Do you know me? ,nOf course you do! ,nThough maybe you haven't seen me in a little whilenI'm that drum beat comin' through your car radionAnd I'm that thumpin' bass that drags you along with the rhythmnI'm that part of music that makes you wanna dancennI'm a pure gospel song issuing forth from a Sunday morning church housenJesus!, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus!nI'm a happy crystal ring of a high mountain fiddlenI'm the blues at midnight oozing out of a back street honky-tonknI'm draw my nourishment from the teeming streets of New York CitynThe lonely grain covered plains of MinnesotanFrom cabaret and camp meeting, and bayou and beer joint and good times and ghettosnI was born in a house of New Orleans traveling up the river on the North bound paddle leadersnI was nurtured in the Mississippi delta when seeds of the blues sprang forth in the rich black soilnI was there when Elvis learned to sing, when BB got his first guitarnI'm black and white and smooth and rough and hard and softnI'm the roots of American musicnAnd I'm always there just the local servicenAnd when the chaff of trend and bad is swept asidenI'm exposed againnStrong, pulsating and very much alivenThe winds of change may blow the tree awaynBut the roots remain, then, now and until the end