About Albina Music TrustAlbina Music Trust is driven by the belief that culture survives when communities are trusted to preserve their own history.
Albina Music Trust is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to the preservation and amplification of Albina’s historic Black musical culture. We exist to document, protect, and share the stories, sounds, and creative legacy of Black musicians whose work shaped Portland—often without recognition or institutional support.
We are archivists, organizers, producers, and community members working across generations. Everything we do is rooted in Albina—its people, its history, and its ongoing cultural life. This work is not about nostalgia. It’s about continuity.
our team
Kenneth W. Berry
Board President
Bobby Smith
Executive Director, Board Secretary
Calvin Walker
Board Chair, Board Treasurer
What Drives Us
For decades, Albina’s musical contributions were overlooked, undervalued, or erased. We work to correct the record—carefully, collaboratively, and with accountability to the people whose stories we steward.
Our programs exist to serve Black musicians past and present, while making Albina’s cultural legacy accessible to educators, students, listeners, and the broader public.
Our Approach
We believe preservation should be active, not static. Our approach blends archival care with public access—bringing history into classrooms, onto stages, into neighborhoods, and onto the airwaves.
We begin by listening. We work directly with musicians, families, and community members to gather, restore, and preserve materials. From there, we activate the archive through exhibitions, concerts, radio, walking tours, and record releases—centering the people behind the work.
We preserve more than artifacts. we preserve the stories, culture, and the meaning behind the music for future generations.
Our Values
Community First
The archive is here to serve the community. We prioritize relationships, community-building, and consent over extraction or spectacle.
Care & Accuracy
We treat historical materials with respect—restoring, cataloging, and presenting them with care and context.
Intergenerational Connection
Elders and youth are equally essential. Our work creates pathways for knowledge, mentorship, and creative exchange.
Access
History should be seen, heard, and experienced. We design programs that invite participation, learning, and discovery.
Our Story
Albina Music Trust was formed to address a gap: the absence of a comprehensive, community-centered archive dedicated to Black music in Oregon. While Albina was once the center of Black life in Portland, documentation of this community’s cultural contributions has been scattered across basements, attics, private collections, and fleeting memories.
What began as a volunteer-driven, grassroots effort to recover lost recordings and photographs has grown into the largest archive of Black cultural history in the state—now encompassing more than 13,000 items across over 180 collections. Along the way, the Trust has become a platform for public history, creative collaboration, and cultural stewardship.
Our work continues to grow, guided by the same principle that started it: if we don’t preserve this history ourselves, it risks being lost.