If you haven’t yet read Amiri Baraka’s seminal piece on jazz, please read it here.
“Most jazz critics have been white Americans, but most important jazz musicians have not been.”
-Amiri Baraka, 1960
54 years later, our critics are still primarily white, our art is still being viewed through eyes that do not quite resonate, and jazz is dead. This has become a reality in the years since, an acknowledgement that what we create is open to critique by those not able to fully comprehend the context of which it was created. In 1960, it was the conception of jazz being appreciated and yet not quite understood by those white critics. Today, hip-hop has been swiped from our collective bassinets.
“As one Howard University professor said to me…’It’s fantastic how much bad taste the blues contain!’”
It’s all noise now. A garbled collection of expletives set to deep basslines. It’s not spoken truth over hypnotic backdrops- it never was to a certain generation, regardless- it’s just hyperbolic boasts in sync with noise. Or it’s noise that has stolen elements of funk, gospel, rhythm and blues, and, yes, jazz in the name of youthful ignorance. It’s why those middle-class Black Americans locked jazz away in closets of shame, and it’s why hip-hop, of any era, remains undefended during times of attack, ridicule, and outrage. It’s fantastic yet unclaimed by those that “matter”.
“…The major flaw in this approach to Negro music is that it strips the music too ingenuously of its social and cultural intent. It seeks to define jazz as an art (or a folk art) that has come out of no intelligent body of sociocultural philosophy.”
They (read: WE) focus on what you “shouldn’t” say. They (read: WE) don’t investigate. “Fuck Tha Police” is too violent, “Fight the Power” is too militant, and “Brenda’s Got a Baby” is too divisive. It’s always too…something, and therein lies the problem. It can’t ever be a reflection; they (read: WE) have to place these songs as depictions. Depictions of what’s wrong with us and not the system or environment in which they (read: WE) escaped in a different fashion. They (read: WE) hear a message but they (read: WE) don’t quite heed it. It’s just an angry noise that- at this point- only emanates from their (read: OUR) children’s bedrooms.
“Most jazz critics began as hobbyists or boyishly brash members of the American petite bourgeoisie, whose only claim to any understanding about the music was that they knew it was different; or else they had once been brave enough to make a trip into a Negro slum to hear their favorite instrumentalist defame Western musical tradition.”
They (read: THEY) knew Doggystyle was unlike anything they’ve ever heard before. They knew Harlem World had a lot of samples from songs they grew up critiquing. Tha Carter III made them love OUR thing. But they didn’t walk into Roscoe’s House of Chicken and Waffles on East Broadway before then. They didn’t venture to Uptown Manhattan until Clinton quelled their fears. They still haven’t walked the streets of Hollygrove; they just knew Wayne’s 16 songs both eschewed the “norm” and placed them in the midst of his chaos. They can analyze and review, but they can’t be us. However, the sad part of this is: they seem to appreciate it much more than we do.
54 years ago, “Jazz and the White Critic” seemed to hint at a defining piece of Black culture slowly being taken from us. Has that occurred with our newest creation? Not fully, but there are ominous signs. Wu-Tang Clan paraphernalia is a Hot Topic “Hot Topic”, Tupac resurrected at Coachella, and Macklemore just Macklemore’d the Grammys (even he was surprised, apparently). Is there anything wrong with any of this? Of course not; they (read: THEY) are remembering and channeling some of the best we have had to offer and that’s awesome. It’s only slipping from our grasp because we don’t cherish our creation. We can give it to whomever but can’t we still bob our collective heads to it? It’s not enough to paint a masterpiece; every once in a while we should stand back and admire what we created.
Rest in paradise, Amiri Baraka. A.J. Armstrong is the humbled creator of The Fly Hobo and His World of Oddities
The Fly Hobo and His World of Oddities 