better than the next person. It's just very important for them to understand their importance and to understand their value so that they look forward to do positive things in life, instead of get caught up in the negative life and that's the main work. But of course, it ties into music, you know, and a whole lot of other things which are really really relevant, as well as unifying people globally.

And I understand, you're a musician?

Well, yeah, percussion. I play drums, percussion. I play percussions. In fact, Bobbin Goma who came here and did stuff, you got him up on film, I studied under him and quite a few people. So I do that recreationally and I'm a reader and a writer and I you know, I'm an author as well.

That's terrific and how do you, um, how does that, uh, you said, you talked about the music in terms of your larger work and in terms of building that sense of dignity?

Right, Well, music is very important. And unfortunately some of our artists to get paid have strayed away from their positive messages and then come up with messages that are not as positive as they need to be. Unfortunately. A lot of our artists are caught in that but you do have a lot of great artists that need to be promoted and push that are putting positive messages out. Because Generations that come after us it's important for them to get the positivity verse a lot of the negative things that we've got caught up in.

That's great. Do you, could you tell us a bit about...Tell us about the kind of the particular communities and also the larger idea of community, in terms of what that means to you?

Absolutely, well, first of all community, the first community is your family and if you don't have good family ties, as far as hard for you get good neighborhood ties, then, good national ties, like Washington, D.C. I grew right up in this neighborhood and Ward Four, you know, and I'm 70 now and I'm just blessed with all blessings that I've had with my grandchildren and things of that nature. So it is important for us to tie community, local community, international community, inter-international community, and to work to build global community that can change the direction of the world, and I have faith that that's going to be done. It's just we're losing so many people young and old unfortunately, through not being clear and conscious enough to understand our purpose here.

That's great. And could you tell us a little bit about where you would like that our world to become that through that work?

You said, where?

Where like, how would you envision where you would like us to go?

Well, we have to be more comfortable with who we are and to connect with each other. I would like to see Africa developed in a direction because the whole world needs Africa. Okay. Everybody's...everybody's in Africa. Okay, the whole world needs it. Unfortunately, too. Many of the brothers and sisters outside of Africa that are African, don't understand the importance of connecting back with Africa, so to pan-africanism work that I do, It's similar to the work that Paul Robeson was calling for us to do, it's to unify us. Because unfortunately a lot of our brothers and sisters outside of the United States don't have access to the resources and things that we have access to. So they are impoverished, they're in poverty. So we have to address those issues. We have to build roadways, we have to do a lot of work, but we have people who have done a lot of building here in America that need to carry that, not only in Africa, but in South America, and wherever you find communities that need engineers, carpenters, you know, experts in in social services. So it's the whole Gambit. So really, I have committed my life to that. So I'm retired but I'm not retired from doing that kind of community work. I won't retire from that.

That's beautiful. Any last things you'd like to leave us with?

Well, I would just say thank you for coming out and doing this. Thank you for the Legacy. I understand you have my mother on film and Januwa told me so I'm very pleased that we're doing this at 149th birthday of Paul Robeson. So here we stand.

Thank you so much. I appreciate that.