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THE MAGAZINE OF THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR INTERPRETATION NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2019 LegacyVOLUME 30, NUMBER 6 INTERPRETING MUSIC A OKPOP’s Music Gallery explores musical connections. See the story on page 12. Contents © hsd FEATURES 6 Interpreting an American Soundscape Legacy Rolando Herts November/December 2019 12 OKPOP: Musical Connections in a Crossroad of Volume 30, Number 6 Creativity Emily Friesen, Christine Echtner Editor Paul Caputo 15 The Song of a Nation 15 Samara Stirneman Associate Editors Parker McMullen-Bushman 18 The Art and Artifact of Music in Cultural Margo Carlock Interpretation William Bevil Eva Paleczny, Jake Paleczny Jose Chavez 21 The Beat Goes On Copy Editor Elizabeth Meyers Richard Thorum 24 Following the Fiddler Home Letters to the Editor Legacy welcomes your input. Send William Ray 21 letters to [email protected] or 230 26 Cherry Street, Fort Collins, CO 80521. Interpreting Music Through Confusion Legacy reserves the right to edit letters. james allen, Jr. Submit a Story Idea E-mail queries to NAI Deputy Director DEPARTMENTS Paul Caputo at [email protected]. 2 First Impressions: Algonquin Loggers Day, Ontario Find information about upcoming themes Parks at www.interpnet.com. 4 Editor’s Desk: The Language of Music, Paul Caputo Subscriptions: $30 U.S./$40 international. Legacy magazine is published bimonthly. 30 Justice for All: Making Music in a Messed Up World, Copyright ©2019 NAI. ISSN 10523774. Larry Beck 24 34 On Interpretation: The National Park Service and American Engagement with History, W. Maclane Hull, John Garrison Marks ON THE COVER 36 Commentary: A New Perspective to Inclusive Teaching, Keith Johnson, “Prince of Legacy is published by the National Association for the Delta Blues,” performs Interpretation. Electronic distribution furnished by Yvonne Schramm EBSCO Publishing/EBSCOhost, a registered trademark at a Delta State University of EBSCO Publishing. 38 Perspective: Just Words, Bob Carter event in Cleveland, 40 From the President: We Stand on the Shoulders of Mississippi. LEGACY 1 Giants, Jay Miller Interpreting an Performance at a Mississippi Delta Blues Bar in Rio American Soundscape de Janeiro, Brazil. MISSISSIPPI: “THE BIRTHPLACE OF AMERICA’S MUSIC” Come to Mississippi University-Community-Engaged the Mississippi Delta region, which is The birthplace of the blues. Soundscape Interpretation known worldwide as the “Birthplace Come on Music heritage in Mississippi carries of the Blues.” To the birthplace of the blues. a legendary mystique that is well While this music heritage You see, we talkin’ about a blues land suited to interpretive storytelling. interpretation may be crafted with Home of that hoochie coochie man! In-the-know locals are proud to a hint of healthy creative license, share how Mississippi has earned the stories point to the importance —“Come to Mississippi” its claim to fame as “The Birthplace of pride of place and economic Keith Johnson, of America’s Music.” Invoking their opportunity. This is especially so in Prince of the Delta Blues, 2018 Southern storytelling authority, they the Mississippi Delta, proudly known will tell you that no other state has as the “Birthplace of the Blues” and produced such a high percentage problematically labelled as the of internationally known, world- poorest region in the poorest state in class musicians. They will tell you the United States. that Mississippi has produced more Since 2000, The Delta Center for Grammy Award-winning artists Culture and Learning at Delta State than any state in the country. They University has forged local, national, will go on to say that this is why the and international collaborations first Grammy Museum outside of to create and facilitate various Los Angeles was built at Delta State interpretation programs that tell ROLANDO HERTS University in Cleveland, the heart of Mississippi Delta stories. As part 6 NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2019 of the university’s commitment to other socio-cultural contradictions They become even clearer when address longstanding educational, that capture the essence of our shared the Mississippi Delta is contrasted social, economic, and cultural American and human experience. with its geographic neighbor, the challenges in the region, The Delta Through programs like the Mississippi Hills, another storied Center’s programs create safe International Conference on the music heritage soundscape widely spaces for historically marginalized Blues and the Most Southern Place on known as the birthplace of Elvis. communities to take pride in sharing Earth workshops for K–12 educators, Given the diverse audiences that visit and interpreting their own stories. The Delta Center immerses residents The Delta Center, interpreting with This includes blues, a musical art and visitors in experiences that a universal language clarifies the form transplanted from Africa illuminate how Mississippi people, contradictions and, ultimately, clears through the transatlantic slave trade places, and culture crafted the pathways to shared understanding. to the cotton producing soils of blues and other musical genres. I This universal language is music. Mississippi. Enslaved Africans forced presented on The Delta Center’s to chop and pick cotton under cruel, place-based experiential learning Mississippi Delta and Hills dehumanizing conditions channeled projects at NAI’s 2019 International Soundscapes in Contrast their oppression into musical Conference in Brazil. The conference The Mississippi Delta and Mississippi expression, crying out to be heard, theme, “Building Interpretive Hills regions are two distinct to be liberated—work songs, field Alliances for Collective Impact,” soundscapes: interpretive, narrative- hollers, and spirituals that became offered an ideal platform for sharing rich destination regions under the blues. how our university-community- constant authorship processes that engaged interpretation work fosters connect music, place, and identity Don’t the Delta look lonesome conversations about race relations, with past and present socio-cultural When that evening sun go down? social justice, cultural representation, dynamics. Both regions represent Don’t this Delta look lonesome and other challenging topics through historical and cultural intersections When that evenin’ sun goes down? Mississippi’s music heritage. of the various music genres that Well, you been lookin’ for your baby In doing this work, we invariably Mississippians have crafted. They Don’t know where she could be found are confronted with the challenge of are the places where blues, country, —“Mississippi Blues” interpreting a host of socio-cultural gospel, rock ‘n’ roll, and soul have William Brown, 1942 contradictions that reflect broader been innovated and interpreted American life: wealth and poverty, by musicians, scholars, and local Blues songs tell the collective story of black and white, urban and rural, institutions, collectively telling African Americans’ ongoing struggle power and powerless, and sacred to live through four centuries of and secular. These contradictions oppression and accrued disadvantage. are alarmingly ever present in A Chicago blues band performs at African Americans have lived the Mississippi Delta soundscape. Mississippi Delta Blues Fest in Brazil. through slavery, sharecropping, the Jim Crow era, the Great Migration, mass incarceration, economic terrorism, and other institutionalized conditions driven by racism and white supremacy. Blues music tells this story. It embodies the hopelessness of surviving at the lower physiological and safety levels of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, as well as the hope of attaining higher levels of love, esteem, and self-actualization. Blues music is the root of all American music genres. These genres—including country, gospel, rock ‘n’ roll, and soul—are encoded with blues’ paradox of hope and hopelessness. As the “Birthplace of America’s Music,” Mississippi is a collection of regional soundscapes where one can hear, feel, and bear witness to hope and hopelessness and LEGACY 7 the complex, multifaceted story of hills—but also due to complex socio- Robert Johnson, the “King of the America. cultural relationships that influenced Delta Blues.” Though currently no Both the Mississippi Delta and musical styles. These contrasts longer in operation, the sharecropper Mississippi Hills are Congressionally can and do serve as a provocative shack that once housed Po’ Monkey’s designated National Heritage Areas, interpretation tool for music heritage Lounge, the world renowned last rural places recognized by the National storytellers. juke joint in the U.S., still stands at the Park Service where historic, cultural, Mississippi writers like William edge of a Delta cotton field. and natural resources combine to Faulkner, Tennessee Williams, and Such Delta music heritage sites form nationally important, lived-in Richard Wright have characterized coalesce with raw emotional sounds landscapes. National Heritage Areas the Delta historically as a morally from souls long gone and resonate are committed to building regional relaxed cotton kingdom ruled with past and present race relations capacity to provide authentic cultural by wealthy white aristocrats who and chronic poverty. The sites and heritage tourism experiences by benefited from the free labor of stories often intersect with the Great engaging local communities in African Americans. The Delta still Migration, which took the blues interpreting and telling their stories. features vestiges of plantation life to Chicago