In the wake of the Nashville school shooting, a country star takes a stand on gun control 

Ketch Secor is best known as the frontman of the country band Old Crow Medicine Show, but he is also a school administrator, and the father of a young child.

He wears three hats when he writes an opinion piece for the New York Times called “Country Music Can Lead America Away From Its Obsession With Guns.”

In it, Secor called on his country’s musicians to join him in the fight against assault-style weapons in the US.

He said he was inspired after a gunman opened fire at Covenant School in Nashville, Tenn., on March 27, killing three nine-year-old students and three adult staff using a legally purchased firearm.

Secor talked to As it happens host Nil Köksal about the essay, and the role he thinks country music can play in bringing gun reform to the United States. This is part of the conversation.

Plus, you know, if it’s in Nashville, there are plenty of other ways to get your hands on this newest school. Can you talk about this?

It was a wonderful experience in my community here in Nashville. But they doubly so as parents of children the same age as those who died at Covenant School last week. Then the third time because I started a school in my community and I thought about school shootings with an administrative hat.

And then, as a country musician, you know, I invite my brothers to speak.

One of your kids just had their first training at school on how to deal with this kind of scenario, is that right?

yes. And I’m sure there are a few moms and dads across Canada who have had the same experience talking to their kids about how they feel behind the desk.

It’s a fire drill of sorts. And I don’t want my son in a school fire. That sounds very, very scary. But something is different when the threat is someone else.

You write for the New York Times … which is not uncommon when you hear one of the most famous songs, Wagon Wheelfor example, you know, blasting from a pickup truck that also happens to have [National Rifle Association] bumper stickers. What would you like to say to those fans?

Answer: The first thing I want to say is how much I love them. And how political persuasion the audience, he did not challenge himself. I believe what I believe. And I’m comfortable with being in a place where people think differently, even very differently. Different gods, different ideologies, different loyalties. It’s fine with me.

I love country music. And to put it bluntly, I love my redneck. I love people deeply and intimately. And I want to provide music for them because I care about them. I wish there were soundtracks for rural America with fiddles and banjos and harmony singing.

Just at this point, I want the audience to understand that I feel the need to come out here and say that assault rifles, we need to surrender. It is time to make sacrifices for our children.

And I know that it has the power to alienate people. But I didn’t do it from a [perspective] from, understand, “We will come to your house.” I do it with love. And that’s the question. It’s like, will the circle not be broken?

Do you think your fans are ready to hear that message?

Fans of mine who have listened to Old Crow’s music more than once or twice know where my heart is. So they are not the ones I want. My platform is about the kind of platform you can do when you have a lot of banjos and harmonicas in your band.

I’m more interested in helping start a conversation in Nashville about how people with more platforms and opportunities to speak than I can think about country music’s past issues with guns and the opportunity to be a part of a national conversation that is so needed today.

WATCH | Nashville shooting sparks political tension in US:

I am amazed by several parts of your essay, but I will read just one in particular. You wrote, “Conservative musicians are always vocal when it comes to the culture war, but stars with a moderate view tend not to weigh in on the public. The motives are genuine. We don’t want to offend anyone. But in times like these. , silence is complicity.” It’s time for country music producers to use their platform to speak candidly to conservative audiences.

How do you think country music and its stars can be a part and really be effective in bringing about different measures of gun control?

Every morning around 7:30, the musicians who are on Jumbotrons across the country and playing to sold-out arenas, are actually in the pickup line dropping their kids off at school. You know, we’re just regular working people; we just have a really cool project.

But we live in Nashville, Tennessee, especially, country singers who are famous all over the world. And we tend to be an educated and centrist-thinking and open-to-other-opinion type of demographic. And we love our children. You know, all the big, big stars with kids, their hearts are broken now.

So what I can imagine is this opportunity that country music has to take.

[It’s] not [that] everyone should get rid of the Second Amendment in the United States. That’s not all. Just token advancements to push the needle a little. It’s been 25-some years since I was a child and the Columbine Murders happened. And nothing has changed, especially in gun laws in the South.

How has the response been to you so far?

I woke up this morning hoping that the world would be different because I stood up. And, you know, I think there’s a devastating reality.

I took a stand because I needed about 100,000 other people to take it. And that’s what I asked.

We all deserve safe schools for our children. Safe schools should be an inalienable right. Personally, I think that right should be more important to lawmakers than the Second Amendment.

At last week’s vigil after the shooting in Nashville, you were on stage and sang, Will the Circle Be Unbroken?, which you mentioned a while ago. This is a Christian hymn for those who don’t know, but it has been recorded by many big stars over the years. But what does it sound like when you sing the words?

I have a third grader with me who plays the harmonica and helps me sing. And I think that’s an important way to give an example of who’s voice really matters.