| Relevancy of Classical Musicians of Color |
| Monday, 16 April 2007 | |
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One of the beautiful things about humans is our ability to reinvent ourselves. Many musicians do it. Take Madonna’s 30 year career for instance. She’s still “relevant.” Wikipedia says, “As of February 2007, according to Warner Bros, Confessions on a Dance Floor [her last album released in 2005] has sold more than 8 million copies worldwide (Billboard). It debuted at number one in 40 countries, a world record for a solo artist. The album won the Grammy Award for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2007.” Madonna is just the first example that came to mind since the woman has been in the game for many many years and seems to know how to change with the times, how to stay relevant and give the public what they want to hear without losing herself, or her identity completely. So when I talk about relevancy as concerns classical musicians of color, who are we keeping music relevant for and what does “relevant” mean exactly? The first and probably natural thought is to say that classical music is irrelevant today. With the rise of the pop star fame and celebrity, classical music seems about as relevant as skis on a beach. But although you may be unaware of it, what you do is historically and contemporarily (culturally) relevant in many ways. And it all comes down to repertoire and the information that you share with your audiences during live performances. Music is constantly reinvented by the performer for the listener. This past Saturday, I enjoyed a performance by the Harlem Symphony at the Apollo Theater in New York. Virtuoso violinist Diane Monroe (see below) performed her own rendition of Amazing Grace, a solo. She started the piece in a Celtic style as it was originally conceived in Scotland. (This may surprise a number of people but, despite what you may think about the piece being a Negro spiritual, it is actually Scottish.) One could definitely hear the cry of the lone voice, the drone of the bagpipes. The sustained tones and clear melismas were mournful, longing, but definitely a sound with which anyone who has ever yearned for or lost someone could identify. The audience’s collective expression, creased brow wide eyes, made me think that they were remembering pain. The bent notes of the one style, the sadness of the melody easily melded into the next; Ms. Monroe slowly transformed her sound into a mournful and soulful blues. That’s when it happened. The blues-inspired improvisation made members of the orchestra sway in their seats and shake their heads as if in church listening to a septuagenarian emote a hymnal cry of freedom. I heard many ummmmph’s, and saw faces scrunched up in a way that made you think a skunk casually sauntered into the room. But that’s the Black facial expression of something being bad—bad in a Run DMC kinda way (“Not bad meaning ‘bad’ but ‘bad’ meaning good!”) I saw this similar expression on the faces in the audience. Members rocked side to side as if comforting a cranky child in their arms, nursing a bruised heart. Then before Ms. Monroe could reverberate her last note, the congregation, er, I mean audience, let out an ecstatic “Amen!” Do you see what happened here? Ms. Monroe effortlessly and non-verbally taught us something about history and about the Black presence in classical music: we were there from the beginning. She presented us with a work that we thought we knew, one with which we identified as Black people. That is, she guided us through a history lesson by presenting a piece with which we were comfortable as claiming as our own and demonstrated that we were not the originators of the piece; its origins heretofore had been attributed to us because we made it so much more relevant to those in America. (How mad do you think Dolly Parton was when Whitney Houston sang “I Will Always Love You” soooo much better than she ever could making everyone believe without second thought that it was actually originally a Whitney Houston song?!) We took this mournful tune, the pain that we heard in its melodic lines resonating deep within us, reworked it in our innate style and produced sounds so moving, its own history was replaced. That’s the true test and what I believe we should all fight for: Do what you do so well, no one can say “That’s a great Black cellist,” but rather, “That’s a Great cellist!” Own your pieces in your heart and sing them like no one else can. It’s possible because your listening public has either been in your emotional state or can identify. And that’s what makes what you do relevant. It’s not YOU per se, but rather your command over the music, giving it a voice and soul. Can you do that with all pieces? Perhaps, if you find something in it with which you can connect. And then, was the piece “relevant” given the context of the Family series concert? Typically, the solemn Amazing Grace is reserved for religious ceremonies or funerals. That’s really the only time I hear it, played like a prayer. However, the way that it was performed for this racially-mixed audience and with all of the feeling that Ms. Monroe breathed into it… that’s ownership right there. It’s so moving when infused with Black emotion that only a deep innate 400+ -year sorrow could produce, played with so much ownership because WE BELIEVE that it is ours, that other people believe the same thing. Damn. That to me speaks to the power of classical musicians of color. We sit here in the midst of two powerful worlds in America, the Black and the White, produced by history and prolonged by experiences. So my charge is to believe in your right to own what you do. The point of this site is to demonstrate our longevity in the music with the hopes that someone will think “I really DO belong here!” but it’s all about belief. White people believe that they are the chosen ones, destined to rule, the smartest of all. That is the power of “white.” That’s what they think and they make non-Whites believe it too, but it isn’t true. But that’s the power that I’m talking about… when you believe that you come from a place of privilege, nothing can shake your confidence or your identity. (That is also the problem with Blacks in classical music in America—our presence disrupts the identity of Whites since they believe that we should not be involved in their music.) But as my friend Mariana said, ‘Saint-Georges (a contemporary of Mozart) composed some difficult music, some of which is better than Mozart and certainly harder.’ So essentially you have a choice to make music even more relevant to the general public and it all comes down to repertoire and the information you convey—verbally or non-verbally. If you don’t speak, put it in the liner notes. So while Amazing Grace was not our original tune, we reinvented it as our own. Of course, that took years to do, but it doesn’t have to. There is music already composed by Blacks from which to choose! You can pick whatever theme, ethnicity, tempo, style (within classical) in which you want to perform. You can choose from music by many different composers for various instrumentations. The only reason music could ever NOT be relevant to a musician is if you loose your passion to perform. However, if you have people that you like to work with, and a zeal for trying out new or unusual things, or perhaps you only like classics and can market yourself to that particular audience that also favors the classics… the point is you need to do your research. Tracking down music is not hard. It’s very easy to contact the publisher. You'll find most of the music by Black composers here: American Composers Alliance; ASCAP; MMB Music, Inc.; Amistad Research Center; Fleischer Collection; American Music Center; Center for Black Music Research. It's also relatively easily to find the composer!
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Next week’s Hot Topic! Orchestras: Can we say that they truly exist if the personnel continues to change, people are paid on an ad hoc basis and the “members” are really only there to perform a paying gig, but go back to another job when the show is over? We will take a historical look at orchestras, their members, how they were formed, and why race in orchestras shouldn’t matter, and relate it to contemporary orchestras. This will be a multi-part series.
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