Another sterling collection of essays by one of our best jazz
critics, drawn from his superb newsletter, Jazzletter. Lees
(Waiting for Dizzy, 1991, etc.) is back with more of the elegant
writing and insightful thought that has made him such a highly
praised music critic. Tying this collection together are some sharp
observations - both by Lees and by the musicians he profiles -
about the ethnic and racial roots of jazz and the ways in which
they reflect the tensions that afflict American society. In the
opening essay, he writes movingly about growing up in Canada as a
young jazz buff and about his encounters with racism both as an
adolescent and as a young journalist. Elsewhere in the book, he
offers profiles of Dave Brubeck, who is part Native American;
musicologist Dominique de Lerma, who discourses on the multiplicity
of cultures that have fed into jazz music; bassist Red Mitchell,
who offers some mordant comments on the decay of American
democracy; singer Ernie Andrews, who talks about the effects of
racism in Los Angeles both in the '40s and today. Finally, in one
of the longest pieces in any of his collections, he takes on the
anti-white bias of many black musicians and writers, and fires a
convincing broadside at the monumental and hollow edifice that is
trumpeter and composer Wynton Marsalis. This last piece is not
calculated to endear him to anyone of a black nationalist bent, nor
will its equally fiery attacks on white racism win him any friends
among neoconservatives. But Lees has long been one of those handful
of social and arts critics who say what needs to be said. Essential
reading for any serious jazz fan or student of American culture.
(Kirkus Reviews)
It was none other than Louis Armstrong who said, "These people who
make the restrictions, they don't know nothing about music. It's no
crime for cats of any color to get together and blow." "You can't
know what it means to be black in the United States--in any field,"
Dizzy Gillespie once said, but Gillespie vigorously objected to the
proposition that only black people could play jazz. "If you accept
that premise, well then what you're saying is that maybe black
people can only play jazz. And black people, like anyone else, can
be anything they want to be."
In Cats of Any Color, Gene Lees, the acclaimed author of three
previous collections of essays on jazz and popular music, takes a
long overdue look at the shocking pervasiveness of racism in jazz's
past and present--both the white racism that long ghettoized the
music and generations of talented black musicians, and what Lees
maintains is an increasingly virulent reverse racism aimed at white
jazz musicians. In candid interviews, living jazz legends, critics,
and composers step forward and share their thoughts on how racism
has affected their lives. Dave Brubeck, part Modoc Indian,
discusses native Americans' contribution to jazz and the deeply
ingrained racism that for a time made it all but impossible for
jazz groups with black and white players to book tours and
television appearances. Horace Silver looks back on his long
career, including the first time he ever heard jazz played live.
Blacks were not not allowed into the pavilion in Connecticut where
Jimmie Lunceford's band was performing, so the ten-year-old Silver
listened and watched through the wooden slats surrounding the
pavilion. "And oh man That was it " Silver recalls. Red Rodney
recalls his early days with Charlie "Bird" Parker, and pianist and
composer Cedar Walton tells of the time Duke Ellington played at
the army base at Ford Dix and allowed the young enlisted Walton to
sit in. Tracing the jazz world's shifting attitude towards race,
many of the stories Lees tells are inspiring--Brubeck cancelling 23
out of 25 concert dates in the South rather than replace black bass
player Eugene Wright, or Silver insisting that while he strives to
provide his fellow black musicians opportunities, "I just want the
best musicans I can get. I don't give a damn if they're pink or
polka dot." Others are profoundly disturbing--Lees' first encounter
with Oscar Peterson, after a Canadian barber flatly refused to cut
Peterson's hair, or Wynton Marsalis on television claiming that
blacks have been held back for so many years because the music
business is controlled by "people who read the Torah and stuff."
From the old shantytowns of Louisville, to the streets of South
Central L.A., to the up-to-the-minute controversies surrounding
Marsalis's jazz program at Lincoln Center, and the Jazz Masters
awards given by the NEA, Cats of Any Color confronts racism
head-on. At its heart is a passionate plea to recognize jazz not as
the sole property of any one group, but as an art form celebrating
the human spirit--not just for the protection of individual
musicians, but for the preservation of the music itself.
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