| Jerome Camal, French of birth, is assistant to the | | | | her interest for the modal music and particularly for |
| Washington University of Saint Louis in jazz studies, | | | | that Indian and the attention of Martin Luther King for |
| logic of music and logic of ethnic music. But it is also a | | | | the fliosofia of the not-violence brought ahead by |
| saxophonist that is not satisfied with to live of | | | | Ghandi. In the first days of the struggle for the civil |
| academic searches and he doesn't want that teacher | | | | rights of the black population often M.L. King painted a |
| calls him, but he prefers to play in the places, to plunge | | | | parallel among the struggle for the liberty in the United |
| himself in jam sessions and to teach the practice of | | | | States and the movement for the independence in |
| the tool. | | | | Africa. It seems me to be able to affirm that both the |
| A stimulating character, that entertains in his home | | | | men saw their job in universal terms. Nevertheless it |
| page a section devoted in full to the analysis of the | | | | doesn't seem me that the music of John Coltrane has |
| political jazz of the sixties. | | | | been welcomed in this way and some of the most |
| The observations of Camal are stimulating, ideologically | | | | radical parties in the Movement of the civil rights they |
| you direct not, also succeeding at the same time to | | | | were rapid in to summon to them the saxophonist as |
| recover important figures of that season, giving them a | | | | musical spokesman. Same Coltrane to the idea doesn't |
| correct position (is worth on all the examples of Frank | | | | appear enthusiastic, as it clearly enough shows his |
| Kofsky and Amiri Baraka, today a little considered, in | | | | interview to Kofsky, where he prefers to deepen his |
| kind the first one). | | | | musical explanations with a more general meaning |
| Camal quotes them, he criticizes them. I mark that their | | | | regarding the human condition. As it underlines Craig |
| ideas "strong" on the jazz they maintain intact their | | | | Werner, Coltrane and Malcom X they saw both their |
| charm, to distance of years. | | | | transformed message and used for justifying the |
| The studies on the jazz, more and more serious and | | | | pursuit of more radical objectives inside the Movement, |
| philologically correct, you are receiving spaces ever | | | | independently from the fact that they wanted you |
| had before. There are authors that bring forth | | | | was used and interpreted their job in such way or no. |
| innovative thesis and different readings from those | | | | F.B.: you think there is a connection among the New it |
| usual, for instance the wise man Paul's Gilroy Black | | | | damages American and the jazz? And of what type? |
| Atlantic, teacher of Black studies to the university of | | | | J.C.: And' an ample question too much for a rapid |
| Yale, that offers a reading that has the breath of the | | | | answer. I have never reasoned on the connection |
| coolness historical-political-geographical. | | | | among New Left and music, even if it seems an |
| From the correspondence by e-mail this interview was | | | | interesting matter to develop. |
| born, that besides opinions not discounted on Coltrane | | | | F.B.: you want to make a brief list of political passages |
| and Sonny Rollins, it furnishes a list at the end - also it | | | | that in the history of the jazz you consider |
| everything anything else other than banal - of music | | | | fundamental and to give apiece us a brief comment? |
| jazz "politics." | | | | J.C.: You my first choice is rather obvious: We insist! |
| Frank Bergoglio: In your pages on the jazz and the | | | | Freedom now Suite (Candid 1961). This recording |
| movement for the civil rights, or when you speak of | | | | exemplifies for many different aspects as the music |
| the jazz of the so-called one "black nationalism", it is | | | | you can politically be used. In first place it is an example |
| frequent to find the name and the work of Frank | | | | of artists of color that you use their art to regain the |
| Kofsky. Which opinion have you matured of his job | | | | authority and the control on his own history and on his |
| after having studied him to fund? Do you think that it | | | | narration storiografica. The Suite of Roach follows the |
| introduced too ideology in relationship to the treated | | | | story of the population of color of African descent is in |
| matters or that, contrarily, the period both well | | | | the United States that in Africa, departing from the |
| described in the writings of Kofsky and Amiri Baraka? | | | | experience of the slavery, continuing with the |
| Jerome Camal: Kofsky is an interesting character. | | | | declaration of emancipation, to end with the struggle |
| Indeed ideology envelops its writings in so mighty way | | | | for right peers in America as in Africa. Facing the |
| to make more its reasonings object objections. An | | | | matter from this point of view is stimulating to observe, |
| example of this attitude is its interview to Coltrane in | | | | as they makes Scott Saul and Ingrid Monson, that the |
| which him test, without succeeding us to make to | | | | order of the sections of the Suite, separate among |
| guarantee from Coltrane its political ideas. | | | | them, you has been changed in comparison to the |
| Nevertheless, some points of its discourse are faced in | | | | ideas of departure of Roach and Oscar Brown Jr. |
| interesting way and they gather meaningful aspects: | | | | Originally the suite foresaw the departure with the |
| the most effective example is the description of the | | | | African section before moving to the experience of |
| economic conditions in which you have to work the | | | | the slavery and to pass to the emancipation. to Put the |
| black musicians. His book Black Nationalism in Music, is | | | | slavery to the beginning serves to strongly take root |
| probably at the end more profit if read as a primary | | | | the African-American history to the experience of the |
| source, which the ideology that informs a part of the | | | | slavery. To depart with Africa would have |
| musicians of the Avant Garde reflects. | | | | emphasized the African inheritance of the |
| F.B: Amiri Baraka is more sociologist in the analyses, is | | | | African-American culture instead. In beaten second the |
| Kofsky a researcher anymore "political" of the jazz... I | | | | Freedom now Suite represents well also what Gilroy it |
| think that its intention was to put its studies the method | | | | defines "black atlantic". All Africa melts the American |
| of Marxist analysis into practice, doesn't it seem you? | | | | jazz with the Cuban music and the African |
| J.C.: I Arrange, but I think that we should think to both | | | | percussions: it deals with an excellent example of the |
| as about two researchers moved by strong political | | | | continuous cultural exchange that is had among |
| motivations. And' past a beautiful po' of time from my | | | | African people, people of the Caribbean, wide also in |
| reading of "Blues People", but, as memory, Baraka | | | | Europe and, naturally, to the United States. From last it |
| seems me it emphasized the African-American culture | | | | needs to remember that the Suite is after all a great |
| as the product and the reaction towards the slavery | | | | moment of music, in which you/they can be seen used |
| and in equal time as connection to Africa. The matters | | | | advanced techniques of composition. Max Roach uses |
| of Baraka are based on a vision "of class", probably | | | | a 5/4, perhaps an answer to the success of Take |
| influenced from the Marxism and to lines bordering with | | | | Five, but more disposition and brave of that of |
| the existentialism. For him the forms of jazz and blues | | | | Brubeck. The tone of the breaths, perfectly in the |
| that have had more commercial success they have | | | | "fourth" in Driva men is interesting and anticipates the |
| been corrupt from the white mainstream. Reading him | | | | times. The photo of cover that shows some students |
| does him the idea that he thinks that assimilation is a | | | | during a sit-in to a counter of a cafeteria it is |
| form of corruption; what the bebop is a reaffirmation | | | | provocative and the notes of cover of Nat Hentoff |
| of the inheritance of the black roots in music and a | | | | they are also candid and fresh to the actual reading. |
| taking of distance from the white hegemony that was | | | | The second example is surely less known. In fact if |
| consolidated during the Swing Era. Many groups and | | | | you has been written a lot on the Freedom Suite of |
| artists of the movement coagulated him around the | | | | Sonny Rollins, I would aim the attention at a 1956 |
| African-American arts, the reasonings of Baraka they | | | | recording, The house The live in, performed for the |
| resounded. Of other song the writer of color Ralph | | | | Prestige. It deals with a passage hard enough |
| Ellison was in strong disagreement with the theses of | | | | conventional bop, but it is also a big beautiful example |
| Baraka and looked at the blues as to a form of | | | | of signifying in music. At the end of the piece Rollins |
| celebration of the results reached by the | | | | inserts as tail the theme of Lift every voice and sing. |
| African-American art. In the demonstrations as the | | | | That spiritual has become subsequently a kind of non |
| blues, where Baraka has the tendency to see the | | | | official hymn for the population of color. In the notes of |
| people of color as victims, Ellison underlines the strong | | | | cover of the cd-playpen of the Prestige, container |
| sense of representation and affiliation instead of it. | | | | everything how much recorded, he explains that the |
| F.B.: Which opinion you are you formed on the course | | | | saxophonist appreciated the social meaning of the text |
| to assign to the job of Coltrane? Before you quoted | | | | written by Robinson and wanted to strengthen his/her |
| one famous interview of his, and in that as in others, | | | | words ending the song with Lift every voice and sing. |
| the timidity of the saxophonist emerges, always of | | | | He perhaps wanted also to answer to the recent |
| few words, that it brings to reserved answers, humble | | | | recording of that song performed by Frank Sinatra. In |
| and at the end ambiguous in comparison to the course | | | | every case it is interesting to notice that this is the only |
| of the legacy coltraniano. | | | | song of that session that has not immediately been |
| J.C.: I Think that the case of Coltrane to treat we need | | | | realized by the Prestige, immediately after the |
| to consider his/her music from two separated visual | | | | recording. I have not made a lot of searches on this |
| angles. Primo: which type of political message (if it is | | | | disk, but I think both too often ignored, today. If then we |
| one of them) it foresaw Coltrane for his music? | | | | want a complete list of passages we should include at |
| According to: which done mean political you has been | | | | least the Haitian fight song and Fable of Faubus of |
| tied up to his music to back, from the most different | | | | Mingus and Freedom rider of Art Blakey, John's |
| listeners? In other words, I believe there is a difference | | | | Coltrane Alabama, the whole apparition of Archie |
| among as Coltrane it conceived and he saw his music | | | | Shepp to the festival jazz of Newport and |
| and the way in which it has been recepita and | | | | Appointment in Ghana of Jackie Mclean. There is then |
| interpreted. Premised this, I see a Coltrane that "it uses" | | | | Strange Fruit of Billie Holiday, but the list would be very |
| his music to communicate a message of integration | | | | long... |
| and universality. I like to show up a parallel among his | | | | |