[Harp-L] RE: B & W



A few simple observations- Nothing fancy on a stick, just my personal experiences and those of a few well-known jazz experts:

First, I am a white boy and have been one for about 61 years. I love the blues- I love playing the blues and I love listening to the blues. I love listening to black people playing the blues and I love listening to white people playing the blues. I love being a white guy playing the blues. If I were a black guy I would love being a black guy playing the blues. I love being a Latino playing the blues. No argument about my legitimacy as a blues lover or player or about anyone else's is ever going to take that away from me.

Blues is a musical language invented by African Americans, but don't forget the Scots-Irish and European classical traditions and others that also played a role in the development of the blues. But it is a fact that the African-Americans took all these influences and made a language of their own.

Fifteenth century Englishmen took the languages of the Angles, Saxons, Romans, Norman French and others and forged a new language, English. Does that mean that only the English can speak the true English Language because it belongs to them and others don't have the shared experiences that bring authenticity to the language?

African-Americans created the language of the blues. It is a language of great power. One of the proofs of this is the way that language has become so adaptable to the experiences of so many and the way so many have, through the blues, been able to join into and share the experience of another culture, just as English has spread to so many others and adapted and become richer and richer as a result. Every incremental spread of the blues to someplace new makes it richer.

Then there is that other issue. Downbeat Magazine has been dealing with the issue of whether white guys can play jazz since I was a kid. In all that time it has been definitively proven that even jazz experts, even jazz experts with a strong bias towards the opinion that white men can't play jazz, cannot tell black from white in a blind test.

So, just let me enjoy my jazz, blues, country, opera, chamber music, symphony, pops, rock and roll or any other kind of music without worrying too much about the race of the performer or the composer. The background of the performer or composer may be interesting, it may have an effect on the style or content of the music. It may inform us about the origins of the music. It is irrelevant when it comes to the quality of the music.





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