Where the Dark and the Light Folks Meet: Race and the Mythology, Politics, and Business of Jazz (Studies in Jazz): 60 - Softcover

Sandke, Randall

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1442243546 ISBN 13: 9781442243545

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014

Synopsis

Where the Dark and the Light Folks Meet tackles a controversial question: Is jazz the product of an insulated African-American environment, shut off from the rest of society by strictures of segregation and discrimination, or is it more properly understood as the juncture of a wide variety of influences under the broader umbrella of American culture? This book does not question that jazz was created and largely driven by African Americans, but rather posits that black culture has been more open to outside influences than most commentators are likely to admit. The majority of jazz writers, past and present, have embraced an exclusionary viewpoint. Where the Dark and the Light Folks Meet begins by looking at many of these writers, from the birth of jazz history up to the present day, to see how and why their views have strayed from the historical record. This book challenges many widely held beliefs regarding the history and nature of jazz in an attempt to free jazz of the socio-political baggage that has so encumbered it. The result is a truer appreciation of the music and a greater understanding of the positive influence racial interaction and jazz music have had on each other.

About this title

Review:

With a much-needed blend of careful research, common sense, passion, insight, and (at times) indignation, Randy Sandke sets the record straight about how the divisive racial mythology of jazz's origins and nature came to be. One hopes that Where the Dark and the Light Folks Meet will do as much good as it deserves to do.--Larry Kart, author of Jazz In Search of Itself

In this compelling adduction of new evidence and analysis, Sandke forensically dissects jazz history and shows it, to paraphrase Ralph Ellison, to be 'ever a tall tale told by inattentive idealists' where myth and legend frequently obscure a less prosaic truth. It is a book that needed to be written and seems sure to inspire countless lines of fresh academic enquiry.--Stuart Nicholson, author of Is Jazz Dead?: Or has It Moved to a New Address

Randy Sandke's research and documentation are thorough. His insights and opinions are forthright. His book will infuriate its targets, those in the music world who place myth, race, nationality, sociology, politics and commerce above music itself. Everyone else will find it revealing, thought-provoking and helpful.--Doug Ramsey, author of Jazz Matters: Reflections on the Music and Some of its Makers

Genuine research involves the discovery of unknown or neglected materials and their analysis in ways that yield fresh insights. Randy Sandke's book meets this standard and therefore warrants careful attention. It is neither the first nor last book on the subject, but an important and serious contribution to our deeper understanding of the music we love.--S. Frederick Starr, author of Red and Hot: The Fate of Jazz in the Soviet Union, 1917-91, and Louis Moreau Gottschalk

What Randy Sandke has to say in these pages is bound to make you think anew about jazz--agree with him or not. And he speaks from the heart.--Dan Morgenstern, director, Institute of Jazz Studies, Rutgers University; dean of jazz historians; editor, Studies in Jazz series

Randy Sandke brings his wide range of experience as a jazz musician and composer to a discussion of jazz history and jazz criticism that is must reading for anyone interested in the elements--and the people--that have created the canons and contradictions of this endlessly fascinating art form.--George Avakian, record producer and jazz historian

The common belief that racial conflict characterizes jazz history is false, jazz trumpeter Sandke says. Instead, jazz is demonstrably a product of black-white cooperation, beginning in its prehistory in nineteenth-century blackface minstrel shows, which Sandke represents as a major venue for antislavery sentiment before the Civil War and which turned viciously racist only with the rise of Jim Crow in the 1890s. In the 1920s and '30s, when jazz became synonymous with popular music, the top black and white bands were comparably well compensated. If jazz composers were often cheated out of royalties and copyrights, the culprits were black as well as white; sometimes they were musicians preying on other musicians. Bad history is to blame for the belief that jazz is sharply racially divided. Sandke scores such 1930s leftist-activist promoters as Vanderbilt scion John Hammond and field musicologist Alan Lomax for starting the racial-strife myths, activist and poet Leroi Jones/Amiri Baraka for exacerbating them, and-ruefully, for they are fellow players-jazz spokesmen such as Wynton Marsalis (whom Sandke recognizes as mellowing with age and wisdom) for perpetuating them. This amateur historian's book, more lucid and straightforward than most professional jazz critic-chroniclers could dream of producing, deserves every history-minded jazz fan's attention.--Booklist, Starred Review

A long-time jazz player and writer, Sandke here broaches a troublesome area of jazz, not to mention American life--race....Sandke takes a strong position on issues ranging from the political agendas of many jazz historians (from the early days to the present) to the more recent narrow redefinitions of jazz, largely by the more conservative (and influential) wing of jazz represented by Wynton Marsalis and writer Stanley Crouch. And, he asks, what myths continue to cloud understanding of jazz? Does the fact that jazz sprang from a black environment make white jazz musicians "inauthentic"? Sandke also explores who the winners and losers have been in the business of jazz, and who the audience has been. In contrast to some works about race and jazz, Sandke's is thoroughly researched and documented. He loves the music deeply and is frustrated that it may be compromised by politics, internal and external. His positions will likely draw fire--and praise. This is an important addition to the literature of jazz. Summing Up: Essential. All readers--CHOICE

In Where the Dark and the Light Folks Meet, musician and author Randall Sandke tackles the stubborn and controversial question of whether jazz is the product of an insulated African-American environment, shut off from the rest of society by strictures of segregation and discrimination; or whether it is more properly understood as the juncture of a wide variety of influences under the broader umbrella of American culture. His book takes the latter course and shows how the widely accepted exclusionary view has led to decades of misunderstanding surrounding the true history and nature of jazz.--All About Jazz

This important book is both brave and provocative, challenging the reader to rethink flimsily-based, partisan assumptions. It is not a jazz history but an essential commentary on it. Open-minded jazz fans of all ages and interests should find it instructive and stimulating and a joy to read.--Jazz Journal

About the Author:

Randall Sandke has been a professional jazz musician for over 30 years. He is the author of Harmony for a New Millennium: An Introduction to Metatonal Music (2002) and has contributed to The Oxford Companion To Jazz and the Annual Review of Jazz Studies (2000).

About this edition

• Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 1442243546
• ISBN 13: 9781442243545
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 288