The Confederacy: Truth and Reconciliation Audiobook By T Bone Burnett cover art

The Confederacy: Truth and Reconciliation

Words + Music, Vol. 7

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The Confederacy: Truth and Reconciliation

By: T Bone Burnett
Narrated by: T Bone Burnett
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"Racism is a disease of white people, and I don't intend to be quiet about it." (Albert Einstein)

“I agree with Einstein about that, and I don't intend to be quiet about it either.” (T Bone Burnett)

Legendary Grammy Award-winning producer and towering musical icon T Bone Burnett speaks plainly, which is all the more reason why his stunning new Words + Music, The Confederacy: Truth and Reconciliation, lands with such force. And his songs, delivered straight from the heart, carry with them the weight of unvarnished truth and the wisdom he’s gathered from a lifetime.

Through performance of his own words and music, in just a little more than 90 minutes runtime, T Bone confronts the choking influence of white supremacy in the United States - from its inception to its current state - reckoning with the musical, political, and personal influences that have shaped his career and his understanding of the human spirit in America. Part history, part personal essay, it is above all a call to action: to reject white supremacy and reconcile our nation’s racist past.

Delivered in his steadfast, gritty voice, T Bone’s meticulously crafted prose recounts the horrors of our nation’s history, its far-reaching, systematic oppression of African Americans to this day, the delusion of grandeur much of Anglo-America still suffers from, and the critical need for personal and societal change if we are to redeem ourselves in any capacity - and survive as a people. All of this T Bone lays bare, not by high-and-mighty finger pointing but through a sense of shared destiny and faith in each other. T Bone’s Words + Music is an honest hand reaching out for ours, urging us to grapple through this, mindfully, together. His words are further punctuated by his own heart-rending music, seamlessly woven in and out of his storytelling, and building upon his open plea. Each song, including “River of Love”, “Quicksand”, and “Hefner and Disney”, is thoughtfully plucked from his prolific catalog.

As T Bone connects the dots for us using well-established facts, personal experience, and skillful songwriting, we are drawn to a resounding truth: that although our past is undeniably paved with unspeakable ills, they must be spoken; denying it only compounds the problem. As T Bone rightly concludes, we are all at a difficult crossroads. But his solution could not resonate any clearer: the path forward requires a hard look within. Join T Bone Burnett and listen to his call.

“Let's make a future where we all want to live.”

“Let's make a past we don't have to forgive.”

(T Bone Burnett)

©2020 T Bone Burnett (P)2020 Audible Originals LLC Biographies & Memoirs Entertainment & Celebrities Celebrity Social justice Inspiring Heartfelt Thought-Provoking

Our favorite moments from The Confederacy: Truth and Reconciliation

The Confederacy: Truth and Reconciliation
"Music doesn't lie..."
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The Confederacy: Truth and Reconciliation
"We stand on a precipice…"
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The Confederacy: Truth and Reconciliation
"I've never forgotten that moment..."
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  • The Confederacy: Truth and Reconciliation
  • "Music doesn't lie..."
  • The Confederacy: Truth and Reconciliation
  • "We stand on a precipice…"
  • The Confederacy: Truth and Reconciliation
  • "I've never forgotten that moment..."
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About the Creator and Performer

With 50 years’ experience in music and entertainment, T Bone Burnett has earned an unparalleled reputation as an innovative artist, songwriter, producer, performer, film and concert producer, record company owner, and artists’ advocate. Born in St. Louis, Missouri, Burnett grew up in Fort Worth, Texas where he first began writing songs and making records as a teenager. In the mid-1970s, Burnett was traveling the country as a musician and record producer when he was asked by Bob Dylan to play guitar in his band on the now-legendary Rolling Thunder Revue tour. That experience led Burnett to form the Alpha Band with David Mansfield and Steven Soles, making three acclaimed albums with the trio before releasing a string of critically acclaimed solo records in the 1980s. Toward the end of that decade, Burnett displayed his unique abilities to effectively meld music with film, producing the groundbreaking all-star music special, Roy Orbison and Friends: A Black and White Night.
Burnett has won an Academy Award, a Golden Globe, a BAFTA, and 13 Grammy Awards. He’s worked and collaborated with musicians spanning many genres, such as the aforementioned Bob Dylan, Elton John, Robert Plant, Alison Krauss, B.B. King, Tony Bennett, k.d. lang, Elvis Costello, The Civil Wars, Taylor Swift, Ryan Bingham, Counting Crows, Steve Earle, and Leon Russell. Burnett’s highly successful and acclaimed work in film throughout the past 30 years includes his collaboration with the Coen Brothers on The Big Lebowski, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, The Ladykillers, Inside Llewyn Davis, and The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, as well as Cold Mountain, The Hunger Games, Walk The Line, and Crazy Heart, for which he served as one of the film’s producers.
His work in television includes serving as the executive music producer and composer for the HBO series True Detective and the first season of the ABC television series, Nashville. In 2014, T Bone handpicked a diverse group of artists to form a band and compose music for newly unearthed Bob Dylan lyrics written at the time of the artist’s historic Basement Tapes recordings. These sessions resulted in the Burnett-produced Lost on the River: The New Basement Tapes album and the accompanying Lost Songs documentary on Showtime. Burnett was nominated for Emmy awards for the scores of True Detective and for his work with Jack White and Robert Redford on American Epic: a multi-part, multimedia project that explores the history of music in America, as well as its global roots.
His work as a recording artist continues with an ambitious three-album series in collaboration with drummer Jay Bellerose and keyboardist Keefus Ciancia, The Invisible Light. The first volume, Acoustic Space, was released in 2019 and the second will be released in early 2021.

Foreword by Caroline Randall Williams

Caroline Randall Williams is a multi-genre writer, educator, and performance artist in Nashville Tennessee, where she is a writer-in-residence at Vanderbilt University. She is co-author of the NAACP Image Award-winning cookbook Soul Food Love. Her debut collection of poetry, Lucy Negro, Redux has been turned into a ballet by the Nashville Ballet—Caroline performed her poetry as an integral member of the cast, all set to an original score by multi-Grammy nominee Rhiannon Giddens. Named by Southern Living as "One of the 50 People changing the South," the Cave Canem fellow has been published and featured in multiple journals, essay collections, and news outlets, including The Iowa Review, The Massachusetts Review, Cherry Bombe, Garden and Gun, Essence, and The New York Times. Most recently, she was ranked by The Root as one of the 100 most influential African Americans of 2020.

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I didn’t think I could love T Bone Burnett more but apparently I was wrong.

Loved it!

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Cynthia should know it’s “short sighted” not “short sided” before she posts her idiocy.
For those that think it’s rewriting history, perhaps you just leaned a white washed version of it and not the truth.
Ignorance is a choice and too many people keep making that choice.
We need more voices like Burnett’s and less like the MAGA cult.

The racists really hate this story

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I can acknowledge that T-Bone Burnett has made his career by copying and collaborating with Black musicians, and getting recognition for making Black music as a white musician, and his awareness of the all the white privilege he has enjoyed while the industry has minimized Black musicians contributions, recognition, and compensation over hundreds of years. He can't change what was done,

I guess it comes off as a white guilt rather than a call for reparations. He might be more "woke" than others, and good for him for just putting this out there. Telling us he knows better. It's more than other people with influence have done.

His sincerity counts for something. And I hope he becomes an influencer for putting Black musicians voices before his own.

Appreciation with caveats

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Loved it and wish more people would listen to it. Eye opening and beautifully narrated.

Inspiring and enlightening

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And I mean really listen. I was both enlightened and moved to tears. Thank you.

I wish everyone in the world would listen to this.

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Always have loved t-bone’s work. As a southerner, I appreciate the insight & life lesson.

Right on & thank you!

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Best if you skip the music chapters. Author’s trying to sell his music.. I get that but the interjection of music between his thoughts/chapters is distracting. For the love of God skip the intro (first 2-3 mins)

Decent overview of the obvious

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I must say that to start, this was an excellent composition. This "music and word book" is something every American should hear. Before, a Florida senator tries to ban history and other subjects from school. Thank Mr. T Bone Burnett, for this eye-opening adventure/history book you have made here. I'm glad I bought it. I shall listen to this many times. My daughter's in high school, and she was impressed of this book as well. Thanks again, Mr. T Bone Burnett and Audible.

An eye opening Truth about America

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Beautiful, heart felt. This man has some great music in this recording...and the very best of messages about deciding to live beyond fear and hate.

Truth for Our Times

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Grammy Award-winning producer and musician T Bone Burnett intersperses a selection of his songs with essays of his reflections on the racial injustice in America. T Bone recounts a history that most Americans don’t want to to think about or even hear. There are atrocities that are obvious, when blacks could be lynched and no investigation even undertaken, but many more that should be obvious, but that we make excuses for. We make excuses for police brutality against blacks because police have a lot to fear and have to react quickly. The neighborhood covenants against selling to blacks were because it would lower property values for the neighborhood. T Bone calls for a critical reevaluation of what race means in our society and a concerted effort to fight against it. 

I like how he states, “This won’t be a performance of white guilt or white fragility. I acknowledge, as all white people must, that I am a beneficiary of white privilege, but I can’t abide the empty self-congratulatory performance of white guilt or white fragility. I’ve rejected that indoctrination from an early age. My psyche is not fragile. My conscience is not guilty. My conscience is appalled and my conscience is in grief because white supremacy is a curse that wounds everything and everyone it touches.” This is not an empty confession of all of the sins of the white race. It’s an admission and call for a change of heart.

T Bone grew up in Ft Worth and the title sounds as if he speaks from the standpoint of the states that formed the Confederacy, but I’d say that limits the book and minimizes the problem, even though I’m sure that is not what he meant. 

I imagine that every southerner of my age has the memory of when they first noticed the “colored” signs above water fountains and restrooms. I was excited to be able to learn to read and was trying to read everything I saw, when I noticed the sign over a water fountain at a downtown department store. I asked my grandmother what the sign was there for. I don’t remember her exact words, but it was something about stupid people who think skin color is important. It was what started me thinking about what it would be like to be separated like that. Later I noticed that gas stationsven had a separate restroom for “Colored” and on peeking in the door, I noticed that it was filthy compared to the restrooms for “Gentlemen” and “Ladies.” 

The message was that the South surrendered in the war, but the basic view that blacks were inferior was not surrendered. However, as I traveled around the US, met people from around America, and read more about history, I found that, while it was more institutionalized in the south, the attitudes and beliefs were common throughout the US. If you look at the more recent incidents of unrest or rioting, you’ll find that it is happening more outside the old “Confederacy” more than within. 

But, there is something in the “Truth and Reconciliation” part of the title. One of the wisest things that Nelson Mandela did as president of South Africa was to establish the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. In one sense the South was right that the war was not fought over slavery. While that was an excuse that the South used to make themselves look better. They weren’t fighting for slavery. They were fighting for states rights. Yeah. But, the truth is that the war in the North was promoted as a war, not for abolition of slavery, but for preserving the union. It was the “Union” against the “Rebels.” The abolitionist movement never won the hearts of the majority. So, when the war was won, America settled for union at the expense of true equality for blacks and turned their heads when Jim Crow laws were enacted in the south, when whole black neighborhoods were wiped out in Wilmington, Tulsa, and elsewhere. When Blacks were not allowed to move into certain neighborhoods, were kept out of certain schools and universities, were paid less than whites for the same jobs, all of that was OK. 

If we don’t face the truth and tell the truth, there will be no reconciliation. If there is no reconciliation, our nation will be doomed to continuous struggle in which all suffer and we will continue to be weakened. 

This is an Audible Original and the only way to listen to it is to go to Audible, though your first listen is free. It’s not long, and much more can be said, but it’s worth a listen.

To Tell the Truth

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