Adolphus C. Hailstork (b. 1941) is featured at AfriClassical.com
African Heritage Symphonic Series, Vol. II; Epitaph For A Man Who Dreamed In Memoriam: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968); by Adolphus C. Hailstork; Chicago Sinfonietta; Paul Freeman, Conductor: Cedille CDR 90000 061 (2001)
Those
who were around in the late 40s will know that a "moldy fig" was one
who didn't dig bop. If that pejorative term could be pushed back a few decades
to embrace the blues, some who tuned into the second week's start of Bill
McLaughlin's NPR series, Portraits in Black, Brown and Beige, would have
taken offence. But the blues is the secular side of the spiritual (to which we
surely will yet be treated). Although a reaction against Reconstruction, it
soon became the catharsis' means of survival and nurtured the jazz and, later,
gospel music, as well as R&B, minus the laments. In its classic form, as
Bill exemplified, it was a variety of solo call and response, using the most
elemental harmonic patterns, thus assuring a variety of applications. Because
Black music does not like silence, each line of the verse was the time to
insert commentary, either vocal ("yes, Lord!") or instrumental, as
with Louis Armstrong's insertion -- the "break". African music does
not like the half-step interval , so the blues microtonally lowers the third
and seventh degrees of the West's major scale. This could have been illustrated
by either of the two first-movement themes of William Grant Still's Afro-American
symphony, which we have been able to hear at least twice during the last
week. This was, in music, what the Harlem Renaissance sought in the
'elevation" of the folkloric; Still used the symphony for his blues, while
Claude McKay (Still's contemporary) used the Shakespearean sonnet to frame his
militant If we must die.
Bill
made reference to the European (relative) emphasis on the first beat of a
measure. This is because that is the place where the previous harmonic motion
settles on the tonic, excepting for feminine endings (the gender reference is
to French grammar). Black music democratizes the pulsations by giving emphasis
also to other beats.
We
had a chance to hear Louis Armstrong's raspy singing. This is a continuation of
the African Klangideal which added jingling rattles to the kora and
rattling beads to the mbira. If we had been able to isolate Armstrong's
vowels, we would have heard a sonority akin to that of his trumpet, alerting us
to the firm confluence of sonorities in Black music, including the messages of
the dundun and Adelaide Hall's scat singing with the sound of Bubber Miley's
trumpet in Creole love call.
I'm listening to Black, Brown and Beige on Chicago's WFMT. This is not an NPR affiliate; they carry
commercials, brief but ubiquitous. These are, however, devoid of hysterics,
commands (CALL NOW!), snake oil promos, and mendacious testimonials. It is good
preparation for the future, when Philistine politicians, true to their
tradition, will regard "high" culture, the arts, and things cerebral
as expendable frills, in which federal funds need not be diverted, and that
will be the end of National Public Radio. WFMT's airing was an hour early, to
make room for a live broadcast of Rigoletto from the Lyric (far more
welcome that yet another airing of a Vivaldi concerto in C major for
whatever).
The program was less unified by the
juxtaposition of unrelated works, already exemplified.
This left the Epitaph of
Adolphus Hailstork in strange company (and Dolph is no longer on the faculty
of Norfolk State, but now has an honorary appointment at Old Dominion -- did
my liner notes err?).
Whenever the week's topic is announced,
I try to guess what works will be included. This time, I'm up for pot luck,
although I have certain hopes, if time permits. By the end of this week, I
think we would all be interested in knowing what works or composers the
faithful missed.
(BTW: If you wish either a CD or DVD of
the Still symphony, so well performed by Kirk Moss and the Lawrence University
Symphony Orchestra -- as well as some fascinating tributes to Native Americana
-- instructions for order placement are provided at the bottom of
http://www.lawrence.edu/conservatory/services/webcasts/.)
------------------------------------
Dominique-René
de Lerma
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