Mark Puryear is a musician, ethnomusicologist, and curator. For the Smithsonian Folklife Festival, he curated the 2011 Rhythm and Blues: Tell It Like It Is program as well as the Freedom Sounds event that celebrated the opening of the National Museum of African American History and Culture. He was nominated for a Grammy for producing the Smithsonian Folkways album Fannie Lou Hamer: Songs My Mother Taught Me.