Jazz musician Louis Armstrong with his wife Lucille and Prime Minister Kwame Nkrumah of the Gold Coast. This photograph was taken in 1956 during Armstrong's goodwill visit on the eve of Ghana's independence.
Originally uploaded by Pan-African News Wire File Photos
“What About We People Who Are Darker Than Blue?”
By Norman (Otis) Richmond
May 31, 2010
Since taking office, President Barack Hussein Obama is yet to issue a proclamation for Black Music Month which was in its 30th year of observance in 2009. Even Toronto’s Mayor David Miller issued a proclamation for Black Music Month on May 11th, 2009. However, President Obama did issue a statement on June 2nd, 2009 in support of what he has been referring to as “African American Appreciation Month.”
President Obama has taken, in one fell swoop, an international music and nationalized it. But, African American music is an integral part of international Black music. Recall, it was The Black Music Association, created be Kenny Gamble, Ed Wright and others, that brought together Stevie Wonder and Bob Marley and the Wailers in concert to demonstrate this fact.
"Sir" Duke Ellington pointed out nearly a century ago that we, as a people, must call our music “Negro” (Black) music, so others could not claim it.
Black music is one of the many gifts that Africa and Africans have given to the world. Black music has transcended borders, and has become universal music.
There is so much contradiction between President Obama's words and his deeds. For example, his brilliant speech at El–Azhar University in Cairo proven that he is one of the most intelligent head of state in the history of the USA.
The president’s speech, with its theme on peace, was like a vintage Earth, Wind and Fire performance. However, it was just that, a performance. Mumia Abu-Jamal pointed out, “But in truth Obama had them at ‘Salaam-Alaikum,’ (the universal Muslim greeting meaning peace be unto you). Peace, it’s sad to say, is hardly a reality when one’s own government is at war with its own people.”
While the president was touring the Middle East he failed to recognize the 30th anniversary of Black Music Month. More than one person has raised the issue that maybe he didn’t know. I find this unbelievable. He recently hosted Stevie Wonder, Earth Wind and Fire and Sweet Honey in the Rock at the White House. He even invited Odetta to sing at his inauguration. Unfortunately, she joined the ancestors before the historical event.
How can a man who spent most of his adult life in Chicago claim to be “deaf, dumb & blind” about Black Music Month? Chicago is the home of Mahalia Jackson (Martin Luther King’s musical lieutenant), Sam Cooke, Curtis Mayfield, Jerry Butler, Mavis and Pop Staples, Ernest Dawkins, R.Kelly, Common, and Kanye West.
The 2009 (June) issue of Ebony Magazine was dedicated to Black Music Month. That issue had Jada Pinkett Smith on the cover and featured a photo of President Obama and the First Lady, Michelle Obama, with Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace.
Last year, after being called out by The Caribbean World News Network, President Obama did rightly issue a proclamation on June 2nd for National Caribbean American Heritage Month.
According to the June 6, 2009 issue of the New York Times, Obama signed a proclamation establishing the Ronald Reagan Centennial Commission. The Commission is supposed to organize activities to mark the 100th anniversary, in 2011, of President Reagan’s birth.
What about we people who are darker than blue – President Obama?
If a Ronald Regan Centennial Commission is in order, what about a Black Music Month Commission with people like Randy Weston, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Cassandra Wilson, Amiri Baraka and Queen Latifah? Raynard Jackson of Philadelphia has opined, “It’s a no-brainer to do a town hall meeting with singers, producers, and songwriters during Black Music Month.”
The music of African people has been an international force since the Fisk Jubilee Singers, a group from Nashville, Tennessee, specializing in African American Spirituals, conquered Europe in 1873. Since that period jazz, calypso, reggae, r'n'b, hip-hop and African beats have come to be the most popular and influential art forms in the world. Bob Marley, Louis Armstrong and Miriam Makeba are known all over this small planet we call Earth.
The great saxophonist Archie Shepp once said, “What Malcolm X said, John Coltrane played.” This was the expression of Africans in North America. The same thing occurred in the Caribbean and in Africa.
In the Caribbean, Walter Rodney (Guyana) and Bob Marley and Peter Tosh (Jamaica) were the concrete expressions of this phenomenon in the 1970s and early 1980s. On the mother continent, Thomas Sankara (Burkina Faso) and Fela Anikulapo Kuti (Nigeria) are examples of music and politics complimenting one another during the 1990s.
Despite the historic influence of Black music on the planet, and notwithstanding the massive collection at the Smithsonian Institute, it was only 30 years ago that the Black Music Association (BMA) persuaded the U.S. government to recognize Black Music Month. In June 1979, around the time the Sugarhill Gang's Rapper's Delight was being released, Kenny Gamble led a delegation to the White House to discuss with President Jimmy Carter the state of Black music. At that meeting, Carter asked trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie and drummer Max Roach if they would perform "Salt Peanuts", to which Gillespie replied that he'd only do so if the President (who made a fortune as a peanut farmer) provided the vocals.
Since that great and hilarious day when Carter butchered the melody of the song, June has been designated Black Music Month.
It must be mentioned that, in 1979, the world was witnessing a revolutionary breeze as Maurice Bishop and the New Jewel Movement seized state power in Grenada; Daniel Ortega and the Sandinistas swept the counter-revolutionary forces out of power in Nicaragua like dust before a broom; and the Shah of Iran was dethroned after being installed in power by the CIA in 1953.
The soundtrack to all of this was (Gene) McFadden and (John) Whitehead’s, Ain’t No Stoppin’ Us Now which was released in 1979. Recall, Ain’t No Stoppin’ Us Now was also played at the 2008 Democratic National Convention on the night Illinois Senator Barack Obama accepted the Democratic Party nomination for President of the United States.
Since 1984, thanks to the efforts of the BMA/TC, Toronto Mayors June Rowlands, Barbara Hall and Mel Lastman have recognized June as Black Music Month. On the 25th anniversary of Black Music Month, Mayor David Miller presented the proclamation at City Hall. The late Milton Blake, Jay Douglas, Michie Mee, Norman (Otis) Richmond (Jalali) and others participated in this event.
When broadcaster and community activist Milton Blake and Norman (Otis) Richmond created the Black Music Association's Toronto Chapter in 1984, the intention was to plug African-Canadian music makers into the international music market.
At that time the only African Canadian musician that was internationally known was Oscar Peterson. Since then, Eric Mercury, Harrison Kennedy (as a member of the Chairmen of the Board), Dan Hill, Deborah Cox, Divine Brown, Glenn Lewis (son of Glen Ricketts), Kardinal Offishall and Drake have conquered the world, musically.
In Toronto, we must pay homage to artists such as Cy McLean, Phyllis Marshall, Archie Alleyne, Doug Richardson, Salome Bey, Tiki Mercury Clarke, Lazo, Jayson Carlos Morgan, Eddie Bullins, Itah Sadu, Lillian Allen, Clifton Joseph and others.
By not recognizing Black Music Month in 2009 you have taken a step backward Mr. President. Are you going to make the same mistake in 2010? As our Comrade/Leader Maurice Bishop told us 30 years ago, "Forward Ever. Backwards Never.”
One of the greatest Africans to ever grace the planet, Ghana’s Kwame Nkrumah, said the same thing 20 years before Comrade Bishop.
For more information contact Norman (Otis) Richmond a.k.a. Jalali : norman.o.richmond@gmail.com
No comments:
Post a Comment