The O’Zone | Black History Month: Soul Jazz a Clarion Call
Soul Jazz Marching by Andy O'
Marching into freedom
Four four time is marching forward
That’s where the walking bass came from
Signs saying I AM A MAN!
A loud proud statement
Let there be no doubt
Let them hear you shout
I AM A MAN!
Read the signs!
A musical heartbeat
The movement has a pulse
A mighty steady pulse
Keep that music bumpin’
Let them know where you stand
Mobilize on the American pavement in stolen land
Blacktop reality coming down
With that walking bass
Turned around in blues
Funk invention
Freedom intention
Shout like a tenor saxophone
Hollar like a brass section
Hammond B3 and stratocaster broadcaster
Make a statement
On the Black top pavement
Soul Jazz Marching
Funky in the heartbeat
The music calls
Injustice falls
Fight back with your culture against the firehose walls
The neon flickers, a digital blue,
But the ghost of the horn is still breaking through.
Syncopated rhythms on the inner city street
Where the 808 pulse and the bebop meet.
They used to blow brass to shatter the wall
To make the long shadows of Jim Crow fall.
Now the sax is a scream, a jagged sharp line,
Drawn under the hashtags that shimmer and shine.
“Freedom!” cried Archie Shepp in a cascade of notes
While the people were marching for ballots and votes.
The soul takes the music into a heavy determined flood
And the names in the static, the tears and the blood.
The club is the livestream, the stage is the block,
Ostinato steady won't ever stop.
From the Schomberg Center archives to the Blue Note tonight,
Melody is still a demand for the light.
It’s the same old blues in a brand new key,
A soulful pursuit of what it means to be free.
The horn hasn’t changed
Just the air that it blows.
A long lonesome wind
That everyone knows.
Timeline 1955-1965: Soul Jazz & Civil Rights
1955: The Preacher: Horace Silver…while not called “Soul Jazz”, this piece is often cited as the definitive birth of the idiom.
Emmet Till’s Murder…the brutal lynching of the 14-year-old and his mother’s decision to hold an open casket funeral. The imagery was documented and published by Jet magazine, exposing the horrors of this racist act to the world.
Montgomery Bus Boycott…December 1st, Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat. Launching a year long boycott led by a young Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
1957 Little Rock Nine…President Eisenhower sent in Federal troops
to enforce school desegregation at Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas.
The Civil Rights Act of 1957…first government legislation since
The Reconstruction Era.
Greensboro Sit-Ins…four college students protest at a segregated
Woolworth’s lunch counter ignited a wave of nonviolent sit-ins across the South.
1958: Jimmy Smith revolutionized the genre with the organ-driven grooves on his album Home Cookin’.
Lou Donaldson releases a cornerstone album, Blues Walk.
1960: Jimmy Smith releases Back at the Chicken Shack.
Hank Mobley releases Soul Station with a popular cut, Dig Dis.
Grant Green, the “Father of Groove Guitar,” releases his debut album with Blue Note First Session.
Civil Rights Act of 1960…which established federal inspection of registration polls & penalties for anyone obstructing the right to vote.
Freedom Rides: Student activists rode interstate buses into the segregated South to challenge non-compliance with the Supreme Court rulings.
1963: The Birmingham Campaign…Nonviolent protests faced Bull Conner’s brutal racist tactics (firehoses and dogs) exposed on national news helped galvanize an indifferent nation into action or attention.
The March on Washington, where 250,000 people witnessed MLK give his "I Have A Dream” speech.
Lee Morgan released The Sidewinder, an iconic crossover hit and the blueprint for the Soul Jazz Sound.
Kenny Burrell’s Midnight Blue features the definitive Soul Jazz cut “Chitlins Con Carne.”
1964: Lee Morgan’s “The Sidewinder” was released in December 1963 is a massive radio hit, establishing the boogaloo beat alongside the more traditional swing sound.
Horace Silver released Song for My Father.
Herbie Hancock has an iconic Soul Jazz hit “Cantaloupe Island,” from his album Empyrean Isles.
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed and later upheld by the Supreme Court.
The Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
1965: Bloody Sunday: 600 peaceful marchers were attacked on the Edmund Pettis Bridge by Alabama State troopers.
Selma to Montgomery March: Led by Dr. King, 25,000 people successfully marched to the Alabama state capitol under federal protection.
Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Ramsey Lewis Trio: “The 'In' Crowd!” Number 5 on the Billboard Hot 100. Practically unheard of for a jazz artist in the 1960s (and today).
Are you in? With the “In” Crowd?
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