More than two decades ago, when I first began reading Amiri Baraka seriously, I was fascinated by the way he spoke about "Black music," often refusing to separate blues, jazz, spirituals, gospel, R&B, and more. To him, it was simply Black music, or the music.
I thought of Baraka while watching Ryan Coogler’s film Sinners. In one scene, a young blues musician plays at a jook joint, and layered over the performance are echoes of musical histories reaching back to Africa and forward through hip hop. The moment lasts just a few minutes, but we’re treated to a spectrum of Black sound and dancing. The suggestion is clear: these styles and histories all flow to and from the blues.
What Coogler put on screen, Baraka had already put on the page. So it’s no surprise that when Coogler wrote a letter naming his influences, Baraka was one of the people he acknowledged.
No comments:
Post a Comment