(Reposted from the Access Waco entertainment blog on the Waco Tribune-Herald website)

Next to the city desk in the Trib newsroom is a First Amendment page-a-day calendar from the Freedom Forum, a press advocacy group. (The Freedom Forum link gives an error message at the moment, but hopefully it'll be fixed by the time you see this.) Each page has a free-speech-related quote, as well as the full text of the First Amendment.

I came to work this morning having already heard of the death of Odetta, a folksinger known as "the voice of the civil rights movement," at age 77. I turned the calendar to today's page, and this was the quote:

"Free expression and music are a potent combination. Freedom sings. And music matters." — Kenneth A. Paulson, editor, USA Today, 2000

I can't imagine Odetta would have disagreed.