Beyoncé is bringing her fans of color to country music. Will they be welcomed in?
NEW YORK (AP) — Dusty, worn boots. Horses lapping up water. Sweat dripping from the foreheads of every shade of Black skin as country classics blare through giant speakers. These moments are frequently recreated during Tayhlor Coleman’s family gatherings at their central Texas ranch. For her, Beyoncé's country album, “Act II: Cowboy Carter,” was the granting of an unlikely wish.
“There is something to be said about the biggest artist in the world coming home to the genre that... we all kind of love but never really felt welcome into — it’s really hard to put that to words,” said the 35-year-old native of Houston’s Third Ward, the same area Beyoncé lived in as a child. Loving artists like Miranda Lambert and Shania Twain, Coleman hoped this moment would come. “I was praying then that one day she would make a country album…Beyoncé is more country than a lot of people making country music today.”