I have to agree that all the people you just named are great, but you pretty
much stayed in the area of jazz (that said, I'm sure as many great artists
in the other genres blues, gutbucket funk, etc. could be pointed out to
prove your point).
In this whole conversation I'm speaking of roots and not the many great
artists from all walks of life that came after. I'm talking about the
rhythms from red clay and gutbucket funk right on through to the New Orleans
"black" indians and even on back to the delta.
At the end of the day we can both cite numerous examples that prove both our
points (this shows that neither one of us is really wrong), but the fact
remains that jazz, blues and funk were BORN in POOR cultures.
later,
JJ
>From: "Steve Catanzaro" <stevencatanzaro@sprintmail.com>
>To: "Jo-Jo Samuel" <jojo6732@hotmail.com>, <acid-jazz@ucsd.edu>
>Subject: Re: what is soul? (was RE: what is jazz?)
>Date: Mon, 22 May 2000 11:49:03 -0700
>
> > That said maybe you should tally up all the greatest Blues, Soul, Jazz
>and
> > Funk artists, look at the culture they grew up in and then listen to
>what
> > they're singing about.
> >
>
>OK, well, let's look at jazz, for instance. Duke Ellington is probably the
>greatest jazz artist. "Black Brown and Beige" may be the most soulful jazz
>music ever written. He grew up as the pampered son of a middle-class butler
>and doting mother in Washinton D.C... He probably ate more cavier and
>smoked
>salmon pate by the time he was 12 then I've ever had in my life.
>
>Sidney Bechet, I think, came from a relatively well-off Creole family (more
>dentists!) Bix Beiderbecke was from a supremely middle class neighborhood
>in
>Davenport, Iowa. Count Basie's dad ran the estate of a very rich family in
>Red Bank, NJ, which was then a popular resort town.
>
>Your great pianists, Bud Powell, James P. Johnson, Willie the Lion, Art
>Tatum, Monk, etc, were by and large formed by the Harlem Renaissance.
>Combined with figures like Mingus, Sonny Rollins, etc., they were not rich
>certainly, but they came from metropolitan homelives that afforded them
>pianos, classical training, affiliation with youth orchestras and the like,
>and heavy doses of gospel music. I doubt any of 'em ever picked one single
>cotton plant.
>
>As we've said, Miles Davis' dad was a prominent dentist. Bill Evans was
>middle class. Ditto Herbie Hancock, with an engineering degree from
>Grinell.
>As far as I can tell, they don't grow possum or cotton in Norwalk,
>Connecticut, where Horace Silver grew up, and they ain't NO ONE funkier
>than
>him. As for Wayne Shorter... I just have a hard time believing someone who
>went to Arts High School and graduated NYU was in cotton picking mode very
>much. Pharaoh Sanders' dad was a high school music and math teacher in
>Little Rock Arkansas. Until Coltrane was 13, his family was pretty
>average... his dad was a tailor, his grandparents were AME preachers, and
>his mom studied music at Livingston College.
>
>So, while not to denegrate the accomplishments of those remarkable artists
>who did grow up dirt poor...Charlie Parker, Ella Fitzgerald, Mahalia
>Jackson, Dizzy Gillespie, etc... there are enough middle class hard rockers
>to show that poverty is probably INCIDENTAL, rather than ESSENTIAL, in
>producing soulful music.
>
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