Black Music Month 2023: Art and loss

This is not about people pouring their grief into art, though that is a thing that happens. 

I'm having a hard time knowing what to write about it, probably because I have not come to any conclusions myself.

It started with a Twitter conversation that was probably related to the writer's strike, and the work that goes into writing. Someone referenced a writer who only writes one book in their entire life.

The response that caught my eye (and I wish I could find it now) was that even if they only published one book, that was not all the writing that they did.

Truth.

Someone else had made a point about family releasing things after the death of an artist that would not necessarily have been desired by the artist. I believe they made a reference to the large vaults of material recorded by Prince.

I had just read The Rose That Grew From Concrete by Tupac Shakur. That is a book of poems written by Shakur as part of a writing group. 

They are not good.

They aren't terrible, but the rhythms are off (which would never have been an issue if he were recording them) and he was much younger at the time of writing. They are a curiosity. As such it is nice that you can see the handwriting as well as typed versions.

I remember reading that it was a transparent grab for cash. Maybe, but I thought I detected grief (to which I am overly sensitive), and also a desire to show another side. He was a loyal friend, and cared about relationships and people and had a complexity beyond the gangsta rap side.

I sympathize with that, but I think the people most likely to read it will not need much convincing.

However, Prince is relevant, not just because I have read three books about him, but because one of them refers to a recording that was amazing, and deleted as soon as it was done for being too personal.

That's one way to avoid the issue.

More recently, I saw another post, with a musician saying he had told his band that if he dies (he has had some health problems), that he wants the current music released, but he had felt differently at a different time.

The conversation that started led to some people sharing their love and ambivalence for Jeff Buckley's posthumous release, Sketches For My Sweetheart, The Drunk. Would he have wanted it released? And yet, it means so much to them.

I don't know. My tendency to want to know and hear and experience everything conflicts with my respect for others. I am a little sad that Jane Austen asked her sister to burn her letters after her death, but since she did ask, it is right that Cassandra honored it.

I do see the value in considering things that might happen, and how you might feel. Sure, things can change at any time, and your predictions can be wrong, but we learn things by asking, and that has value.

I wish for a world where art is safe and revealing yourself is safe, but that you still aren't forced too. I also wish for a world where it is possible to be secure enough financially that artistic decisions don't get influenced by desperation and greed.

I wish comfort for the bereaved.

And, this is starting to touch on another area of grief (and anger) for myself, so I'll get back to that on Tuesday.

For a few other connections for the month, one story featured in the Muscle Shoals Documentary is that the recordings the band made there were not initially released due to a conflict with getting radios to accept the longer songs. Then, the crash happened. Those sessions were the source of Skynard's First and... Last. 

I was distracted by the band's apparent inability to play without a Confederate flag in the background, but I wouldn't wish that crash on anyone.

From The Wrecking Crew, one of the names that kept coming up was Mike Melvoin. Because I was reading about Prince, I kept thinking that sounded familiar. Yes, esteemed pianist and keyboardist (and past Recording Academy president) Mike Melvoin was the father of guitarist Wendy Melvoin, and also (Prince's former fiancee and) singer and songwriter Susannah Melvoin, and Jonathan Melvoin, who was the touring keyboardist for The Smashing Pumpkins at the time of his death. 

I had really only known about Wendy before, but that was a really musical family, and one not unacquainted with grief. Jonathan's death ruptured some relationships.

Back to Prince, he has his own conundrum with posthumous releases. With his perfectionism, surely if he didn't want things released he had a point. With his unusually high productivity, I can't imagine it would have even been possible to release everything he did. Those were never the only factors, as contracts were a big issue.

Mainly I see how much there was to him, with generosity and selfishness and celebration and grief, and I wish he could have had longer to sort things out and heal, but living longer doesn't guarantee that.

I wish him well.

And I wish you well too. 

I will write a bit more about the loss of Tupac Shakur (and Biggie Smalls), in a different post.

Related books:

The Rose That Grew From Concrete by Tupac Shakur
I Would Die 4 U: Why Prince Became an Icon by Toure
The Most Beautiful: My Life with Prince by Mayte Garcia
The Beautiful Ones by Prince with Dan Piepenbring

Between mourning and burying

My neck is a lot better. The collarbone is worse, or at least seems worse because that is the focus now.

I am not quite better yet, so I am trying to work my way toward that.

Plus, there is another big stress coming. (This one will be financial.)

The surface stress of Mom's health issues were feeling a need to do something and not knowing what to do, but it also pulled up things that were not quite at the surface.

I mean, we don't really ever stop carrying this grief with us. We love our mother, we had a lot of good times together, and she is absent, but still here. We know her, and we recognize so much of her nature, but we are not recognized back. 

Where dementia is especially cruel is that it happens in stages, where we keep adjusting and then constantly getting knocked off of that tentative equilibrium. 

One thing I have been thinking about here is that while I have been more emotionally present since June last year, it may be time to grow beyond that now.

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2022/10/all-better.html

Yes, it was a big thing to break down some of those inner walls. I feel the pain of Mom's loss more now, but at the same time it is just this sad inner cry: "Mom!" 

I don't do anything with it. I don't know what to do with it.

Well, okay, what I have been doing is reading and then writing in my journal and sometimes blogging. Shortly after writing that post in October (about the realization in June), I posted about books I was reading and planning on reading that I thought would come together.

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2022/11/deciding.html

I still think they will, but that list has expanded to include books about Italy and grief and trauma, and it will be a while before I am done.

In fact, while things were going on with Mom, there was brief wondering if this was the beginning of the end, and if so, well, I haven't finished the books yet! (Because then I would be ready, see, because being ready is possible.) 

It is not surprising that someone who spent decades trying not to feel might not completely work out the details of what to do with emotions over a thirteen month period. It is something I am thinking about more.

It is probable that I over-intellectualize things. That was probably one thing that was helpful with the bodywork, in that it was not all taking place inside my head; it couldn't be. No matter how much the pain was rooted emotionally, it had anchored itself physically.

I did find myself thinking a lot about and feeling that there is so much unresolved grief all around me. I personally am not the only person who does not know what to do with their pain.

I am not the only person who has buried without mourning.

One hope I have is that after all the books and the things that I learn, that I will be able to help others.

That distance will not be marked solely in books.

Black Music Month 2023: Prelude

Not all of the reading was specifically about "Black" music. There was other media that had been on my list that related to music more generally.

For this post, I am going to focus on The Wrecking Crew. That means both the 2012 book by Kent Hartman and the 2008/2015 documentary by Danny Tedesco, both about the session musicians operating in Los Angeles in the 60s and 70s and collectively sometimes referred to as such.

If you are wondering about the two dates on the documentary, the filming was completed in 2008, but music licensing took a separate fundraiser. 

Danny Tedesco is the son of original Wrecking Crew member Tommy Tedesco. Originally, he filmed a conversation between his father and three other prominent members: Carol Kaye, Hal Blaine, and Plas Johnson. There kept being more interesting information, so he added background and interviews. I spent a long time watching DVD extras and it was enriching.

I don't think the book and movie had any official connection, but one of the extras has Lyle Ritz (I think) mentioning getting called up by someone clarifying that both he and Carol Kaye played bass on the same song. He used the anecdote to explain how they would stack musicians, and that it wasn't unusual to have a standing bass, electric bass, and maybe one other bass on the same song. I just knew that the call he had gotten was from Kent Hartman. 

The amount of time spent on the documentary made things like that likely, but it also meant that with an aging group there were losses along the way, including Tommy Tedesco himself. (I believe the initial filmed round table discussion was at least partially inspired by Tommy's cancer diagnosis.)

I had a lot of thoughts from watching this, and then the previews on the DVD had three other interesting looking documentaries. That included Muscle Shoals (2013), which I just finished, about the session musicians at FAME Studios and then Muscle Shoals Sound, in Alabama.

One thought with that is how much influence a place can have on a sound. There are indications that the river itself influences the sound there, where perhaps in Los Angeles it was more the scene, but that scene was at least partially created by being a place with a lot of work for musicians, meaning it could attract some of the best.

Prior to that, just with reading and watching The Wrecking Crew, I was thinking more about music creation. There is so much that goes into making music everything that it can be. Writing lyrics and melody matters, but then there is the arrangement for how it all comes together. What riffs and fills will you have? It deepened my appreciation.

I saw the Ramones documentary, End of the Century (2003), in theaters, but it was on the DVD extras that I saw them asking different members (separately) how much they had contributed to some songs. It was always 90%; that the song was mostly theirs. I kind of understood the self bias that might make you think that anyway, but I think I have a different perspective now of how you might see that the part you are playing is what is unique, and that was you.

I'd had no idea how common it was for musicians to not play on their own albums before. I understand how it worked, but also it did not work for some musicians, and it seems less common now. Of course, with multi-track recording and other technology changes, there is more room for different working styles anyway. I did hear in some of those voices how they missed those group sessions, even when they were still working but one at a time. I sympathize with that.

It helped me with one other thing.

Another book I read had me listening to a lot of jazz, which I still do not appreciate.

Well, a lot of the Wrecking Crew started as jazz musicians. Honestly, that ability to adapt and respond quickly to others is probably a huge part of their skill development.

A lot of them did not initially like rock and roll, though some of them learned to appreciate it later.

So from now on, when I feel unsophisticated because I am forcing myself to listen to jazz and gritting my teeth, I am deciding that is because I am too rock and roll.

But it does not rule out future appreciation.

Please excuse Gina for not writing Friday...

... she was not feeling well.

That's been coming on for a while. Ironically, I had been feeling very optimistic when I wrote this:

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2023/06/episode-2555-new-hope.html

I guess the thing to remember when it feels like you are making progress is how quickly that progress can be lost.

Technically the issue that sent me backwards started around June 15th, where my mother started having some health issues that also seemed to indicate some communication issues with her facility. That was stressful, but seemed manageable.

It got a whole lot worse, culminating in a hospital transport on July 4th, with a stay of a few days, and two more transports after getting released from that. 

Things are okay now, though it does feel like there are some steps downward. Obviously, all along it was very stressful.

Somewhere along the way, I started developing this tightness.

I mean, I kind of always have this knot in my neck that I live with, but it started sending lines down along my shoulder and collarbone. Moving it definitely hurt (especially overhead), but sometimes standing still could hurt too.

Like the frustration was not already enough to make me cry.

Of course it was my right shoulder, attached to my dominant hand that I use for everything.

I'd had a similar issue before, and what it needed was a massage and then follow up with stretching. I can be very functional, though I was not exactly proving it.

I dragged my feet on getting a massage. 

Money was a concern, as always, but the almost paralyzing concern was scheduling: that I would have to take time off, and then not be able to get time off. Yes, I have hours available, but getting them approved for the time that aligns with someone else's schedule is not guaranteed, especially in summer when there are so many vacations scheduled. 

Combined with that was the fear that if I took time something would fall through, requiring a different time, or that something else and worse would happen that would require time, and I would have already used it.

There was also quite a bit of frustration about things that I was not getting done. There is a lot that I still need to do and haven't.

But I was in so much pain.

Beyond that, there was this... tiredness does not seem like the right word; I am always tired. There was this downward pull. Keeping my head up was hard. I just wanted to bend it, down to my chest, or fall forward onto the bed. 

I was able to schedule a massage for a day off, and the worst of it is gone. It would not be reasonable to expect this to be gone in one session. I don't know that I can manage scheduling others, but I can still stretch.

The pull downward is still there. I do not feel quite as drained as I did the week starting July 4th, but I don't have a lot to give.

I am doing something bold, and taking off my two available days. I may regret this, but it also may keep me from screaming at someone over the phone. I mean, you can't always know.

When Mom first went into the hospital, we had a fun day planned, and we did not do those things. That was not a restful holiday.

Saturday, she was back at her facility, and we thought great! We can do at least one of the things we meant to on the 4th. That was our trip to the clematis garden.

https://sporktogo.blogspot.com/2023/07/rogerson-clematis-garden.html

We did that and it felt really good, and then, well Sunday kind of sucked. That's life.

I don't think my feelings from that dream was completely wrong, either. There are things I can handle better now. I have grown and progressed.

That just doesn't mean that the next thing to go horribly, horribly, wrong won't feel like it is going to kill you.

Can we hold off on those flowers?

I am reacting to something that I can no longer find, at least not the way I first saw it.

What I saw was a tweet with a clip of comedian Bill Burr going off on white women. It said "Give Bill Burr his flowers."

I was thinking about that on the 4th. I knew I wanted to do something with it, but we were having home issues and I put it off. Now that tweet and all the people agreeing with it are gone.

I think this makes sense. The clip was a short snippet of his monologue from Saturday Night Live from October 2020. I initially thought it was recent, and I think other people were going on that assumption too, like maybe it was a reaction to recent Supreme Court rulings on affirmative action. Old things do sometimes pop up as new, and then sometimes people reacting to that find out, get embarrassed, and delete.

It is possible that there was another reason for embarrassment and deletion, which I'll get to, but I must first express surprise at how many references came up to Bill Burr and flowers without me being able to find that one. Like, did he do a bit about it at one time that people are referencing? I don't know.

I could not find that clip, but I did find an article that gave me the date and a longer clip:

https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/tv/a34338294/snl-host-bill-burr-white-women-cancel-culture-rick-moranis-opening-monologue/

For the record, I don't think it's a great article, but it does clarify how much was edited. The clip in the tweet only had criticism of white women. It was missing the criticism of pride month and unironic uses of "woke" and "cancel culture" and glee over Rick Moranis getting sucker-punched. He did also criticize anti-maskers, but his emphasis was on not caring that they are dying or taking out relatives with them.

This is not surprising.

I am not saying that criticism of white women is not reasonable, but my immediate reaction to it was "You're not the one who gets to say it."

Yes, I realize more than half of white women voted for Trump, but you know what group had a higher percentage? White men.

Burr refers to white women getting Black men lynched by sleeping with them and then declaring it was rape. Well, maybe sometimes, but let's not forget the high frequency of times when everyone knew it was consensual and didn't care, or the times when there wasn't even that; just economic success that needed to be punished. Or, you know, that maybe if there really was a crime, you don't need a lynch mob, you can just let the law handle it. We all know that white men are big fans of criminal prosecutions and penalties for rape.

It reminds me of the movie Rosewood, where the whole massacre was the fault of a lying, cheating (but actually with a white man) white woman, but it was okay because at the end her husband was mad about all the deaths and beat her (just like her white lover did!). 

Sorry about the spoiler.

Here are the things that don't surprise me:

1. It does not surprise me if someone recently edited the clip to focus on white women but without sounding racist or homophobic. There is some strong misogyny out there, and there are people whom that appeals to, as long as it does not sound bad in other ways. This in no way means that white women are the last group that you can criticize, only that different people are more susceptible to different things.
2. It does not surprise me that Burr jokes about killing off your cousin with asthma, and does not express any concern about anti-maskers killing off other people, that are not their relatives. Honestly, it doesn't surprise me when any comedian is hateful. It's not the only path to comedy, but that path gets a lot of traffic.
   
3. It does not surprise me that in searching other references came up to Burr being transphobic. You can think that you accept almost everyone, but these things have a way of growing. You can find men who say they are only sexist but not racist, or people who say they are fine with "LGB" as long as you take off the "T". Don't put too much trust in them.
4. It does not surprise me that even an old, truncated clip would get a lot of people immediately going "Yeah!" without noticing the hypocrisy. There is that "taking sides" thing, but also that thing where a Republican will take one principled stand out of 99 and then have people praising their leadership and wanting them to run for president.

I firmly know that this is not helpful.

If all you have to offer is slamming on the group that seems safe, you are not going to accomplish anything good.

Our legacy of bigotry is build on the exploitation and abuse of others where it is allowed. Leaving some groups out of that, but still only focusing on pushing down, does not make you brave or wise or useful.

We cannot build anything good with those tools.

But it might result in a temporary burst of flowers.

A Book A Day for Native American Heritage Month (twice)

I got  started blogging about Black Music Month early because I was still waiting on two books for this. This means my posts are not perfectly sequenced.

There was always a chance of that.

This reading list started at https://www.heisereads.com/nahm2022/.

Jillian Heise's #ClassroomBookADay was inspired by Donalyn Miller's (The Book Whisperer) #bookaday.

There could be many of these lists our there, and I am not sure that I want to know given how hard a time I have passing up any such lists, given my passion for literacy and representation.

Regardless, I did read all 60 of the books that Heise selected, for 2021 and 2022. If she makes another selection for 2023, then I suspect I will read another 30. For now, all I am really committed to are some more curriculum-geared books also listed on that page. (But not the Dunbar-Ortiz book; I've read that.)

I try and keep my eye out, but there were so many books here, and most of them in our local library system (the handful that weren't is why I could not post until today). For a few favorites...

May We Have Enough to Share by Richard Van Camp

I adored Little You, Van Camp's collaboration with Julie Flett, who is fast becoming one of my favorite illustrators. That is a poem of love for one growing child, and beautiful. 

This one is a collection of photos, with lots of different, smiling faces, affirming that the Native people are still here, alive and vibrant.

Shaped By Her Hands: Potter Maria Martinez by Anna Harber Freeman, Barbara Gonzalez, and Aphelandra.

Beautiful artwork, and I was impressed by how vivid they made the colors, which is important because part of Maria Martinez' contribution was finding a technique to recreate a type of black pottery that had been lost. 

Sharice's Big Voice by Sharice Davids, Nancy K. Mays, and Joshua Mangeshig Pawis-Steckley

This is a good one for the rowdy kids, because cage fighting and political office do not have to be mutually exclusive, and loud kids can do good things.

A River's Gifts: The Might Elwha River Reborn by Patricia Newman and Natasha Donovan

This is beautifully illustrated and full of hope. It makes me think that we could get Celilo Falls back. In addition, there is so much about ecosystems and history that while that may not interest younger kids it could put a little bit older kids on a good path for a science project. 

We Are Still Here! Native American Truths Everyone Should Know by Traci Sorrell and Frané Lessac could help start a social studies project, but I did not find it as enthralling.

Of course, everyone has different needs and tastes. So if there were things that did not mean a lot to me personally, they might still mean a lot to children with sensory issues (Thunder and the Noise Storms), or facing a move (Forever Cousins), or frustrated with recent Supreme Court decisions (probably all of the ones with "water" in the title but especially The Water Lady).

Because, really, we all need lots of books, all the time. 

Here are the books. In general, the names in parenthesis are the author, illustrator, and sometimes translator, but sometimes there is more than one author or illustrator, or even translator.

Be A Good Ancestor (Leona Prince, Gabriel Prince, Carla Joseph)
May We Have Enough To Share (Richard Van Camp)
Thunder and the Noise Storms (Jeffrey Ansloos, Shezza Ansloos)
The Water Walker (Joanne Robertson)
Runs With the Stars (Darcy Whitecrow, Heather M. O'Connor)
Unstoppable: How Jim Thorpe and the Carlisle Indian School Football Team Defeated Army (Art Coulson and Nick Hardcastle)
First Laugh – Welcome Baby (Rose Anne Tahe, Nancy Bo Flood, Jonathan Nelson)
It's a Mitig! (Bridget George)
Classified: The Secret Career of Mary Golda Ross, Cherokee Aerospace Engineer (Traci Sorrell, Natasha Donovan)
Forever Cousins (Laurel Goodluck, Jonathan Nelson)
A River's Gifts: The Might Elwha River Reborn (Patricia Newman, Natasha Donovan)
My Heart Fills With Happiness (Monique Gray Smith, Julie Flett, Angela Mesic, Margaret Noodin)
Chester Nez and the Unbreakable Code: A Navajo Code Talker's Story (Joseph Bruchac, Liz Amini-Holmes)
Powwow Day (Traci Sorrell, Madelynn Goodnight)
When We Were Alone (Davd A. Robertson, Julie Flett)
Mashkiki Road (Elizabeth S Barrett, Jonathan Thunder)
Finding My Dance (Ria Thundercloud, Kalila J. Fuller)
Berry Song (Michaela Goade)
Ojibway Animals (Jason Adair)
SkySisters (Jan Bourdeau Waboose)
Where Wonder Grows (Xelena Gonzales, Ariana M. Garcia)
Tallchief: America's Prima Ballerina (Maria Tallchief, Rosemary Wells, Gary Kelley)
Still This Love Goes On (Buffy Sainte-Marie, Julie Flett)
Keepunumuk (Danielle Greendeer, Anthony Perry, Alexis Bunten, Garry Meeches Sr.)
We Are Grateful: Otsaliheliga (Traci Sorrell, Frané Lessac)
Dancing With Our Ancestors (Sara Florence Davidson, Robert Davidson, Janine Gibbons)
Young Water Protectors: A Story About Standing Rock (Aslan Tudor, Kelly Tudor)
The Good Luck Cat (Joy Harjo, Paul Lee)
Together We Drum: Our Hearts Beat As One (Willie Poll, Chief Lady Bird)
I Hope (Monique Gray Smith,Gabrielle Grimard)

I Sang You Down From the Stars (Tasha Spillett-Sumner, Michaela Goade)
Jingle Dancer (Cynthia Leitich Smith, Ying-Hwa Hu, Cornelius Van Wright)
Nimoshom and His Bus (Penny M. Thomas, Karen Hibbard)
The Train (Jodie Callaghan, Georgia Lesley)
The Forever Sky (Thomas Peacock, Annette S Lee)
Wilma's Way Home (Doreen Rappaport, Linda Kukuk)
Sus Yoo the Bear's Medicine (Clayton Gauthier)
Birdsong (Julie Flett)
Mission to Space (John Herrington)
Look Grandma! Ni Elisi! (Art Coulson, Madelyn Goodnight)
At the Mountain's Base (Traci Sorrell, Weshoyot Alvitre)
Wolf Cub's Song (Joseph Bruchac, Carlin Bear Don't Walk)
We All Play (Julie Flett)
We Are Water Protectors (Carol Lindstrom and Michaela Goade)
Mii maanda exhi-gkendmaanh/ This is How I Know (Brittany Luby, Joshua Mangeshig Pawis-Steckley, Alvin Ted Corbiere, Alan Corbiere)
The First Blade of Sweetgrass (Suzanne Greenlaw, Gabriel Frey, Nancy Baker)
Sharice's Big Voice (Sharice Davids, Nancy K. Mays, Joshua Mangeshig Pawis-Steckley)
When We Are Kind (Monique Gray Smith, Nicole Neihardt, Mildred Walters)
Greet the Dawn the Lakota Way (S.D. Nelson)
The Girl and the Wolf (Katharena Vermette, Julie Flett)
A Day with Yayah (Nicola I. Campbell, Julie Flett)
Shaped by Her Hands: Potter Maria Martinez (Anna Harber Freeman, Barbara Gonzalez, Aphelandra)
When Turtle Grew Feathers (Tim Tingle, Stacey Schuett)
Fry Bread: A Native American Family Story (Kevin Noble Maillard, Juana Martinez-Neal)
Hungry Johnny (Cheryl Minnema, Wesley Ballinger)
We Are Still Here! Native American Truths Everyone Should Know (Traci Sorrell, Frané Lessac)
Josie Dances (Denise Lajimodiere, Angela Erdrich)
On the Trapline (David A. Robertson, Julie Flett)
The Water Lady (Alice B. McGinty, Shanto Begay)
Bowwow Powwow (Brenda Child, Jonathan Thunder, Gordon Jourdain)

The Master's Tools

 “For the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. They may allow us temporarily to beat him at his own game, but they will never enable us to bring about genuine change. And this fact is only threatening to those women who still define the master’s house as their only source of support.” -- Audre Lorde

Yes, it is the 4th of July. That may be one reason I am holding off on writing something lengthy.

This quote by Audre Lorde does pertain to some of the things I might have gone off on today.

I will also tell you that I have spent some very unproductive time thinking about this quote really literally.

I first heard it at a young age. Even though I knew it was meant to be more metaphorical, I was still thinking that tools should be tools. If the master wasn't letting you use them, that's one thing, but they should be able to work, right?

The interference of the "master" can be a real issue, but I think you also have to consider the structure of the house. If what shelters the oppressor comes from demeaning others, capitalizing on ignorance and hatred... you get a very flawed shelter from that.

I have read the full essay a few times, and I didn't think so much about that next line, about the women. That has a different resonance now, but yes, there are absolutely men who are threatened by it. 

For today I will only add that it is worth thinking about what shelters us and how it was built. These can be things that are very hard to honestly scrutinize; culturally we have told stories that may contradict what we start to find. 

That only makes it more necessary.