Just Like Selma is a powerful new social-justice hymn composed by award-winning producer Nolan Williams, Jr., featuring Grammy®-nominated Gospel artists Zacardi Cortez and Beverly Crawford, alongside the 130-voice Wheeler Avenue Baptist Church Mass Choir. Inspired by the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the a cappella hymn evokes the spirit and sound of traditional civil rights anthems while speaking directly to the urgent moral challenges of today.
Just Like Selma is inspired by the daring of the Honorable John Lewis, SNCC co-founder Diane Nash, activist Amelia Boynton Robinson, who lived to be 110 years old, and the thousands of patriots who marched from Selma to Montgomery 61 years ago to advocate for voting rights, fair wages, education, and justice in America. “The struggle for voting rights that defined Selma sixty years ago is not ancient history—it’s a present reality,” Williams adds. “As new generations face renewed battles over democracy, access, and equality, Just Like Selma reminds us that the courage and strategy of those who marched across the Edmund Pettus Bridge remain urgently relevant. We stand at a crossroads once again, and the time to unite and act is now.”
Just Like Selma (NEWorks Productions /Red Alliance) will be released to all digital music platforms on February 1, 2026, creating the gateway for the official launch of Black History Month. This year marks the centennial of Black History Month, launched by Dr. Carter G. Woodson in 1926 to instill self-affirmation among people of color and celebrate their achievements across a variety of fields. The Just Like Selma hymn centers on core American values and calls on communities to remember, reflect, and act. More than 80 churches, chapels, choirs, and organizations—spanning 14 denominations and representing over half of the United States — have joined the ‘Just Like Selma’ Hymn-sing Project.
Participants include prominent black churches, historically black colleges and universities, and cultural organizations. Notably, the Progressive National Baptist Convention—the 2.5-million-member denomination that gave birth to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s activism —has officially adopted the project. Just Like Selma is part of the broader Freedom Advances campaign — a movement the Williams-led NEWorks Productionslaunched in 2024 to inspire voter participation, civic engagement, and preserving the legacy of leaders such as Dr. King and Fannie Lou Hamer through faith-based activism. Listen. Sing. Share. Join the movement.
NEWorks Productions is a leading producer of inspirational arts projects ranging from film projects and theatrical productions to concert programming and educational initiatives. Since its founding in 2003, the Washington, DC-based firm has successfully produced multidisciplinary civic projects, including I Have a Right To Vote, Liberty: Unplugged, and West Side/South Side.
An award-winning producer, multi-hyphenate creative, inaugural Kennedy Center Social Practice Resident (2019-24), and founding CEO of NEWorks Productions, Nolan Williams, Jr. has dedicated his career to illuminating civil rights, social justice, and cultural identity through the arts. From 2004-2025, he music produced Let Freedom Ring, an annual MLK celebration hosted by the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. that featured guest artists such as Aretha Franklin, Leslie Odom Jr., Chaka Khan, Patti LaBelle, Smokey Robinson, Natalie Cole, among others. Williams is the editor of the African American Heritage Hymnal (GIA Publications), which has sold over half a million copies worldwide. Last year, Williams’s film short “Rise Up & Fight” earned him the 2025 Cannes Film Awards prize for “Best Director, Animated Music Video.”
