Walking to the Beat of Your Own Drummer

 Choosing a college was difficult.  I had five choices.  They were Appalachian State University, East Carolina University, North Carolina State University, the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.  The purpose of the state university system is to offer affordable quality education.  Unlike Ivy League schools, which earn from out-of-state tuition, colleges and universities within the state system are there for a specific reason.  When I chose Chapel Hill, there was no doubt in my mind it was the best school.  I didn't necessarily want to go there, but I felt like if I was offered the opportunity, I should respect and take it.  In retrospect and at the urging of my Professor uncle, Dr. Peter Reichle, perhaps Appalachian State could have been a better choice.  I majored in music for lack of a better choice.  I did not want to become a music teacher, but like many others, I completed the Bachelor of Music Education degree as a backup.  Graduating from UNC was the single most difficult thing I ever did.  On graduation day I had to look in the program to see if my name was there.  I nearly failed Sight Singing ll under Dr. Ann M Woodward, the wife of noted musicologist Dr. Howard E. Smither.  My final exam score was a 59, and she gave me the extra point to allow me to graduate.  I spent no time working on the assignment, because it was my last semester.  We were expected to sight sing the opening to Igor Stravinsky's "The Rite of Spring" in seven clefs with moveable do.  I could not do it, although I was a good sight reader and aced the piano proficiency test.  I could read and sing pitches and intervals, but it didn't make sense to me to have to remember syllables to go with the pitches.  It is a different mental process, and it takes a lot of effort.  Fixed do made more sense to me.  I was able to play all of my scales four octaves, both major and minor keys.  The piano faculty was impressed, because I was a trumpet major.  You had to harmonize a few melodies at sight and then transpose them to a different key.  This process is related to jazz, and while that was not the chosen topic of this blog entry, it would be good upon which to expound.  Lately as I have been trying to play the piano more, I am becoming more aware of the difference between a jazz education and a traditional one.  My undergraduate degree at UNC-Chapel Hill was traditional, so I satisfied all the requirements of a European-based university music degree.  That meant part writing in the style of J.S. Bach, counterpoint of different centuries, orchestration, music history and the rest.  It is a bear, and my interest in jazz got me through it.  You can be musical and be learned.  Many academics in music are not musical at all and don't have talent.  There is enough substance to music theory to keep you occupied.  If anyone wants to listen to you play or hear one of your tunes is a different story.  American jazz musicians for the most part were not traditionally trained.  The Creoles were different, and their European/African mix allowed them to attend institutions of higher learning.  It was not until Jim Crow laws were enacted in Louisiana that Creoles lost their once white status and became lowly slaves.  Classically trained musicians playing in orchestras and opera houses turned to jazz as a viable vocation.  The disparity or battle between jazz and classical music never has waned, and like the return of Trump versus Biden, it is a mainstay go to issue that never will go away.  There is a lot to debate.  In the position I find myself, the difference between the jazz vernacular and classical music is stark.  While the Fayetteville Symphony Orchestra and the military bands bridge this gap well, the difference is most obvious at the lower levels of music proficiency.  The place to learn less formal music, popular music, folk, jazz, or gospel would be in the black churches.  Easily this designation could suffice for the difference.  I have been interested in the history of the Black Church for this reason, and freely I admit I am ignorant.  There only are a few documentaries on PBS and Youtube.  Less than a week ago in in the throes of Black History Month, I stumbled upon Louis Gates' offering.  I did not have a fond opinion of his show researching celebrity bloodlines on PBS.  He seemed like an ordinary talk show host without much knowledge.  His newest offering, a four episode two hour long history of the Black Church was exactly what I was missing in my research of jazz history.  I had finished my study of Early Jass, and necessarily was moving to American Popular Music.  this nebulous and oft cited entity, the Black Church, has not been documented well enough.  In light of the recent Woke movement it is understandable.  White America has not interest in the roots of American Popular Music and the exploitation of black musicians.  Best to stay in your own neighborhood, church, or community.  When you begin trying to influence the American mainstream is when assassinations begin.  Unfortunately America was racist enough not to allow this proliferation of black Civil Rights.  We swept it under the rug, and recently with the Black Lives Matter movement it has erupted again.  As it turns out the Black Church is a metaphor for black Civil Rights.  It is a metaphor for survival of the black race in America.  When the stakes are this high, then the content of this movement is valid, relevant, and important to document and sustain.  I find myself squarely in the middle of this racial tug of war.  I grew up in the Episcopal Church playing the trumpet at Christmas and Easter and engaging in "high" church.  The Eucharist was followed in our prayer book, and the service was formal.  As I have matured, grown, and aged musically as a human being playing jazz and American popular music, it is difficult to adopt this aged approach as my source of worship.  It would seem there are other viable alternatives for worship embracing more modern kinds of music.  Of course this is true, because traditional learned church quickly is becoming extinct in America.  All denominations are having difficulty attracting and keeping members.  I would say with the advent of the interactivity of the internet and its accompanying technology, traditional church has become passe.  It is reasonable that a new generation of younger Americans seek more modern and familiar surroundings in their place of worship.  This includes "Shobiz," a term that always has denoted the glamour and pageantry of Hollywood-based television, film, and music television.  Rock 'n' Roll would be another metaphor for this style of worship.  The mixing of American Popular Music and church is new to me, but I don't feel a problem with it.  My interest in traditional jazz and the origins of the Hammond organ lead me to the Black Church, where openly they choose this instrument as their major voice.  The major difference between traditional European-based music is its source on paper.  Because audio recording was not invented until the 1920's, written manuscript was the only choice for documenting and preserving music.  When I sit down and read out of a songbook, like I have been doing for the first time recently, the disparity between the two processes is stark.  Those written notes on the staff do purvey some of the intent of the music, and certainly expressive markings for dynamics and phrasing help.  What the written music does not convey is sound.  What audible sounds are you trying to make, and what is the human process for creating these sounds?  Jazz music bypasses written music and jumps to the chase.  It mostly is an aural tradition, one that is passed on by mouth through human beings.  No one can dispute the musical artistry of Louis Armstrong, although shallow and discriminatory bigots may call him an unpleasant-looking Negro.  Some will say he is unrefined and gross, the same way American bigots characterized the freed slaves.  African blood and culture is different than European influenced America, and it is what has made America rich, unique, and artistic.  The quest of the black race to survive and flourish in America is our most viable identity.  Addressing the effects of slavery are necessary for an understanding of the history of America and who we are as a people.  While as a nation since the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950's and 1960's, we have shuttered that unpleasant history.  Are we better for it?  It was Donald Trump and the Far Right who reignited this bigotry.  It is a broken record.  The red state MAGA ads are appearing on television now, and they are a sickening concoction of formula, manipulation, and lies.  They no longer are relevant, and they will fail to sway any voter.  The assembled cast of gruesome characters are a tepid lot of figure heads chosen by and driven by selfish, corrupt, and almost fascist Political Action Committees.  Vladimir Putin himself admonished Donald Trump for his high crimes and misdemeanors, and suggested Joe Biden should be reelected in 2024.  Trumps egocentric tirade to shield himself from prosecution by being reelected is a huge, unwanted, detrital siege of American consciousness.  For America to survive, regroup, and begin to develop a new identity with solidarity, Donald Trump should wane in presence.