[Harp-L] RE: B & W

[Albert Catasus <acatasus@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

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.