Aretha Franklin

To commemorate music’s transformative ability to preserve and promote free speech, here are five songs curated by the arts editors.

“Respect” memorializes a musical legend, and with Hudson as Franklin, the biopic pays the Queen of Soul only what she deserves: the utmost respect. 

This year, as we celebrate Juneteenth — a holiday meant to bring Americans together to celebrate the day all Americans became free — we can reflect on the ways Americans have told stories of Black liberation for all the world to see — through public art.

This summer shapes up as a season of options: variety in the movies to choose and variety in the ways to watch them. Here are movies slated for the summer.

Subconsciously, I think about things to avoid feeling things. In the heat of the moment, however, sex makes it hard to think. And even if thoughtless sex can sometimes be risky, I love escaping my head.

Hozier’s appreciation for the work of Black musicians shapes the entire track, including the lyrics, the gospel-inspired chorus and, most importantly, the involvement of a prominent civil rights singer, Mavis Staples, who sings alongside him.

I realized quickly that her music did make me want to dance. What took longer to realize was that it could also make me want to cry.

Even before reports of low attendance at President Donald Trump’s inauguration, his administration encountered an issue that was unprecedented in modern history: no one wanted to perform.