C.B. Davis, PHD: Talking with Beethoven (and Dr. Ira Progoff)

C.B. Davis, PHD: Talking with Beethoven (and Dr. Ira Progoff)

Jazz Profiling in Georgia

Jazz Profiling in Georgia

When I was a professor at the University of Georgia in Athens, I used to hang out in a Borders that had a decent CD department with a better-than-usual Jazz section. I wondered about the jazz buyer and one day, I ran into him.  After chatting a little about music, I told him I was a jazz musician and where he could hear me play. Then I asked him about sales.

    “Jazz doesn’t sell or we would have more of it.” He said, “When I’m gone you can watch it dwindle to nothing.”

     “I knew there was intelligence behind this stock.” I said, “So, what does sell? Is it that instrumental RnB they call smooth jazz?”

    “It’s worse than that.” he said, then gestured toward the holiday crowd in the store. “It’s busy today, we might actually sell some jazz. You see, look, there’s a rarity. A woman in the jazz section!”

     We both looked at the 30-something, casually-dressed woman in the first aisle of jazz. She seemed to be pensively looking for something.  I was about to walk over and observe her more closely, but the jazz buyer held me back.

     “I’ll bet I can guess what she’s looking for.” said the buyer.

       “Huh? Do you know that customer?”

    “Nope. Never even seen her in here. But she’s going to buy either Harry Connick Junior or Diana Krall. How much do you want to bet that I’m wrong?”said the buyer.

     “No thanks, I don’t gamble. But you should have to pick only one, so which is it?”

     “You try. What do you think she will buy?”asked the buyer.

     “Well, your guesses are good, but maybe Norah Jones. Is she in the jazz section?.” I asked.

     “No” he said, “she’s too popular. No one could find her if she were here.”

     I laughed and he gestured.

     “Look.” said the buyer with a smile. I turned and saw the woman turn the corner at the end of the aisle. I could clearly see that she was holding a CD by the New Orleans crooner, Harry Connick Junior. The buyer then noticed another customer in the jazz section.

      “OK, check this out. Perfect. A professional in his 50s …. he might be more of a challenge,” said the jazz buyer, who had inhaled a sandwich.

   I looked at the older guy in the suit, thumbing through CDs.  “You young people don’t gauge the age of your elders very well. I’d say he was in his 60s.”

    “Good, then it should be easy for you. Don’t deliberate too much. Take a quick guess.”

     “Ok, just instinctively I would guess Brubeck. “

    “You are correct,” said the jazz buyer guy, now devouring an apple. I turned to look at the man in the jazz section. He had yet to make his choice.

     “What do you mean I’m correct? He hasn’t made his choice yet!”

     “I said,” he said, “that I could tell you what everyone would pick, and you are correct. That’s what he’s going to pick. You see him there at the B’s?

     “Well no actually, that I can’t see, but go on.”

     “Well he’s looking at that CD trying to remember whether he has it or not.” I asked. “Why don’t you help him? “

     The jazz buyer said, “If I asked him the logical, pertinent questions, I might sound patronizing.”

   “What do you mean?”

     “Are you looking for “Take Five? Do you have “Time Further Out?”

     “Oh, I see.” I said.

The buyer squinted and asked, “How did you know he would pick Brubeck?”

     “Well, the Quartet was very popular around the time that guy was in college.” I said, thinking that I knew my own reasoning.

     “Why not the Modern Jazz Quartet? They were also popular with college kids in the 50s, as was Dizzy Gillespie.”

     “Oh, I see what you’re getting at. He might have been a hipster back then.”

     The jazz buyer, who was in his late twenties, just looked at me as if I had just spoken in a foreign language.

     “Oh,” I said, “hipster means something else now.”

     “No. Well yes, but no.” said the buyer. “Your instinct told you something I have observed to be almost invariably true.”

     “Oh! You mean how white people buy jazz by white artists. Isn’t that an unfair generalization?”

      “No” he said. “Not here anyway. Where are you from?”

      “Northern California.”

     “Things might be different there, but probably not. You buy black artists because you are an aficionado….an actual jazz musician.”

    The buyer paused as he watched a young man approach the older one who was looking at Brubeck CDs.

     “This is a lot of jazz traffic even at Christmas rush. He must be the old guy’s grandson or something. “

     “I don’t think so,” I said, “See. The old man doesn’t know who the kid is.” I continued with my analysis. “This kid is a band geek. He’s going to want something like Maynard Fergusson or Stan Kenton. No, he’s too young for those …maybe Wynton Marsalis or Joshua Redman?”

     “I see how you snuck two black artists in there. But no. He’s a hipster band geek.  He’s going to like some dreamy boring thing that doesn’t swing. “

      “Hipster band geek might be into Dave Douglas?  He can be dreamy and not swing.”

      “Whoever it is, it will be a white artist.” Said the buyer.

     “Why couldn’t it be that they just that they like those particular musicians?” I suggested.

     The buyer shook his head. “No. It’s uncannily invariable.”

      “Ok. What about black customers? “I asked.

     The jazz buyer shrugged and said, “We don’t get many. They are much less predictable though. Look, there’s a black lady in the classical section now.”

     Another white man, between the ages of the previous two was now walking into the jazz section. He was a clean but ungroomed middle-aged hippie.

     “What about this guy,” I said, “He looks like a classic rock person to me, so in jazz he likes probably something funky or good old-fashioned fusion. Maybe smooth jazz. But he might buy black artists, don’t you think?”

     The jazz buyer sipped on his drink and said, “Nope.  But I will admit he is a more difficult subject. would be thinking guitarists.”

     “Is he a Pat Metheny or a John McLaughlin?” I said. “No…wait…is Jeff Beck in the jazz section?”

     “Yes, but only because I put him there.” Said the buyer. “Look, he’s in the F’s.”

      We both searched our brains for guitarists whose surnames began with an “F”. We can rule out Tal Farlow, if you even have any,”

     “Nope.” Said the buyer.

     “Hay no Feliciano…. Robben Ford? Fripp? Frith? I know…. Bill Frissell.”

     Was I correct? No. But he did pick up the latest by Bela Fleck, the sole jazz banjoist on earth, also a white guy.

     “I find this whole demonstration disturbing.” I said. “At least you sold some jazz.”

     The buyer sighed and said “Jazz doesn’t sell well because white people only buy white jazz artists, and black artists are dominant in jazz. The black jazz artists outnumber the white 20 to 1. The white customers outnumber the black by about the same ratio.”

     From then on, every time I went into that Borders I would play the “guess what people will buy” game, mostly in the jazz section.  I confirmed the buyer’s observations that any white person who ventured into the jazz section seemed only to buy the work of white artists. None of these people think of themselves as racists. They like jazz and these just happen to be their favorite artists, every one of them white.

     I probably could not tell a white musician from a black one in a blindfold test unless I recognized a known player, which I probably would. I can tell Lester Young from the white players who followed his style like Getz, Zoot, Desmond etc. but not because those guys sound “white.”  But I do have an idea of what “sounding white” means.  I discovered this while talking to some summer session students the morning after Ray Charles died.

     “Do you know what popular music would sound like if it weren’t for Ray Charles?” The students stared blankly at me as if I wanted an answer. Not only was this a Script Analysis class, but it was early for Drama majors.

      “It would sound…. white.” I said, and wondered almost immediately if that was appropriate.

     One of the students asked, “What do you mean? What does white sound like?”

     I shook my head and said, “I’m sorry. That just came out. It’s not a responsible thing for a historian to say. But as a jazz musician, between jazz musicians, it’s something unspoken but generally understood. “

     This was followed by silence until I said, “Ok, let’s make this simple. Most country music sounds white, but not all of it. It’s 2 beat like polka. Any style can sound white, though. You must have heard the Beach Boys, right? They were from my time but have stood the test because of their creativity and unique sound. But you would not mistake them for a black group, would you?”

     More silence. The oldest student then asked, sarcastically, “What about the Carpenters? They sound white, and they happened way after Ray Charles.”

      “Well, we evolved from apes and there are still apes.” I said, and immediately wondered if that was going to get a prickly reaction. Somehow, I made a teaching moment out of it and talked about cultural evolution being more mercurial than biological evolution.

     Later that day I was standing in line for coffee. I looked down at the newspaper headlines. Ray Charles caught barely a moment’s coverage when he died right in the middle of the weeklong blanket media overkill of Ronald Reagan’s death and funeral. I flipped over the paper and saw a small lead to Brother Ray’s Obituary. An old white woman was just ahead of me in line. I asked her pardon when I realized she had also been looking at the paper.

   “I was looking for something about Ray Charles dying.” I explained.

     The old woman smiled and made eye contact. “He was great, wasn’t he?” she said.“I’d march down the street for Ray Charles before I would for Ronald Reagan.”

     Every so often, even in Georgia, people will surprise you.

Interrupting for Truth: A lesson from Cervantes

Reading the Quixote gives you a lot to think about. Every single story told by any of the many verbose characters in Don Quixote is at some point, and sometimes more than once, interrupted. Only then do we find out the truth, Cervantes tells us! Of course every interruption in the Quixote makes you laugh, too. Cardenio tells Quixote not to interrupt him under any circumstances or he won't finish his story. This in itself is almost as funny as the inevitable interruption, which drives Cardenio into a fit and yes, reveals the truth of his madness.
It occurs to me lately that the truth does not emerge without dialogue. Monologues and stories need to be interrupted, which is also to say "interpreted." Think about a lawyer or therapist who asks, "What was that you said about money and your mother? Can we get back to that?" Boom. Truth bombs drop.
That's why we need Drama that has substance and not just sensory immersion, so there can be smart dialogue for us to overhear. The Athenians invented democracy and theatre at the same time. Cervantes invented the novel around the time that people were starting to doubt what they had always believed. Time for interrupted stories, or in other words, dialogue. Without it, the stories take control. Socrates warned us that the stories in the theatre might be too influential, but we only know that because Plato wrote it in his Dialogues.
We need to listen. Cervantes tells us to listen to a lot of different people's stories, especially the ones who don't have a voice in their culture. But we should also interrupt and ask questions. Everyone else's story is a tangent to our own, but also another angle to see ourselves from. Interaction is required for common ground to exist.
As Cervantes tells us, sometimes the search for justice and truth means getting beat up and thrown into the road. But Quixote and Sancho have great dialogue when waking from unconsciousness in pain. It's better than Pozzo and Lucky in Godot. Sancho interrupts Quixote's story to ask, "Exuse me sir knight, but when do you think we will begin to feel our legs again?"
When you interrupt a racist, you may be asking the same question shortly thereafter. But interrupting is necessary for dialogue to occur. As soon as someone says something racist, call them on it. They think political correctness is a thing of the past? They won't know what hit them because it won't be violent conflict, just dialogue. But watch out for the backside of windmills.

Awkward Brush with Greatness: Meeting Dizzy Gillespie in London, circa 1981

     It happened at Ronnie Scott’s, the big-name jazz club in London.  I was in my early twenties, on my first and only London and Ireland adventure. It was a sort of honeymoon because my girlfriend Robyn and I had to pretend to be married to sleep together in religiously conservative Ireland. 

We didn’t have a large trip budget, but we felt so lucky that Dizzy and Betty Carter were playing while we were in London, that we decided to splurge and go! I had seen Dizzy live several times, but never Betty Carter, my favorite and the woman who Carmen McCrae called “the only REAL jazz singer.”

      Ronnie Scott’s was very large and posh in comparison to the name jazz clubs in the States. The place was only about half full that night.  I found it strange and disappointing that there were so few people there to see two of the greatest living jazz artists. The more Guinness I drank, the more this upset me. After the third pint, I waited until Dizzy’s band took a break and ran down the red-carpeted stairs to the restrooms.

     It seemed a small men’s room for such a large club. There was only one man besides me at the short line of urinals. I joined him, but I directed my gaze toward the urinal cake. Even in my youth, three pints was a lot for me and I knew I would be there for a while. As the urinator to my left finished and walked away behind me, I heard him say something to another man just coming through the restroom door. When the new guy pulled up next to me, I rather suddenly realized that I was pissing next to Dizzy Gillespie: one of my heroes, a virtuoso trumpet improviser, a founding father of Modern Jazz and founding uncle of Latin Jazz, Charlie Parker’s other half, composer of Con Alma, Salt Peanuts, Night in Tunisia, Groovin’ High, Manteca, Tin Tin Deo, Woody’n You etc. etc.  

     Luckily I didn’t turn and inadvertently piss on him. But I did something just as stupid. I was drunk, remember, and not an experienced drinker. After we both finished and zipped, I felt somehow obliged to apologize for the small audience turnout upstairs. But what I said was, “Too bad it couldn’t have been a better night for you.” Oh, my God, almost as soon as I said that I knew it didn’t come out right. I stammered, “I mean, too bad there weren’t enough people here.” That was bad too, but not worse, as if any number of people would be enough.

    Dizzy shrugged it off, and looked right at me, as if to say with a nod, “I get it. Don’t be so nervous.” Then the maestro proceeded to wash his hands. I thought, “Here is my moment to recover.” So, while he was washing his hands I leaned next to the sink and said something about how I had learned all his tunes. “Even Con Alma?” said Dizzy as he dried his hands.

“Yeah that’s a tough one.” I said, excited that he had spoken to me. I could see he was about to leave the restroom, so I instinctively put out my hand to shake his. He pulled his hand back and said quickly, “You haven’t washed your hands yet.”

     Ok, THAT is what I did that was stupid, not just misspeaking such that my unsolicited and unnecessary apology came out as an insult.  Now I was guilty of a hygiene crime!

   Again Mr. Gillespie shrugged it off. Instead of just leaving quickly he waited until I had washed my hands so we could shake. While I was wiping them dry, Dizzy said:

     “You know in France they wash their hands before they go. Because then it’s clean!”

     This made me laugh and we shook hands. He even whistled softly at Robyn as she came down the stairs, probably wondering what had happened to me. I couldn't wait to tell her. Meeting Dizzy Gillespie makes up for any possible embarrassment my youth and alcohol level could cause.

   

Cervantes' Muslims

      I was surprised at how the Muslim characters in Don Quixote were handled. Even in the "story within a story" of the long-suffering, Spanish, captive-in Barbary sea captain, no Turkish or Arab character is a caricature.
      In Part 2, Cervantes challenges the crude logic of Western xenophobia. Quixote and Sancho meet up with a band of German pilgrims, one of whom turns out to be Sancho's former friend and neighbor Ricote the Morisco. (The Moriscos were those Muslims left living in Spain after the Christian victory; they were forcibly expelled—on pain of death—by royal decree from 1609 to 1613.) Ricote, a humble shopkeeper, has disguised himself as a pilgrim in order to retrieve a small "treasure" he had to leave behind when he and his family were forced to flee. His wife and daughters are in Algiers; he hopes to settle them in Germany, far from the "terror and fear" they have endured in Spain. His story is a poignant one, the refugee's timeless lament, and Sancho listens sadly, sharing a wineskin with his old friend, until they "go their separate ways." Cervantes never belabors the point, or descends into sentimentality, but offers a moving affirmation of ordinary human ties flourishing in spite of fanaticism.
    I know, who has time for timelessness anymore?