Blackberri: Doing Politics Through Music

When Blackberri, the black gay singer from San Francisco, released his first solo LP, Finally, in 1981, he surprised a lot of people with the high quality of the production. "They were expecting something more amateurish. I don't think Finally's my best. It's the best thing I've done so far. As a first effort, it was exceptional."

The album was not the first time Blackberri has appeared on record. In 1978, he recorded two songs for Wall to Roses, an album put out on the Folkways label by a men's music collective.

The Finally LP has become a must in the record collection of a select group of black gay writers and artists who cherish the album because of its gay content and glowing affirmation of gay pride and liberation.

The songs range from blues to country & western, so it's hard to pigeonhole Blackberri as an artist. The use of multiple musical styles was to show listeners that he "can do any kind of style comfortably."

Since the release of the album four years ago, Blackberri has not done any recording for one simple reason--no money. He was able to do Finally because "I was fortunate enough to get a donation from a man who told me later on he didn't really want the money back. Then we borrowed some money to distribute it and other stuff."

He would like to produce other artists on his Bea B. Queen label but the " finances have to get much stronger" before that can happen. "I made the mistake of not being one record ahead. What people do is make an album, then it comes in, they make another album. The money that comes in from the second album, they start paying their first album bills with. Then the third album , they pay the second album. That way they've always got money to do another project."

Blackberri to put it simply is Bea B. Queen Records. "I'm basically a one-man company. I have to do the bookings and my own bookkeeping. For a while, I was doing the shipping and my own distribution, plus being the artist. It's a lot of work for one person."

I asked Blackberri where the name Bea B. Queen came from. "Somebody called me Bea B. Queen once and I thought it was really funny. It's a takeoff on B.B. King."

Before moving to San Francisco, and recording songs, Blackberri lived in Tucson,Arizona. While he was there, he vocalized with a band called Gunther Quint. "We played hard rock and blues. We were basically a trio with a singer. We were one of the best bands in Arizona at the time. Got a lot of reviews written about us. Got mentioned in Rolling Stone."

Blackberri's reason for leaving Tucson after six years was because there weren't many clubs where he could play original songs. "Most of the clubs there like bands [that play] the Top 40." So Blackberri packed his bags and guitar and headed for San Francisco, where he's lived for the last 11 years.

Blackberri, a native of Buffalo, New York, knew of his same-sex attraction since he was about six years old. At that time, on Saturday afternoons, he, who was big for his age, along with other kids, went to the neighborhood movie theatre  that was a block from his house. The theatre showed adventure serials like Buck Rogers, the space ranger. Inside the theatre "I spent s lot of time cruising the bathrooms. I would always try to sit beside some older boy. I was looking for it. I knew exactly what to do. I was already having sex with my next door neighbors on both sides of me, and sex with the boy up the street from me."

At age 12 or 13, Blackberri sang a lot. His desire, however was not to become a professional singer. He wanted to be a marine biologist. "I was into science. Then I went through a religious conversion and that kind of took me out of everything for a while. I went into the navy and that spun me off into a different direction. I was in the service from '65 to '66. I was discharged for being queer. I was placed under investigation because one of my shipmates turned  me in. They put a tail on me, and when they thought they had enough evidence, they arrested me, went through my personal belongings and found incriminating letters and other things."

Being an artist, the circumstances of his departure from the service has not had a negative affect on his career. And although he can afford to take chances, like speaking out for gay rights, his political activity has been slight.

"I was more politically active at one time than I am now. Part of the reason [for that] is that I have a career; I'm not always in one place long enough to take on any commitments. I've been working with different groups, taking on small tasks, little things I can do. I do my politics through my music."

This article was originally published in a slightly different form in the New York Amsterdam News in 1991 and the New York Native in the mid-80s.

Note: Blackberri can be heard on the soundtrack of Marlon Riggs's AIDS documentary Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien (No Regret) (1992, 40 minutes).