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Dirty-South Blues Harp forum: wail on! >
Race... again?
Race... again?
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Big Nancy
100 posts
Aug 22, 2010
2:20 AM
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Here I go again, dropping my two cents. But it seems to me that these threads often hinge around the issue of race and contain a sort of distorted view of things [ie. the recent thread on calling oneself a blues man...]. I think people sometimes forget that African Americans were here before the advent of slavery! There are theories which support that view that they were here before anyone...including an excerpt:
[The earliest people in the Americas were people of the Negritic African race, who entered the Americas perhaps as early as 100,000 years ago, by way of the bering straight and about thirty thousand years ago in a worldwide maritime undertaking that included journeys from the then wet and lake filled Sahara towards the Indian Ocean and the Pacific, and from West Africa across the Atlantic Ocean towards the Americas.
According to the Gladwin Thesis, this ancient journey occurred, particularly about 75,000 years ago and included Black Pygmies, Black Negritic peoples and Black Australoids similar to the Aboriginal Black people of Australia and parts of Asia, including India.]
Blacks and Whites interacted throughout the ages. And by the same token white blues players existed and played their part in the earliest evolutions of blues. Racism, as well as certain cultural aspects played a part in shaping and recording of the blues, as we know it.
White cultures often frowned upon entertainers of any kind, as their lifestyles were contrary to European views of hard work for an honest days pay. Black cultures had their struggles with church v Satan, and yet there was still a tremendous support from within. White blues players like Jimmie Rogers were often lumped into the Country category. White guys that played blues were viewed as vagabonds and hobos… during the very same era that Black players were lighting up the big cities. White players have been there from the beginning and yet who really knows why black players emerged to be so dominant after the Civil War? It certainly has to do with economic struggle, oppression, and hardship. But there are many other factors that are derived from White cultural views and prejudices as well.
And then there is the essence of the blues itself…
Beat, Language, Tonal quality, Story, Soul and Groove. It could be that black players of the day were just better at it and garnered more attention. But white players have been there all along… and if you have those elements and you use them well… race is not an issue!
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Andrew
1136 posts
Aug 22, 2010
2:53 AM
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"The Negritic African race...entered the Americas perhaps as early as 100,000 years ago, by way of the bering straight"
Come on, Nancy, apart from the fact that you haven't cited your source, this is such a foolish piece of revisionist wind-up, that I really do think there's no point in retaining this thread.
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Andrew,
gentleman of leisure,
noodler extraordinaire.
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kudzurunner
1770 posts
Aug 22, 2010
4:16 AM
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I think that the Native American contribution to the blues is what's been left out of the story.
In his book THE MOJO TRIANGLE, Jim Dickerson (not to be confused with Memphis producer/performer Jim Dickinson)argues that "bands" of Chickasaws and Choctaws--little trios and quartets--were playing on the docks of Natchez when the first slaves were brought by boat, and that this Indian music helped shape African American music that eventually fed into the blues. He argues that the reason we call rock bands and blues bands "bands" is that they trace back to Indian bands. You're heard the phrase "a band of Chickasws"? Now you know the rest of the story.
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Sirsucksalot
243 posts
Aug 22, 2010
4:21 AM
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cool Adam very interesting stuff. ill have to read that.
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Zhin
533 posts
Aug 22, 2010
6:58 AM
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Adam that's incredibly cool and interesting.
I actually read somewhere that Alan "Blind Owl" Wilson absolutely believed the Native Americans had direct influence on the blues. Apparently his styling is based on that. He apparently went all the way and even lived in native american camps to get closer to their music.
Do you have any more about this to share?
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http://www.youtube.com/harmonicazhin
Last Edited by on Aug 22, 2010 6:59 AM
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Big Nancy
101 posts
Aug 22, 2010
6:36 PM
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Adam... that's a given.... there were other books on the subject also very good.... BBQ Bob P did quite a bit of reading on the subject. He turned me on to one and I lent it out and never got it back! I think one of the titles was Indian Blues....
What I believe is of no consequence... I stated clearly that "there were theories"... guys take em or leave em! But we all played a part in the evolution, formation, transport, and staying power of the blues.... we still do. I am alarmed at how many people believe that the blues was born of the civil War... or those who feel that there were no white players before the 60's folk era.
Its not all black or white.
And Andrew, I don't care who got here first.... I wasn't here to jam with them!
Sir sucks... thanks for taking the time to look that up!
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Last Edited by on Aug 22, 2010 6:37 PM
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Blown Out Reed
201 posts
Aug 22, 2010
10:17 PM
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Interesting Theory
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Zhin
548 posts
Aug 22, 2010
11:08 PM
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ROFLLL!!!!!!
I'm reduced to tears and knots in my stomach... XD
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http://www.youtube.com/harmonicazhin
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kudzurunner
1776 posts
Aug 23, 2010
5:11 AM
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LR: For many decades, whiteness wasn't stigmatized in America; in fact it was a positive good. White people, who called themselves "white people," "white men," "the white man," etc. quite explicitly, charged themselves with leading the inferior races (as they called them) towards civilization. This whites-take-the-lead stuff went underground, to some extent, but still: in the world in which many of us over 50 came of age, with whites greatly predominating in the political arena, in business, etc., whiteness as such was invisible. When something is invisible, it's easy to carry it lightly. What has happened over the last thirty year is that whiteness has become visible, and the sense of white precedence and priority that governed American life from the beginning through the 1960s--call it 250 years--has considerably evaporated. White people aren't writing all the history books, or blues history books, for example, whereas for 250 years they pretty much did (although there were always a handful of professional black historians, starting after the Civil War).
Your blood pressure is getting up because you're sensing what it feels like not to be able to frame the conversation, the history, exactly as you'd like.
This gives you and black people something in common. They've never been able to frame it exactly as they'd like, except, perhaps, over the last 20 years on BET. When you're a minority, and especially a long-stigmatized minority, you don't have the luxury of telling the story exactly as you'd like.
The key thing here is that you're invoking an ideology of color-blindness, where the white guys who looked like you and me back in 1900 would have done just the opposite.
An ideology of color blindness is fine in many respects, and in fact I've met many black people who espouse it. But it has problems, too. When the State of Mississippi adopts the touristic slogan, "No black, no white, just the blues," you've got to ask yourself: Aren't 98% of the great, famous bluesmen from Mississippi black? Are people really going to visit the state to see WHITE Mississippi bluesmen? So isn't that statement.....misleading? That sort of statement makes people like James "Super Chikan" Johnson's blood pressure go up. He says as much in a forthcoming book on Mississippi blues tourism that I just reviewed for the University Press of Mississippi.
You've got something in common with him. :)
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Andrew
1142 posts
Aug 23, 2010
5:16 AM
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Plato's Timaeus and Critias, written in the first half of the 4th century BC are the only source, they are companion texts to the Republic, which is also about a mythical state. I haven't read it for a while, so I can't remember the exact details, but it's basically an allegory about the loss of the Athenian maritime empire. It's pure fiction and has nothing to do with the eruption of Santorini/Thera, which is currently dated to 1628 BC by independent tree-ring datings in California and Ireland. Although obviously sunken islands can inspire fiction. (there is actually another sunken island, or sunken part of the Greek coast which happened not so long before Plato lived)
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Andrew,
gentleman of leisure,
noodler extraordinaire.
Last Edited by on Aug 23, 2010 5:20 AM
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toddlgreene
1691 posts
Aug 23, 2010
5:17 AM
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I'm part Choctaw and Iroquois-maybe that explains my draw to the blues?
I want to read up on this American Indian/Blues tie-in. If any one has some good links, ISBN numbers of books, etc., I'd be appreciative.
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Crescent City Harmonica Club
Todd L Greene, Co-Founder
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kudzurunner
1777 posts
Aug 23, 2010
6:53 AM
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Todd: James L. Dickerson's MOJO TRIANGLE: BIRTHPLACE OF COUNTRY, BLUES, JAZZ, AND ROCK 'N ROLL, can be purchased at Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Mojo-Triangle-Birthplace-Country-Omnibus/dp/0825673011
I just searched, using Amazon's search-inside-the-book function, and discovered that the stuff about America's debt--and specifically southern music's debt--to the Choctaw and Chickasaw, is the focus of chapter 1.
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The Gloth
449 posts
Aug 23, 2010
6:53 AM
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I saw a TV documentary on contemporary Mississippi blues, and Super Chikan was in it. Great musician ! He played a one-string steel guitar he'd made himself, and what he did with it was incredible.
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http://www.buddybrent.be
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scojo
85 posts
Aug 25, 2010
11:44 AM
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Adam: RE: your comment about the tourism slogan, "No black, no white, just the blues"... While I am definitely no Haley Barbour acolyte, I think the point with that slogan is that the blues transcends race, at least in terms of the present day. I know that you want us not to shy away from thinking about that these issues, and there's a lot of value in that.
But there's also value in viewing music as music, and letting go of the race issue as much as possible. I can say definitively that, when I play gigs at venues in downtown Jackson (some of which are at blues venues, even though I'll say for the thousandth time that my music is not really blues per se)... I get fans and supporters of all races, creeds, and political persuasions (in pretty equal numbers, actually). And I honestly believe that, in the context of those performances, it doesn't matter.
That's not any kind of credit to me or my playing. It's simply a fact that, to a large degree, we have gotten past the obsession with race, at least in the Jackson musical community. That's not limited to Jackson, from what I have observed in Oxford and other places in the state.
That's not to say, at all, that race is no longer an issue in Mississippi. Obviously that's not the case. But I think that slogan ""No black, no white, just the blues" is, to a large extent, a goal that is worthy of pursuit and is often achieved.
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groyster1
399 posts
Aug 25, 2010
12:19 PM
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adam
loved your post-I had no earthly idea of native american influence on blues-I always thought that blues evolved from spirituals and was transformed into what willie dixon said"the blues are the facts of life" need more informative threads like these
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kudzurunner
1789 posts
Aug 25, 2010
12:41 PM
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Scojo:
As the paleface half of a salt-and-pepper blues duo for 20 years, I'd be the last person in the world to insist that blues can't be a solvent for racial strife. It most certainly can. But the moment you reify that soul-mingling force, reducing it to a slogan, and the moment that slogan becomes part of the State of Mississippi's official tourism agenda, you're dealing with what might broadly be called political economy. You're dealing with groups of people who have political and economic power, goals, and ideologies. At that point, ironies begin to enter the picture.
The Mississippi Tourism Commission has, for the past decade, been embarked on a deliberate, well-planned campaign to use the blues, including the Blues Trail program, as a way of redefining Mississippi's image in the American and world imagination. Steven C. King writes eloquently about this in his forthcoming book. In particular, the MTC is trying to use the blues to help transform the image of Mississippi from a "closed society," pervaded by economic inequality and virulent forms of racism (read Unita Blackwell's BAREFOOTIN' for an accurate read of black life in the state in the early 1960s), into "the birthplace of the blues." From the death place to the birthplace: from Emmett Till to B. B. King's Museum.
The difficulty is that while the material base of all this is black blues artists--99% of the great "named" blues performers from Mississippi, historically speaking, were black--the power structure remains predominantly white. Not entirely white, of course. And a considerable amount of political power in the state resides in African American hands. But the economic power is mostly in white hands. (How many large black landowners are there in the Delta these days? Very, very few.)
So there's an irony in the phrase "No black, no white, just the blues" when it shows up, for example, in an official State of Mississippi Welcome Center in Vicksburg. The irony is that the MTC has been devoting a huge amount of time to recognizing, honoring, naming, and cataloguing black blues performers. NOT white blues performers, except for Jimmie Rodgers and Charlie Musselwhite. Black performers. It's a long overdue act of collective recognition. But that act of recognition is, in turn, framed within a political economy which makes it clear that profit--tourist dollars--is one of the chief reasons for this long-overdue recognition. Tourist dollars and the corresponding need to redefine Mississippi in the popular/touristic imagination. That's where the slogan comes in.
"No black, no white, just the blues" certainly does speak to a truth about the transracial fraternity that can be experienced by blues musicians black and white, and blues audiences black and white. But within the political economy that I've just sketched, it's also sort of a lie. What are the Mississippi blues if not black art? And who are Mississippi whites, in long historical context, if not the people responsible for helping make the state a breeding ground for the blues? Little Brother Montgomery, Memphis Slim, Honeyboy Edwards, and especially Big Bill Broonzy testify to this, and eloquently. Used in contemporary Mississippi, the slogan "No black, no white, just the blues" is designed to make white tourists feel welcome. No black and no white? Wasn't Mississippi supposed to be THE place in the South where segregation was adhered to most rigidly: the last holdout? Wellllllll, yes. But, ah, all that has changed. These days, it's....no black and no white. Just.....the blues. Come on down, y'all. We promise not to flag your car as you cross the state line, chase you down, shoot you in the head, and dump you in the Tallahatchie River. That was then, this is now. We ALL love the blues. One big happy family!
In other words, you're right, but there's more to it that that. I was speaking to that more.
Last Edited by on Aug 25, 2010 12:45 PM
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robdee
10 posts
Aug 25, 2010
12:54 PM
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@ toddlegreene
On the theme of aboriginal connection see Elaine Bomberry who has organized Rez Bluez shows in Canada for many years and a radio documentary on the topic.
See for example:
http://www.torontobluessociety.com/0401cov_rezbluez.htm
...
"Given the frequency of contact between the two peoples, and the circumstances, the theory of a Native contribution in the formation of the blues seems plausible. But most of the history is undocumented and has been passed down orally. Bomberry says that African American musicians and radio hosts she spoke to in Chicago are aware of the connection between the two cultures and their music. "The thing is, because we don't have it written down, when I speak to musicologists, they don't know what I'm talking about."
On the other hand:
I was at an event in Toronto two years ago where the keynote speaker was Elijah Wald, author of Escaping the Delta/Robert Johnson - and he replied to her question on this issue. that he had not found any evidence of any significant historical aboriginal connection. There is a huge contemporary aboriginal blues community in southern Ontario in particular.
TBC
Last Edited by on Aug 25, 2010 12:55 PM
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Buzadero
511 posts
Aug 25, 2010
1:00 PM
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Adam,
While we have not yet met face to face, I've see enough photos of you to conclude that no matter what the duo, you're likely to be the 'paleface half'.
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~Buzadero
Underwater Janitor, Patriot
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scojo
88 posts
Aug 25, 2010
1:23 PM
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@Kudzurunner: This is what I get for shooting off a response to a thread, then getting an incredibly educated response that I have not nearly enough time (nor, likely, the ability) to answer with even a fraction of the thoughtfulness you employed. :)
I will say this, and I'll let you consider the relevance without a very detailed explanation from me, for now: Jackson is VERY different from the rest of Mississippi, and I made my previous statement primarily based on that experience. Everything you say about the political and economic realities of current-day Mississippi is true, even here... but it's a tad less true here.
The complexities of Jackson politics and power are mind-boggling even to an insider... and while I am not exactly one, my mother-in-law has been a Democratic member of the City Council here for 25 years. I have heard more crazy stories than one web site could hold, and experienced a few personally. (Adam, have you heard about our late mayor, Frank Melton? Remind me to tell you a few choice bits about him the next time I see you.)
It's not all one big happy family, but my daily life here is probably more racially diverse, harmonious, and irony-free than anywhere I lived around the country... which includes Boston, NYC, DC, Virginia, Ohio, Los Angeles, and San Diego. (I heard the N-word more times in one ridearound with NYC transit cops, when I was in grad school, than I've heard it in the 7 1/2 years I've been back in Jackson.) My street is 50/50 black and white, and my gigs are, proportionally, all over the map.
That's not to say things are perfect by any means... but the imperfections, to me, more closely resemble the problems that are found throughout this country... a country with an extremely problematic racial past AND present, to say the least.
How does this relate to the tourism commission? I am not sure. :) I wouldn't stake a dime on any alleged good intentions coming out of that administration, so I guess in the end I have to say that I do agree with you for the most part.
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nacoran
2621 posts
Aug 25, 2010
1:52 PM
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No offence Nancy, but I think your first post misses the point. 'Black' isn't a race, it's a racial identity. The color of your skin in America creates an experience for you that shapes who you are. If you grow up somewhere else you may not fit into the group 'black' even if you have dark skin, at least not culturally. It's about disenfranchisement. I had a friend point out to me that she was black, but she was not African-American. She was Jamaican. She had a very different experience growing up in Jamaica than she would have growing up in the U.S. She even said until she came here she didn't even think of herself as black. She wasn't hit with that construct until she got here.
The African-American culture draws from African culture, and white culture, and disenfranchisement, and the black power movement, and poverty and a million other things. As a white person, we may in fact have a lot of overlap culturally, but that overlap will never be complete, for us, not for a Jamaican, or for anyone else. We can copy it. We can borrow it. We can try take the parts that do overlap and try to use those to create a synergy, and we may even get accepted. I can sing about poverty. I can try to put myself in the shoes of someone else, but I have to be careful not to claim an experience that's not mine. I have to be careful whether it's a question of race, or any other part of identity. If I write a song about sitting on the banks of the Mississippi or sitting in the Globe Theatre in London and I haven't experienced it I have to own the fact that it's fictional up front or I'm misrepresenting the facts.
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Nate
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kudzurunner
1794 posts
Aug 26, 2010
9:27 AM
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Scojo:
I think this is a classic example of us both being right. And I really do understand, and value, why you're invoking your own experience in present-day Jackson. I'm envious! But I had something like that in NYC's blues culture: a completely race-mingled environment where the slogan "No black, no white, just the blues," was indeed operative. I'm a huge fan of contemporary blues cultures when they function like that, and a number of them do. There's a terrific essay by a literary critic named Vincent Leitch in a book called THEORY MATTERS in which he offers a clear-eyed and analytically sophisticated description of Oklahoma City blues culture, and he describes it very much as you describe Jackson, Mississippi. In OKC there's an admixture of Native American performers and fans; that gives their blues a slightly different feel.
I should add that I'm extremely glad to have you on this forum, speaking from experience about contemporary urban Mississippi's blues culture. We need that.
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groyster1
401 posts
Aug 26, 2010
12:50 PM
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dont know when sonny terry and brownie mcghee came out with white boy lost in the blues but maybe came early in caucasian attempts at playing blues people like paul butterfield and eric clapton may have been the catalysts in giving whites the birthright
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scojo
95 posts
Aug 26, 2010
1:09 PM
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Thanks Adam... I appreciate it. I do want to clarify something, though... although I have spent plenty of time in and around the blues world down here, I wouldn't want to make any definitive statements about it... especially since my own music is more a mix of a lot of things. It's about as much blues as the music of Widespread Panic or Galactic is (or Blues Traveler, to pick a more obvious example)... which is to say, it's influenced by blues but also by a lot of other things.
I really was trying to make an observation that was more about the culture at large down here, of which we all are a part and the blues world is a subset. The arts community here is VERY vibrant, and is much better integrated with mainstream society and the power structures than in most places I've lived or visited. It's partly because of this, and my own role in it, that I perceive things to be pretty good here.
But really, drift out into the Jackson suburbs and spend all one's time working a 9-to-5 job, and one could have a very different experience. So it's a complex thing. But Jackson the city -- which has had a LOT of problems, not all of them race-related -- is moving in the right direction on a lot of fronts. And part of that is because the old barriers have been slowly but surely deteriorating.
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joeleebush
67 posts
Aug 26, 2010
1:35 PM
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This race thing has always interested me when it comes to blues music. I have lost more shows than you can shake a stick at because the buyer (usually a black) made the bigoted observation that because I was white, I couldn't cut it. And my act would be far superior to the black guy he ended up hiring.
I even went so far one time to just bust in on an owner at lunch (after getting brushed off for 6 weeks)...and while he was whining about "I don't have time for this now, etc etc"..I pulled out a harp, jumped up on the empty stage all by myself, did a few Jackie Wilson dance moves, and went into "She Used to Be Beautiful" by Forest City Joe, singing and playing with no accompaniment and BLEW HIS MIND!
Then I looked at him while his jaw was wide open and said.."now, man are we gonna do some business or keep up with this bull you're putting down".
I got booked there every Saturday night for 2 years running! He wound up loving us and we held his customers in there like he couldn't believe (Fellas, all they want is to get 2 more drinks out of the guest and they're way in the money).
For years I argued that race didn't matter...but about ten years ago I did a total 180 on that. After listening to so many whites, I came to the conclusion that unless a person has had some early connection,and I mean a SERIOUS connection with the black race, he won't come across as the real deal. I am NOT talking about the harp playing..I am talking about the vocals or stage rap. PLENTY of white harp players can cut it, all you gotta do is look and see who rules the den today...Portnoy, Guyger, Estrin, Musslewhite, Piazza, Wilson, etc etc etc.
If you see my website you will see me (the one with no shirt) sitting on the back of a truck next to my house with black kids I grew up with and played with from kindergarten years. I think that's where I picked up the true southern negro dialect..all those years.
My wife today is stunned at how with no prompting at all I can switch into that dialect in a conversation with true southern blacks...and although she too had negro people living in the alley beside her house, she "wasn't allowed to play with them" whereas I was...along with all the other white kids on the street. She cannot do that dialect to save her life....
My son is amazed at it too...he says, "daddy you're just a black man trapped in a white man's body".
The point of this diatribe is that I feel sorry for anyone who never grew up in the segregated south playing with black children, listening to that music, and even sorrier for those who did and missed the point.
As for those blacks today, who keep moaning about stuff that happened before they were even born (they never sat on the back of the bus in their lives..they're too young)...well, that's a topic for another time and another place.
Not ruffling feathers here, gents, just giving my point of view from down here in the part of the country where it all started.
And please don't come talking about not "paying my dues" or "not cultivating that cotton". I was arrested in front of Leb's restaurant here in Atlanta (around 1961, I think it was) for carrying one of those protest signs before a great number of you were born too. The Atlanta Chief of Police was my Sunday School teacher at Cascade Baptist Church and turned us all loose..both the whites and the blacks.
Let's see the great Dan Rather or John Kerry top that act!
Regards.
Joe Lee
Last Edited by on Aug 26, 2010 1:38 PM
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groyster1
404 posts
Aug 26, 2010
3:25 PM
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great post joe lee I am old enough to remember both the 50s and 60s
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LittleJoeSamson
430 posts
Aug 26, 2010
4:01 PM
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My sister and mines "babysitter" was Willie... a few years older than us. Course, we thought of him as our best friend. He did cool stuff with us. I remember him swirling us down the kiddie hills in our saucer sleds.
Then we moved to a different neighborhood and lost track of our pal.
Ten years ago, my Dad passed on. Many condolences and cards, but ONE PERSON got in touch with me by phone : Willie!
This thread reminds me some of Studs Terkel and his tales of traveling with Big Joe Turner and other legends.
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kudzurunner
1797 posts
Aug 26, 2010
4:13 PM
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I've heard Sugar Blue and Billy Branch switch into the black voice you're talking about, Joe Lee, when they're in blues mode. Then they get offstage, away from blues fans, and talk somewhat differently. It's food for thought.
Most of the older down-home black blues performers didn't switch voices, as you're describing that you do. They wouldn't have been able to shock their wives as you describe shocking your wife. They just spoke the way they spoke, and their singing proceeded naturally from that. This is why there's a paradox in the voice switching that you describe--and why it's probably a mistake to assume that guys like Piazza or Estrin are the "real deal," as you put it, because of their vocals and stage rap. Some people--and I'm not by any means the only one; Living Blues reviewer David Whiteis is another--have found an element of calculated artificiality in the stage persona that they deploy.
Tab Benoit, by contrast, meets your primary criterion--he spent a lot of time around black people, groving up in Louisiana--but he doesn't put on any stage persona. He just sings. So does Portnoy.
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joeleebush
70 posts
Aug 26, 2010
4:39 PM
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Interesting discussion, Mr. Adam.
It is good we can all talk together about these things in a civilized way, regardless of political connections or religion or faith or whatever without some pup blowing a fuse and ruining things.
Do you think maybe, though, its because of the mileage us older guys have that enables these conversations to come about. I'm not implying that you're an "old geezer" like me, but I'm sure you're no fresh rooster.
I for one, have learned long ago that it's a no-win situation if one attempts to "sell" an idea, process, or procedure...all I can do is just put it out there and let it hit where it hits.
I love this forum when little controversial ideas as these can be talked over without going to war.
By the way, I have prowled your website and I am curious...do you play that knocked out stuff like that Howard Levy guy does?
Man...he blew my mind with the Amazing Grace and then some of that jazz stuff I hunted down on the web. Do you do all that stuff too? I will find it and try to use some of it. However...I am an honest thief. I always give credit to the person who got there first and created it. (That's kept me in good stead with lots of players who would have killed me long ago if I had claimed the stuff was my own. Rod told me to use whatever of his material I wanted to use as long as I gave him credit for it and its worked out okay..he hasn't hit me with one of those surfboards yet)
I need to get into that arena a little and learn some stuff to steal so I can take it back to my own little shows. I even put Levy on my Tascam "slow down machine" and I STILL cant catch him.
Regards,
Me
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Joe_L
572 posts
Aug 26, 2010
9:37 PM
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I'm looking forward to reading Super Chikan's book. He's a great singer and guitar player.
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shanester
207 posts
Aug 26, 2010
10:12 PM
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I will say that when I go to pow - wows the flute guys seem to be playing kind of a minor pentatonic scale.
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Shane
1shanester
"Keep it coming now, keep it coming now,
Don't stop it no don't stop it no no don't stop it no don't stop it no no..."
- KC and the Sunshine Band
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Sirsucksalot
244 posts
Aug 26, 2010
11:52 PM
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TO: 5F6H
I never said anything like that. Neither Atlantis OR Atlantians. I simply found The article Big Nancy was referring to and copied it to my post. please reread my post...........................The Following is all I Wrote.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................I don't like Commenting on this sort of thread but that sounds like a lot of BS. Im part Native American. I find these statements Strange and wacky. i have not studied this Gladwin Thesis. i think its more likely that aliens built the pyramids.Well, maybe not. Anyway iv never seen anyone present any evidence for this. maybe they point to the people of easter island whose ancestors traveled vast distances across the pacific. anyway i dont know enough about this topic to continue with out making myself look like a bigger idiot. But who knows. I seem to remember Columbus had a hard enough time crossing the Atlantic. on the other hand no one believed the vikings came to america until someone found a settlement up in Newfoundland.
But anyway, i like the point you were trying to make.
IF Your Good, it Doesn't matter what color you are.
Hopefully i wont get called a racist and get kicked out.
This i think is the article you were referring to. its pretty interesting. ..............................................................................................................................The rest is copied From said Article.
Thanky You
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TNFrank
4 posts
Sep 13, 2010
1:41 PM
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I just read thru this quickly but here's my take on it. First off there should be no hyphenated Americans, we are all AMERICANS, Period, doesn't matter what color you are.
Second, you can be White and be African-American because there are a lot of African born "White People" so, once again color doesn't enter into it.
[Forest Gump]That's all I got to say bout that.[/Forest Gump]
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Hohner Harps:
Golden Melody in C(bought in '76)
Blues Band in C(what else,LOL)
Big River in A
Hot Metal harps in G, A, C, D, and E)
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kudzurunner
1851 posts
Sep 13, 2010
2:41 PM
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@TNFrank: Since Forest Gump has an IQ of about 85, I"m not sure he's the best guy to stick onto the end of post in which you're offering your own take on the subject--unless you're trying to make the claim that race in America is such a simple thing to understand that sub-normal intelligence is the best guide.
But since you've raised the issue of Forest Gump: please note that the whole movie culminates with Forest, the southern-born white man who lives in the big white plantation house, giving a bucket-load of money to his dead black pal Bubba Blue's family. Payback for slavery, in symbolic terms. Payback for slavery is also the fact that Forest is his own lawn-boy, riding that Snapper in circles. And the fact that he's hardly Rhett Butler. And....and.....and. It's a good, deep movie.
You're quite right, BTW, that somebody can be white and African American, but there are more ways that can happen than you seem to be aware of. One way, which you suggest (or imply), is that a white person born in Africa can emigrate to America and become a naturalized citizen: a white African American. Sure. Another way is that you can be an African American descendant of slaves who happens to be albino, or suffer from vitiligo. There's a whole book about such people called THE WHITE AFRICAN AMERICAN BODY: A CULTURAL AND LITERARY EXPLORATION, by Charles D. Martin. Another, more common, way, is that you can be descended from African-born slaves, but, because you've got so much white ancestry (due either to rape on the plantation, or consensual interracial sex) that white folks can't tell that you've got that African ancestry. Lots of folks who looked like that crossed the color line and passed as white, generally in the North. Walter White, a famous "black" journalist, passed as white and went down south to report on lynchings. One particular lynching, in Valdosta, Georgia, involved a mob stringing up the wife of a lynched man--she had loudly protested his lynching--and disemboweling her, ripping out the infant, and stomping its head into the ground.
I'm not sure what "color doesn't enter into," as you use the phrase, but I think you'll find that some Negro people, I mean some colored people, I mean some Afro-American people, I mean some African American people, don't agree with you.
It would be great, though, to live in a world where people could just be people.
Last Edited by on Sep 13, 2010 2:44 PM
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TNFrank
10 posts
Sep 13, 2010
2:54 PM
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I think I was trying to say that it SHOULD be simple enough that anyone could understand that Color shouldn't matter. That's pretty much what Dr.King was going for, not the Color of a man's skin but the content of his character is what should count but unfortunately many times doesn't.
I do think one thing that rubs a lot of people the wrong way is Americans wanting to be called a hyphenated name, heck I'm only 2nd Generation American on my mother's side of the family but I don't call myself a Croatian-American, I'm an American, plain and simple even though, as I said, I'm only 2nd Generation on my mother side of it all.
Any time someone wants to be a hyphenated American they only serve to further build up the wall that separates them from other Americans.
I think the fact that a lot of us "White Guys" have taken to playing the Blues just goes to show that Music can and does cross all racial boundaries. That's probably a big reason why I love playing music so much, you don't have to be Black or White or even Purple, you just have to be willing to play.
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Hohner Harps:
Golden Melody in C(bought in '76)
Blues Band in C(what else,LOL)
Big River in A
Hot Metal harps in G, A, C, D, and E)
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TNFrank
14 posts
Sep 13, 2010
4:46 PM
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Thanks MD. Having been raised by adopted parents that were raciest(even though they never would have admitted it)I've had a lot to over come with regards to race. I fell in love with and married a Hispanic woman and the way she was raised race doesn't enter into it and thank God, she's helped to teach me that over the years. Now my younger daughter is living with and has a daughter by a Black guy, one of the nicest guys you'd ever meet, that's been another lesson for me, race doesn't enter into it. Many of the guitar players that I idolized growing up were Black(Jimmi Hendrix, B.B.King) so for me being a great guitar player has nothing to do with race. I've learned(or should I say "de-programed") my self over the years to simply ignore race. People are people, I've seen good and bad in all races so were people are concerned race just doesn't enter into it.
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Hohner Harps:
Golden Melody in C(bought in '76)
Blues Band in C(what else,LOL)
Big River in A
Hot Metal harps in G, A, C, D, and E)
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Blown Out Reed
209 posts
Sep 14, 2010
6:10 PM
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"In order to get beyond racism, we must first take account of race. There is no other way. And in order to treat some persons equally, we must treat them differently.”- Harry A. Blackmun
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Shredder
189 posts
Sep 14, 2010
7:08 PM
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I can under stand why the native Americans could be the 1st Blues men, look how much they got screwed by the White man.
Mike
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groyster1
471 posts
Sep 14, 2010
7:23 PM
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@Shredder
go to cherokee in the summer see unto these hills-you will go away realizing andy jackson @his worst
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Blown Out Reed
240 posts
Oct 18, 2010
3:04 PM
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TNFrank wrote
"I do think one thing that rubs a lot of people the wrong way is Americans wanting to be called a hyphenated name"
Frank, does having African American Studies in our schools rub those "people" the wrong way too?
Last Edited by on Oct 18, 2010 5:00 PM
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yogi
48 posts
Oct 18, 2010
3:27 PM
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@ tnf frank
''Any time someone wants to be a hyphenated American they only serve to further build up the wall that separates them from other Americans''
Your argument is absurd, not surprisngly from reading so much of your absurdities.
Groups of people giving themselves a common name i.e. african american, latin american, indo american, etc gives you strength of commonality. You all want to be Americans. Be happy with that.
Over here we have a massively diverse cultural and racial population who have no desire to find commonality in name or any other form.
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TNFrank
461 posts
Oct 18, 2010
3:45 PM
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I just wonder how many "African Americans" have actually been to Africa? If you're born in America then you're an AMERICAN, Period. No hyphen needed otherwise I'd be an Irish-Slavic-American, now how stupid does that sound?
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Blues13
64 posts
Oct 18, 2010
4:08 PM
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A-hole comes in every color. that my way of seeing it.
Martin
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kudzurunner
1946 posts
Oct 18, 2010
5:00 PM
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Some days it's hard for anybody around here to remember the forum creed. I'm locking this thread.
Last Edited by on Oct 18, 2010 5:01 PM
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