By: HISTORY.com Editors

1963

Mahalia Jackson performs at March on Washington, prompts Martin Luther King Jr. to improvise speech

Bob Parent/Getty Images

Published: November 13, 2009Last Updated: August 20, 2026

On August 28, 1963, legendary gospel vocalist Mahalia Jackson not only performs as the lead-in to Martin Luther King Jr. and his “I Have a Dream” speech at the historic March on Washington, but she also plays a direct role in turning that speech into one of the most memorable and meaningful in American history.

By 1956, Mahalia Jackson (1911-1972) was already internationally famous as the “Queen of Gospel” when she was invited by the Reverend Ralph Abernathy, director of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, to appear in Montgomery, Alabama, in support of the now-famous bus boycott that launched the modern Civil Rights Movement and made Rosa Parks a household name. It was in Alabama that Jackson first met and befriended the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr., whom she would support throughout his career.

Indeed, if Martin Luther King Jr. had a favorite opening act, it was Mahalia Jackson, who performed by his side many times. On August 28, 1963, as she took to the podium before an audience of 250,000 to give the last musical performance before King’s speech, King, himself, requested that she sing the gospel classic “I’ve Been ‘Buked, and I’ve Been Scorned.” Jackson was just as familiar with King’s repertoire as he was with hers, and just as King felt comfortable telling her what to sing as the lead-in to what would prove to be the most famous speech of his life, Jackson felt comfortable telling him in what direction to take that speech.

The story that has been told since that day has Mahalia Jackson intervening at a critical junction when she decided King’s speech needed a course-correction. Recalling a theme she had heard him use in earlier speeches, Jackson said out loud to Martin Luther King Jr. from behind the podium on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, “Tell them about the dream, Martin.” And at that moment, as can be seen in films of the speech, King leaves his prepared notes behind to improvise the entire next section of his speech—the historic section that famously begins “And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream….”

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Timeline

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1774

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1869

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1879

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1917

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1941

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1952

“Red Scare” dominates American political news

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1955

Emmett Till is murdered

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1963

Martin Luther King Jr. delivers “I Have a Dream” speech at the March on Washington

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1987

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1988

Air-show accident burns spectators

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1990

Murdered students are discovered at the University of Florida

The bodies of Tracy Paules and Manuel Taboada are discovered at the Gatorwood Apartments, near the campus of the University of Florida. Their murders came two days after the discovery that three young female students had been killed and mutilated in two separate locations near the campus. The serial killer was known for positioning his […]

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1996

Charles and Diana divorce

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2003

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