There’s something about a Friday morning that invites a little more ease, a little more gratitude — and on this week’s Love Supreme Friday edition of 1st Sky Omaha in the Morning, hosts Paul B. and Buddy the God leaned into that feeling fully. From a conversation about Nebraska’s primary election results to a deep, inspiring sit-down with a North Omaha music visionary, the show was exactly what a Friday morning in Omaha deserves: thoughtful, warm, and pointed straight at the future.
Paul B. opened by acknowledging just how much noise is out there right now — political, emotional, communal — before making a deliberate call to rise above it. “We’re going to change our mindsets over to something else,” he said. “It’s an effort, because it’s real easy to let your emotions take over when there’s so much to be emotional about.” It was a gentle but firm invitation to think bigger, to sit with purpose — and the show delivered on that promise from the very first segment.
The election conversation sparked plenty of reaction in the viewer chat, with many weighing in on low voter turnout and civic disconnect. Viewer Kimber Snipes offered a compassionate perspective: “I’ve been having conversations with people between the ages of 20 and 35. What I hear the most is most of them don’t really know what to do and know nothing about the candidates. I don’t think we should be slamming people for not voting when the system is really what has caused this.” Viewer Sean McCarthy added another layer: “One huge problem is so many of these positions don’t pay a living wage, so only those who can afford to hold those positions run.” It was the kind of community-level dialogue that makes the show’s chat feel less like a comment section and more like a town square.
The morning’s centerpiece, though, was a rich conversation with Dana Murray, executive director of the North Omaha Music Academy — formerly known as Love’s Jazz — nestled right on North 24th Street. A South Omaha native who spent eleven years in New York City before returning home, Murray brings a rare combination of street-level passion and boardroom-level strategy to everything he does, and it showed.
Paul B. has long called the North 24th Street corridor “the most important black corner in Nebraska,” and Murray echoed that reverence while pushing it forward with clear-eyed pragmatism. “The area that can truly claim to be a cultural and arts district is the North 24th Street corridor,” Murray said, “but a lot of the community within can’t relate to the power of what was there.” He laid out a vision that goes well beyond nostalgia — one that includes housing, eateries, parking, and eventually a hotel capable of hosting festivals and conferences that fuel the entire stretch. “There’s been a lot of stuff on North 24th Street that wasn’t sustainable,” he said, “and I can’t get caught up in the emotion of redevelopment — the X’s and O’s have to make sense.”
Viewer Pops felt that history in his bones, writing in: “Artists like Fats Domino used to stay at your grandfather’s home when he came to town to perform. So yes, more infrastructure for the artist around the Deuce corridor would be a godsend.” It was one of those chat moments that bridges generations in a single sentence.
Murray was equally compelling when talking about what NMA is really building — and it’s about far more than music lessons. “Think of Omaha Performing Arts and what it means to downtown — not just as a cultural entity, but as an economic vehicle bringing in $40 to $50 million in revenue every year,” he said. “We’re not only raising musicians — more importantly, we’re raising more critical-thinking human beings.” The academy offers electives in live sound, broadcasting, podcasting, and live streaming, and teaches students the historical context of artists like Victor Lewis — one of the most recorded jazz drummers in history — so that young people can connect their own potential to a larger lineage of Black excellence. “If you give kids context,” Murray said, “they connect the dots for themselves and start to see the wins and losses in not only Black people but the rest of the country. Then they can see how they can be impactful.”
He was candid, too, about a challenge that cuts across Omaha’s civic life: brain drain. “We’re not retaining talent, and that’s devastating to our community.” His answer is a planned $20 million capital campaign — the first phase of an NMA campus that he envisions becoming for North Omaha what Omaha Performing Arts is for downtown. “Money is not our issue in North Omaha — it’s transformative ideas,” he said. “Our artistic genius is equity. Every music in America has been built off of our experience. The sooner we look at it as equity to build and monetize for our community, the better we’re going to be.”
For those interested in joining the NMA mission as music instructors, Murray extended an open invitation — with one important condition. The academy is seeking educators who can do more than teach technique. “Unless you’re able to inspire a young person, they don’t have the attention span for the X’s and O’s of music,” he said. “The ‘why’ they’re doing it is everything.” Interested instructors can reach Murray directly at dmurray@northomahamusic.org or his assistant Andrew Bailey at abailey@northomahamusic.org.
Buddy the God brought the show’s larger theme into sharp focus when he described the season’s guiding philosophy: “Follow the money — and people think money, they think economics, but I’m thinking ecosystem in the sense of real systems, how they circle back, how they loop back, how they regenerate.” Paul B. built on that with his concept of the “secondary matrix” — the idea that everything the show does has a deeper layer of purpose beneath the surface. “On the surface we’re a couple of talking heads,” he said, “but what we’re really trying to do is build community, build coalition, build a family of people that we can regularly talk to and come to some conclusions so we can get to some action.”
The show also paused to celebrate some personal joy. Viewer Aeros 402 (Mary Sanchez) shared a love note that lit up the chat: “My only daughter gave birth to my second granddaughter. They are both new and good. I feel blessed.” On a Love Supreme Friday, that kind of news is the whole point.
Buddy closed out the week the way he always does — with both feet planted in possibility. “The lanes are running. The lanes are wide open. Just get in where you fit in and make it happen.”
That’s the spirit of 1st Sky Omaha in the Morning — come as you are, bring your questions, bring your community, and leave a little more ready to act. Tune in Monday morning and keep the conversation going.
