Social and Aesthetic History generally reveals diverse and complex landscapes. One culture, however, has left an indelible mark on America. It proclaims the triumph of perseverance, tenacity, and self-respect over conformity, complacency and indifference. And contrary to Kierkegaard’s view in The Absolute Paradox that “the highest pitch of every passion is to will its own downfall”, the highest pitch of black culture and passion has been to exercise the highest form of giving, which is forgiveness. Ultimately, that is why Black Music culture still stands tall, defining and influencing the course of our lives.
The journey began with an atrocious incident in the history of mankind. It was easily one of the darkest, gruesome exhibitions of capitalism and imperialism—and it destroyed the African understanding of human community and unity with the divine in the motherland. The appetite of blood thirsty and free-labor hungry Western Slave Traders that spanned approximately from 1440-1860, forcibly uprooted the West African griot, also called the Jali , from West Africa (Guinea, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Nigeria, Gabon, Cameroon, Zaire, Angola, Senegal).
Only twenty per cent survived the ocean crossings that transported them to Europe and to the Southern Slave plantations. However, the Jali preserved in him the tradition, musical culture and practice that threaded the social, political and communal activities of African life together. The Jali would continue to serve as the life support system and source of knowledge providing those African retentions that would be coupled with Western European influences to create the new sound that filled the slave house and echoed through the bitter nights of gloom and impending doom.
1669 marked the arrival of the first enslaved Africans at Jamestown as the Atlantic Slave Trade continued without shame or remorse. The African Holocaust persisted and the institution of slavery was established. This marked the genesis of an African American Heritage. As they faced the need for reorientation in the new cosmology within the confines of their new found pain and sorrow and at a time when they could have easily crumbled and buckled at the knees, the black slaves mastered the courage to stare adversity in the eye and found an avenue of expression through the amalgamation of West African rhythms and European harmonies from the newly imposed religion. This period extending all the way to 1865, witnessed the extraordinary genius of a people under duress, through the creation of spirituals.
The Spirituals became an outward manifestation of all the internal tensions and implosions, which would have otherwise yielded hatred or revolution. In Black Notes, Professor Bill Banfield writes that “in the Spirituals we have a people screaming out, pushing boundaries, transcending their condition, wrestling with the meaning of their existence, challenging the times.” Yes! Indeed this is the essential meaning of the Spirituals. The African slaves who had always treasured their unity with the divine were now introduced to the European churches, which became the source of the theological significance that was an essential aspect of the Spirituals. It is clear that many blacks saw white churches in which ministers promoted obedience to one's master as the highest religious ideal - a mockery of the "true" Christian message of equality and liberation.
In the slave quarters, however, African Americans organized their own "invisible institution." Through signals, passwords, and messages not discernable to whites, they called believers to "hush harbors" where they freely mixed African rhythms, singing, and beliefs with evangelical Christianity. The spirituals embraced such themes as liberation and freedom, divine justice, living in exile, faith in adversity, spiritual walking and devotion. Apart from their thematic composition, there were three kinds of spirituals that were performed (i) the folk spiritual, which still strongly resonates in many traditional rural churches, (ii) the hymn spiritual which came out of the congregational hymn books and (iii) the concert spiritual which was represented by choral arrangements and performances by early concert singers such as Paul Robeson, William Warfield, Kathleen Battle and Denise Graves. The spirituals, with their double meanings of religious salvation and freedom from slavery, developed and flourished. Take for example “Oh Freedom”, a classic hymn relating the liberation and freedom themes. This spiritual invokes emotion and demands divine justice.
“Oh freedom over me! 

And before I’d be a slave, 

I’ll be buried in my grave, 

And go home to my Lord and be free.”

Spirituals like “Oh Freedom” not only speak of the moral injustice that characterized black slave treatment, but it also illustrates the psychological distinction that becomes a key ingredient in all of black history for years to come. It’s captured in the line “And before I’d be a slave, I’ll be buried in my grave.” While the black slave was in physical bondage at the mercy of the taskmaster, in his mind he was liberated and living in transcendental freedom. This phenomenon can be attributed to the establishment of black theology.
Black theology was key to the theological aspects of the Spirituals. African American identity was defined as black believers directed to the idea of a European version of Jesus who personally identified with his pain, power and spirit as a resurrected figure. Biblical stories became easily comparable and adoptable to the black slave situation. For example God’s chosen people in bondage under Pharaoh being led out of captivity by Moses into the “promised land”. This spiritual connection defined black theology in its most essential form as it gave hope and a reference point that instilled inspiration to the black slaves in bondage.
The Negro spirituals moved from the slave quarters to the plantations and then to recitals and liturgical services through the efforts of traditional black (trained) concert singers who performed this repertoire and introduced this new genre to stages around the world. Important to note here would be the Fisk Jubilee Singers in the 1870’s who helped these works become mainstream repertoire.
The Negro spirituals gave birth to a new music form and style that in its tone encompassed the struggle, pain and misery of the black slave. An uplifting and radically empowering art in which sorrows and adversity where transformed into a source of strength that gave the burden bearer an unusual declaration of triumph through adversity. It was the art of singing while in the funk and this style came to be universally known as the blues. The origins of blues can only be likened to the origin of life. A 12-bar, bent-note melody bonding itself together with cries of shared self-victimization. Bad luck and trouble are always present in the blues, and always the result of others, pressing upon unfortunate and down trodden poor souls, yearning to be free from life's troubles. The blues have strongly influenced almost all popular music including jazz, country, and rock-and-roll and continues to help shape music worldwide.
From the crossroads of Highways 61 and 49, and the platform of the Clarksdale Railway Station, the blues headed north to Beale Street in Memphis. With this migration the anonymous names and faces behind black music became increasingly recognizable under the new light of commercialization of the blues. The black composer W.C Hardy (1873-1958) first popularized the blues form between 1911 and 1914. However, the poetic and musical form of the blues first crystallized around 1910 and gained popularity through the publication of Hardy's "Memphis Blues" (1912) and "St. Louis Blues" (1914). Instrumental blues had been recorded as early as 1913. During the twenties, the blues became a national craze. Mamie Smith recorded the first vocal blues song, 'Crazy Blues' in 1920. The blues’ influence on jazz brought it into the mainstream and made possible the records of blues singers like Bessie Smith and later, in the thirties, Billie Holiday.
In addition to their poetic musical form the blues also found interpretation through language, ethos and social history, artistry, and just the raw musical elements. These elements are what have now been commonly referred to as the interpretive windows of the blues. When Mayor "Boss" Crump shut down Beale Street to stop the prostitution, gambling, and cocaine trades, he effectively eliminated the musicians, and entertainers' jobs as these businesses closed their doors. Many of Memphis' best blues artists left the city at the time. The blues migrated to Chicago and Detroit, where it became electrified. During the late forties and early fifties, Muddy Waters, Willie Dixon, John Lee Hooker, Howlin' Wolf, and Elmore James among others, played Mississippi Delta blues, backed by bass, drums, piano and occasionally harmonica, and began scoring national hits with blues songs. At about the same time, T-Bone Walker in Houston and B.B. King in Memphis were pioneering a style of guitar playing that combined jazz technique with the blues tonality and repertoire.
Now, there is no way one can talk about this rich tradition without touching base in New Orleans. 1897 marked the reopening of the New Orleans red-light district, which was later popularly known as Storyville. New Orleans became the attractive destination for sailors, travelers and soldiers returning from tours of duty. It was here that the New Orleans band style was birthed. A unification of European harmonies, the militant rhythms of the marching bands and the essence of spirituals and the blues, saw the emergence of one of the most profitable results of coexisting music styles. New Orleans produced a unique sound that was forged forward by artists such as Buddy Bolden, Jazz-bo Brown, Jelly Roll Morton (1890-1941) and King Oliver (1885-1938), who expanded the influence of New Orleans Rag-Blues-early Jazz as far north as Chicago and as far west as California.
More examples that show the cultural migration northward lead us to the incomparable Louis Armstrong. Born in 1901, Armstrong played on the steamboats that travelled between Chicago and New York, returning by way of Mississippi. His sound and tone was revolutionary and his stardom reached tremendous heights, further stamping the influence of black music and aesthetic on American Culture. As time progressed, the music evolved and each generation built on the foundation that was established in the slave quarters. This evolution leads us to black ragtime composer Scott Joplin. Joplin made his home in Sedalia, Missouri in 1895, where he studied at the George R. Smith College for Negroes. He published some songs that made him immediately famous and moved to St. Louis in 1900 to work more closely with his publisher, John Stark.
In 1902, Joplin's first major composition was a ballet suite that utilized the rhythms of a type of music called "ragtime." Ragtime was a combination of folk tunes, African rhythms, and Creole influences. It was played by small groups in the streets of New Orleans and on showboats on the Mississippi River. It was peculiarly American, and was like no other music heard before. While European (and European-American) music explored counterpoint and complex harmonies, the music of West Africa expressed most of its complexity in its rhythms. These characteristics defined the practice of ragging an existing piece of music. To "rag" a piece of music is to take a well-known tune and change the rhythm of it to make it syncopated, or "jazzy"-sounding.
A shift in focus brings us to another significant movement and event in African American sociology and aesthetic. In the 1920s, African-American literature, art, music, dance, and social commentary began to thrive in Harlem, a section of New York City. An African-American cultural movement began and was known as "The New Negro Movement." Later it would be entitled the Harlem Renaissance. More than a literary movement, the Harlem Renaissance exalted the unique culture of African-Americans and redefined African-American expression. African-Americans were encouraged to celebrate their heritage. The main factors contributing to the development of the Harlem Renaissance were African-American urban migration, trends toward experimentation throughout the country, and the rise of radical African-American intellectuals. The Harlem Renaissance transformed African-American identity and history, but it also transformed American culture in general. Never before had so many Americans read the thoughts of African-Americans and embraced the African-American community's productions, expressions, and style.
A key figure to take note of is Alaine Locke. Alaine Locke played an influential role in identifying, nurturing, and publishing the works of young black artists during the New Negro Movement. His philosophy served as a strong motivating force in keeping the energy and passion of the movement at the forefront.
This kind of movement in our modern day America might be successful, but would face self-imposed challenges. It appears that the mentality of the black man in terms of how he perceives himself is experiencing its most passive phase ever, as compared to the tenacity and intellect that characterized those involved in the former renaissance. While a more educated and professional population of blacks exists now, the overall perception of black people appears to have deteriorated owing to the commercialization of black art that has sucked out the authenticity and the attributes of genius that once characterized black music culture. The once dominant and influential black music creations that penetrated every pore of music culture have become a scarcity and the genius of black music is over-shadowed by the commercialized depiction of what African-American creativity truly entails. The question is: how did we begin with spirituals and end up tangled in Thong Songs? How did we sail from the trueness of the blues and find comfort in the false glitter of “bling-bling” and grills? How did we invent Ragtime and digress to “Shake that Ass!” among other profanities? The Jali tosses in his grave.
Therefore if the former renaissance began as a result of the flourishing African-American literature, art, music, dance, and social commentary, how much of that still exists today? How much do we have that can provide reasonable grounds for “the movement” without being depreciated by the manifestations of morally degrading commercial endeavors that have compromised the integrity and essence of what it truly means to be a descendent of that rich African-American heritage? The renaissance is possible but even more importantly we should teach the successors of this art and culture to bear this torch with a full understanding of the depths of this rich tradition of perseverance, brilliance and moral accountability.