How America Invented Rock and Roll (And What That Teaches Us Today) Written for and Presented on Underground Media Productions January 14Th, 2021
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
How America Invented Rock and Roll (And What That Teaches Us Today) Written for and Presented on Underground Media Productions January 14th, 2021 - Speaker: Larry Kuperman Why Am I Here Tonight? (Or Why Is This Night Different from All Other Nights?) Before I begin my presentation, I would like to thank Acacia Dietz for hosting this and to salute Jeff Schoep for making this possible. Jeff and I are so different and yet I will always value his friendship and empathy and view him as a living symbol of redemption, proof that America is about second chances. Okay, now onto the immediate reason that I am speaking tonight. On January 6th, 2021 we all watched our American Capitol be defaced. With all the terrible events of that day, the most striking images were of my fellow Americans wearing on their shirts “Camp Auschwitz” and “6 Million Weren’t Enough.” I was so angry, so enraged that I wanted to….teach them that their hatred was misplaced and based in part on ignorance of our shared history. Yes, I know that they hate me, hate my family, hate my children. They view all things made by people like me as tainted, unclean, and defiling the purity that they long for. I wonder if they knew that included in the things made by “mud people” like me is that most American form of music, Rock and Roll. This is the story of how that came about. Before I tell you that story, I’d like to ask that you think about, visualize, a map of the world. Look at how small the Middle East is. Now zoom in even closer and look at Israel. See that little dot that is Jerusalem? That is place that the Arabs call Al-Quds, the Holy One. Ask yourself by what coincidence this place, this tiny bit of land, brought forth Moses, Jesus, and Muhammed. And you’ll have to listen to the end to have that question answered. Our American Story The history of Black and Jews in America goes back a lot further than people realize. In 1619, the San Juan Bautista1, a Portuguese ship, left Angola in Africa to cross the Middle Passage to the New World with 350 slaves on board. By the time the ship docked at Veracruz, Mexico on August 30th, only 147 remained alive and on board. Fifty had been taken by English pirates aboard the ship the White Lion and would be exchanged for food and supplies at the English colony of Point Comfort in Virginia. 1 1619 in America: 400 years ago, Africans arrived in Virginia (usatoday.com) A year after the arrival of the first Africans in America, the Pilgrims would arrive on board the Mayflower. Not to belabor the point but let’s remember who was here first. The Pilgrims were among a number of groups who came to America seeking the freedom to worship as they saw fit. Among the other groups that would follow were Jews fleeing the Inquisition. Europe was not a hospitable place for Jews. In fact, the word “ghetto” originally referred to a specific place to that section of Venice where Jews were segregated.2 But it was generally a place where Jews could survive. Jews had lived peacefully in Spain and Portugal for hundreds of years. Beginning in 1492, under royal edicts, both Jews and Muslims were told that they must either convert to Christianity or leave. Even if they chose to stay, they were called Marranos and were under suspicion. Most Jews accepted conversion, sometime practicing Jewish rites in secret. Others fled. Holland, which was a Spanish colony, was one destination. Brazil, that was originally under Dutch authority, was another. Although it has since been renamed the Rua dos Judeus (Street of the Jews) in Recife, Brazil was the site of the Kahal Zur Israel Synagogue, built in 1636. South America was not to be the final destination. Joachim Gans, born in Prague, Bohemia, was recruited by Sir Walter Raleigh as a mining expert. He had helped develop a new process for the smelting of copper. He arrived in America in 1585, settling in the Virginia territory. He didn’t stay long, returning to England in 1586. But he was the first. 2 Venetian Ghetto - Wikipedia In 1654, Jacob Barsimson, an agent of the Dutch Jewish community arrives at the Dutch colony of New Amsterdam, to make ready. Later that same year a group of 23 Jews from Recife in Brazil flee the Portuguese aboard the Sainte Catherine. Barsimson meets them. But they are not welcomed. Dutch Governor Peter Stuyvesant called them “the deceitful race, the hateful enemies and blasphemers of the name of Christ…” and has them thrown in prison. But he has made a mistake. His employer, the Dutch West India Company, has Jewish investors who order him to “let my people go.” I am paraphrasing, but you get the idea. Jews have arrived in what would become the United States 120 years before the Declaration of Independence. I have spoken about this before. Jews, in particular Haym Salomon, supported the American Revolution as this was our home. Our Un-Civil War Slavery spread throughout the Americas. The insidious practice was not confined to the British or to the colonies that would become the United States. The Portuguese, the Spanish, the Dutch, the Danish, and the French all were involved. They established outposts on the African coast, bought enslaved people from local leaders, and transported them to Europe and the Western Hemisphere with little regard for human life. It is estimated that over 12 million Africans were taken from their homes, with 1.2 to 2.4 million dying during the passage and millions more dying in what were called “seasoning camps.”3 It would be great if I could say that Jews did not participate in the slave trade, but that wouldn’t be true. Also untrue is the myth that Jews dominated the trade. By 3 Atlantic slave trade - Wikipedia and large Jews were as guilty, no more and no less, as other people of European descent. In the years after the Revolution, the American city with the largest Jewish population was Charleston, South Carolina. The charter of that fair city guaranteed freedom of expression to “Jews, heathens, and dissenters.“ Jews were accepted in a way that they had not been in Europe. And outside of the ghetto life, they began to mingle with their neighbors. Some members of Congregation Beth Elohim began to notice that the services attended by their Christian neighbors were in English. And were shorter. And had organ music! They petitioned the congregation to adopt these traits. When they were rejected, they formed their own congregation, the Reform Society of Israelites and Reform Judaism was born. Now bear in mind that South Carolina was in that part of the country where slavery was prevalent. We don’t have evidence of it, but it is logical that in some households the Passover Seder meal, the Jewish celebration of the flight from slavery in the land of Egypt, was served by African slaves. Again, there is a myth that Jews were particularly engaged in the slave trade. There are meticulous records of the sale and purchase of slaves and Jewish owners were in about the same proportion as non-Jewish.4 When the Civil War broke out Jews fought on both sides. About 12,000 Jews in all were engaged in the war, with three-fourths (about 9000) fighting for the Union. The remainder fought for the Confederacy. Ft. Myers, Florida, is named after Abraham Myers, the quartermaster general for the South5. Judah P. Benjamin served as first the Secretary of War and then the Secretary of State for the Confederacy. After the war he would flee the United States.6 While I have said that Jews were, by and large, accepted in America, that was not always the case. In 1862, Union Major-General Ulysses S. Grant issued General Order No. 11 expelling all Jews from his district: Tennessee, Mississippi, and Kentucky. President Lincoln would countermand that order in 1863. 4 Project MUSE - Jews, Slaves, and the Slave Trade: Setting the Record Straight (review) (jhu.edu) 5 QM General Abraham C Myers Story – The Virtual Museum of Southwest Florida Jewish History (jewishhistorysouthwestflorida.org) 6 Judah P. Benjamin - Wikipedia What About the Music? The point so far is to set the stage that Blacks and Jews were here in America from the very earliest days and that we had shed our blood to gain the freedoms that we enjoy today. But let’s get to the music. In the city of New Orleans there is a park named after Louis Armstrong and in this park there is place called Congo Square. The French slave- owners in the days before the Civil War allowed the slaves to meet there, giving them freedom from their labors. They celebrated by playing their traditional music and doing their traditional dances. Soon Europeans began coming to the park to watch and listen. A thing happened then. The slaves began to play African songs on the musical instruments of the Europeans and to mix the two styles of music. This gave rise to the New Orleans Second Line and to American Jazz. Early performers who helped popularize this style of music included Mahalia Jackson, Jelly Roll Morton and of course, Louis Armstrong. Things were changing for American Jews as well. The first Jewish settlers came from Spain and Portugal, the Sephardim. They were soon joined by Western European Jews from Holland, France and Germany.