It was a Love Supreme Friday on 1st Sky Omaha in the Morning, and the energy in the virtual studio matched the occasion. Hosts Paul B. and Buddy the God brought their usual blend of candor, community love, and big-picture thinking to Season 4, Episode 53 — and this week, they had the perfect guest to anchor it all: Dana Murray, executive director of the North Omaha Music Academy (NMA).
Before Dana took the floor, the hosts set the table with some post-primary election reflection and a concept they’ve been developing all season: the secondary matrix. Paul B. described it simply but powerfully.
“Everything that we do has a secondary meaning, a deeper meaning. On the surface we’re talking heads, but what we’re really trying to do is build community, build coalition.”
Buddy the God pushed the idea further, connecting civic engagement to something almost ecological. “Follow the money — but I’m thinking ecosystem in the sense of real systems, like how they circle back and loop back and regenerate,” he said. And on the question of whether community builders should engage politics at all, he was direct: “We got to do both — build our own ecosystems and continue to engage the political structure, because whether you want to be engaged in it or not, you’re a part of it. Don’t pay taxes and see what happens.”
Paul B. closed the political conversation with a challenge to anyone tempted to stop at the keyboard: “Posting on Facebook is not enough. Awareness without action changes nothing.”
Viewer Mark Manor chimed in with a pointed observation on the local political landscape: “People are going to let Brinker in unfortunately if this all continues. That’s my thought on this Denise Pal/Brinker Harding race. You may not like some things about Pal or believe some things about her, but to let Harding in because of that is wild.” It was the kind of community-level political commentary that makes the 1st Sky chat room feel less like a comment section and more like a front-porch conversation.
Then came Dana Murray — and the conversation shifted into something altogether inspiring.
A South Omaha native who spent eleven years in New York City before returning home, Murray brought a musician’s soul and a strategist’s mind to the discussion. He spoke about North 24th Street — “the Deuce,” as the hosts affectionately call it — with the reverence it deserves and the honest assessment it needs. Paul B. has long called it “the most important black corner in Nebraska,” and Murray didn’t disagree. But he was also unflinching about the work ahead.
“There are a lot of districts in Omaha redeveloping — Blackstone, Benson, Little Bohemia. But the area that has the most history and can truly claim to be a cultural and arts district is the North 24th Street corridor. We’ve been so far removed from that.”
Murray’s vision for what the corridor could become is both ambitious and grounded in practical metrics — housing, eateries, parking, entertainment destinations, and eventually, a hotel that could support music festivals and conferences right in the heart of North Omaha. “A lot of stuff on North 24th Street hasn’t been sustainable,” he acknowledged, “and I can’t get caught up in the emotion of redevelopment without the X’s and O’s making sense.”
Viewer Pops offered a personal footnote that gave the conversation historical weight: “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.”
At the center of Murray’s work is NMA itself — a youth music academy, performance space, and community anchor that he envisions growing into something transformative. He drew a deliberate comparison to Omaha Performing Arts, which he noted generates $40 to $50 million in revenue annually for the downtown area. “We need a vehicle like that for North Omaha,” he said, “and I see NMA taking up that space.”
But NMA isn’t just about producing musicians. Murray was emphatic on that point. “We’re not only raising musicians — more importantly, we’re raising more critical thinking human beings. Not all these young kids are going to become musicians. Some will become doctors, lawyers, business owners. Whatever they choose, they’re going to be better because they were aligned with artistry.”
The academy’s curriculum reflects that philosophy. Beyond instrument instruction, students learn live sound, broadcast production, podcasting, and how to conduct artist interviews — a hands-on approach Murray described with quiet conviction: “It’s not just telling them they can be something — no, they can be it right now. Once you remove those barriers, the sky’s the limit.”
Murray also spoke to the deeper cultural stakes. Teaching kids about local legends like Buddy Miles and Victor Lewis isn’t about reciting names and dates, he explained. “If you give kids context, they connect the dots for themselves and they start to see the wins and the losses — not only in black people, but in the rest of the country. Then they can see how they can be impactful within that ecosystem. Now you’ve got a critical thinking human.”
And on the broader question of culture as a community asset, Murray was unambiguous: “The sooner we understand that our culture is equity, that our brilliance and our artistic genius is equity, the better off we’re going to be. Every music in America has been built off of our experience — trace it all the way back to the music brought over from Africa. That’s equity for us to build and monetize for our community.”
NMA’s first capital campaign phase is set at $20 million, with a full campus as the long-term goal. Anyone interested in joining the teaching faculty can reach Murray at dmurray@northomusicacademy.org or his assistant Andrew Bailey at abailey@northomusicacademy.org.
The show wrapped on a warm note, with viewer Senator KML summing up the feeling in the chat room: “Thank you, Uncle Dana. You’re changing lives in big ways. We are the students.” And viewer Aeros 402 brought a moment of pure joy to the conversation, sharing that his daughter had just given birth to his second granddaughter — a reminder that community, at its core, is always about the next generation.
That, in a lot of ways, is exactly what 1st Sky Omaha in the Morning is about. Tune in Monday — the conversation is always worth showing up for.
