Posts filed under 'Sunday at the Square'
David Kirby is probably immunized against what must be a common appellation for him: “brilliant.”
An award-winning poet and FSU professor, Kirby has written a homage to Little Richard, popular music as serious art, and a taut celebration of youth culture.
His book “Little Richard: The Birth of Rock n Roll” excels in giving us an exact and delightful portrait of the most significant musical pioneer of the last 60 years.
It is kind of sad, though, that Kirby would have to make the case for Little Richard’s brand of artistic greatness. That’s the fault of rock critics. At first, I got the impression that Little Richard was being used as a proxy for theorizing in the academic mode.
There’s some of that in here, but Kirby retains the sincere, nostalgic infatuation of a teenage boy getting his first taste of youthful revolt.
About that theorizing: It can be seen as a high IQ professor slumming, but Kirby is a genuine appreciator of pop culture and he’s made a nice case for its importance. A lot of it, he says, is non-sense.
The non-sense of pop life didn’t begin with “Tutti Fruit-ti” but it refined it by adding black rhythm, therefore, it is a case of profound injustice that Little Richard has been ignored as a pioneer of rock history, while Fats Domino and others says Kirby, have not.
Art, says Kirby, is largely accidental. And Little Richard’s ability to give young suede shoe teens joy was a product of an accidental moment.
That moment in a recording studio, where Little Richard blushing in embarrassment at the nature of the original lyrics —a “paean to anal intercourse” —stood singing against a wall to avoid the sight of a young lady writer —would change music history by creating a chasm between adult culture and youth culture.
This is especially significant because pop music up until this time was a universally shared pleasure. Mostly, it was the polished stuff of Tin Pan Alley —Cole Porter, the Gershwin boys, Harold Arlen —with singers like Frank Sinatra crooning the swank lyrics.
It had a youthful theme: romantic loss, love, etc but with an adult gleam and sophistication. Little Richard bulldozed that and paved the way for a good deal of the musical act we have now, Lady Gaga, for example.
Although, I admit, jazz was reaching the high point of its artistic achievement in the stuff of Miles Davis, it by then was a minor art-form, mostly ignored among the wider listening public.
What makes Kirby’s appreciation significant is its celebration of the youth culture that Little Richard’s music wrought. The 1950s, as cultural watchers like to say, was the real ferment of culture-upsetting ideas.
What it allowed some Boomers to do is cherish an idea of youthful impetuosity that is self-involved and self-defeating. Greater minds have said better things about its assaults on cultural life than I can muster here. However, I’d like make the point that this is one of the regrettable legacies of Little Richard.
You take his wonderful, interesting exploitation of vaudeville, the black church, and see its seamless integration into his personality: His pancake make-up, gaudy wardrobe, very gay, Wildean personality. And say, Wow! Like Louis Armstrong, he could make you smile.
Kirby makes a claim that I’m not sure I can agree with: Little Richard was the first cross-cultural black entertainer. By being one of the first black performers to strut his musical stuff in front of fully integrated crowds, Little Richard is a little noticed hero of race relations.
I think that designation really goes to Louis Armstrong. Through his countless tours, jazz sets and albums, but especially his TV appearances he was one of the first, really cool black musicians to become accepted by a white audience.
Sometime ago, I was showing a friend of mine an original recording of Ella Fitzgerald doing her famous rendition of “Mack the Knife” in Switzerland. He’d noticed the no-frills accompaniment, assured and dazzling singing, but the lack of a performance concept.
That’s another thing Little Richard did for music: He made it into a performance art. Armstrong had his performing repertory of hokum, but Little Richard seems to have elaborated and perfected it.
His overwhelming legacy, before Beatlemania, was ushering in youth culture and making it possible for a list of pop acts— Madonna, Michael Jackson, Lady Gaga — to use considerably less talent, personal novelty and various hi jinks to vulgarize and propel the adolescent swing of pop life.
Kirby makes the case that Little Richard was an original and exciting pop artist in a vivid prose, but he also left a cultural dearth. Still, the music was, readily conceding my tender young ears, “A-wop-bop-a-loo-lop-a-lop-bam-boom.
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Chris Timmons shares his insights and conservative sensibilities in a featured blog for The Village Square (and occasionally does a little bit of rock n roll).
(Photo credit.)
June 13th, 2010
“You can tell you’ve created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do.”
Anne Lamott, Grace (Eventually)
(Photo credit.)
April 25th, 2010
The term via media originated in the nineteenth century to describe the middle way between Protestantism and Catholicism, first charted centuries earlier by Queen Elizabeth I navigating her bloody family feud. It is attributed to John Henry Newman who wrote that via media is “neither the one nor the other, but with something of each, cutting between them, and trifling with them both.”
This isn’t unlike the story of America herself, as perhaps our founders most profound insight was to see our diversity as a creative force. Madison called this “factionalism” which he thought promoted deliberation and moderation. A devotion to what Alexander Hamilton referred to as “the constant clashing of opinion” is a fundamental principle of American democracy and I’d argue no small part of our having become a light in the world.
But mature and respectful struggle is hard given human nature, particularly in the age of uber-individualization of everything from I Tune playlists to news programming, and we’re increasingly avoiding the difficulties that come with disagreement. With the rise of a million choices, many of us choose to lead our lives never hearing a peep from people who don’t see it our way. As a result, the marketplace of ideas is ailing, replaced by a growing “tribal” hatred that has written far too many chapters in human history before America came along.
The psychology of like-minded groups is well documented over a hundred years of social psychology experiments: They grow more extreme in the direction of the majority opinion – to the point of actually denying facts in favor of a shared view of reality. We think that describes our current political environment, with two diametrically opposed sets of views and sets of facts.
Enter The Village Square, created by Tallahassee leaders with enduring across-the-aisle friendships and a commitment to revive the central role of jostling of ideas in solving real problems. Our nervy goal is to revive the uniquely American marketplace of ideas, where people stay connected despite their disagreements. We think that has to be done one relationship at a time – one community at a time – beginning in Tallahassee.
Our quarterly “Dinner at the Square” series takes on the most contentious issues of our day and our project “We the People” – winning a highly nationally competitive Knight Community Information Challenge grant through the Community Foundation of North Florida – will offer programming on hot local and state topics along with a groundbreaking project to civilize a tiny part of the internet.
The Village Square will complete its third dinner season this summer on June 22 with “Here I am, Stuck in the Culture Wars with You.” In the fall we will launch the Knight Foundation project, trying to involve as many community organizations and individuals as partners in the project. After building a strong foundation in Tallahassee, we hope The Village Square will grow to new communities.
The early Anglican Church ultimately agreed that – through the Book of Common Prayer – Catholics and Protestants could hit their knees in prayer together even while they disagree.
The Village Square thinks we can find common humanity at the dinner table while we “trifle with them both.”
That’s no small thing. Great countries have been built on it.
(This article was prepared for St. John’s Episcopal Church (The Village Square’s host church) newsletter called Logos.)
March 28th, 2010
“In France one speaks of ‘la ville d’Ys’, the city of Ys, which, because of the simpleness of the surrounding world, disappeared in the depth of a lake. Only people with a pure heart can see this city through the waters of the lake and hear the sound of its bells. This is what we must learn to do with regard to others. But to do so we must first have a purity of heart, a purity of intention, an openness which is not always there – certainly not in me – so that we can listen, can look, and can see the beauty which is hidden.
Every one of us is in the image of God, and every one of us is like a damaged icon. But if we were given an icon damaged by time, damaged by circumstances, or desecrated by human hatred, we would treat it with reverence, with tenderness, with broken-heartedness. We would not pay attention primarily to the fact that it is damaged, but to the tragedy of its being damaged. We would concentrate on what is left of its beauty, and not on what is lost of its beauty.
And this is what we must learn to do with regard to each person as an individual, but also – and this is not always as easy – with regard to groups of people, whether it be a parish or a denomination, or a nation.”
– Met. Anthony of Sourozh
(… by way of Lea…)
(Photo credit.)
December 27th, 2009
Thanks to Lea for bringing my attention to this insightful discussion of extremism in The Screwtape Letters written by C.S. Lewis. Remember that this letter was written by God’s enemy, a senior demon Screwtape, so references in the letter to “The Enemy” are references to God. References to “the patient” are to a man whose soul Screwtape is seeking.
“I had not forgotten my promise to consider whether we should make the patient an extreme patriot or an extreme pacifist. All extremes, except extreme devotion to the Enemy, are to be encouraged. Not always, of course, but at this period. Some ages are lukewarm and complacent, and then it is our business to soothe them yet faster asleep. Other ages, of which the present is one, are unbalanced and prone to faction, and it is our business to inflame them. Any small coterie, bound together by some interest which other men dislike or ignore, tends to develop inside itself a hothouse mutual admiration, and towards the outer world, a great deal of pride and hatred which is entertained without shame because the “Cause” is its sponsor and it is thought to be impersonal. Even when the little group exists originally for the Enemy’s own purposes, this remains true.
“We want the Church to be small not only that fewer men may know the Enemy but also that those who do may acquire the uneasy intensity and the defensive self-rightousness of a secret society or a clique. The Church herself is, of course, heavily defended and we have never yet quite succeeded in giving her all the characteristics of a faction; but subordinate factions within her have often produced admirable results, from the parties of Paul and of Apollos at Corinth down to the High and Low parties in the Church of England.
“If your patient can be induced to become a conscientious objector he will
automatically find himself one of a small, vocal, organised, unpopular society, and the effects of this, on one so new to Christianity, will almost certainly be good. But only almost certainly. Has he had serious doubts about the lawfulness serving in a just war before this present war of serving began? Is he a man of great physical courage—so great that he will have no half-conscious misgivings about the real motives of his pacifism? Can he, when nearest to honesty (no human is ever very near), feel fully convinced that he actuated wholly by the desire to obey the Enemy? If he is that sort of man, his pacifism will probably not do us much good, and the Enemy will probably protect him from the usual consequences of belonging to a sect. Your best plan, in that case, would be to attempt a sudden, confused, emotional crisis from which he might emerge as an uneasy convert to patriotism. Such things can often be managed. But if he is the man I take him to be, try Pacifism.
“Whichever he adopts, your main task will be the same. Let him begin by treating the Patriotism or the Pacifism as a part of his religion. Then let him, under the influence of partisan spirit, come to regard it as the most important part. Then quietly and gradually nurse him on to the stage at which the religion becomes merely part of the “cause”, in which Christianity is valued chiefly because of the excellent arguments it can produce in favour of the British war-effort or of Pacifism. The attitude which you want to guard against is that in which temporal affairs are treated primarily as material for obedience. Once you have made the World an end, and faith a means, you have almost won your man, and it makes very little difference what kind of worldly end he is pursuing. Provided that meetings, pamphlets, policies, movements, causes, and crusades, matter more to him than prayers and sacraments and charity, he is ours—and the more “religious” (on those terms) the more securely ours. I could show you a pretty cageful down here,
Your affectionate uncle
SCREWTAPE”
December 20th, 2009
On this morning’s Meet the Press, Rick Warren of Saddleback Church (emphasis added):
MR. GREGORY: What is testing the faith of Americans, do you think, as we approach this holiday season?
MR. WARREN: Well, no doubt about it, the economy, the, the war in Afghanistan; but also I just think the political divisions are a big deal, that the, the coarsening of our society, that we’re, we’re demonizing differences. Those things need to be dealt with…
This is an important thing that I think even at this Thanksgiving, as we move into the holiday seasons, you don’t have to agree with everybody to work with them on something. I can work with Muslims and atheists and other religions and gays and straights and–I can work with any–if you want to save a life, that’s a human issue. And, and so you don’t have to water down your beliefs, but you, you can work for the common good…
I have friends who are Republicans and I have friends who are Democrats, and I’m for my friends. People ask me, “Are you left wing or right wing?” and it’s pretty well known I say, “I’m for the whole bird,” because I’m for America. And so I want the president to succeed, I want the Congress to succeed…
(Photo credit.)
November 29th, 2009
Last Sunday, U2′s Bono wrote about the Millennium Development Goals, America’s role in achieving them, and touched on the Nobel Peace Prize in doing so. In case you missed it last week like I did….
“We will support the Millennium Development Goals, and approach next year’s summit with a global plan to make them a reality. And we will set our sights on the eradication of extreme poverty in our time.”
They’re not my words, they’re your president’s. If they’re not familiar, it’s because they didn’t make many headlines. But for me, these 36 words are why I believe Mr. Obama could well be a force for peace and prosperity — if the words signal action.
The millennium goals, for those of you who don’t know, are a persistent nag of a noble, global compact. They’re a set of commitments we all made nine years ago whose goal is to halve extreme poverty by 2015. Barack Obama wasn’t there in 2000, but he’s there now. Indeed he’s gone further — all the way, in fact. Halve it, he says, then end it.
Many have spoken about the need for a rebranding of America. Rebrand, restart, reboot. In my view these 36 words, alongside the administration’s approach to fighting nuclear proliferation and climate change, improving relations in the Middle East and, by the way, creating jobs and providing health care at home, are rebranding in action.
These new steps — and those 36 words — remind the world that America is not just a country but an idea, a great idea about opportunity for all and responsibility to your fellow man…
In dangerous, clangorous times, the idea of America rings like a bell (see King, M. L., Jr., and Dylan, Bob). It hits a high note and sustains it without wearing on your nerves. (If only we all could.) This was the melody line of the Marshall Plan and it’s resonating again. Why? Because the world sees that America might just hold the keys to solving the three greatest threats we face on this planet: extreme poverty, extreme ideology and extreme climate change. The world senses that America, with renewed global support, might be better placed to defeat this axis of extremism with a new model of foreign policy…
The president said that he considered the peace prize a call to action. And in the fight against extreme poverty, it’s action, not intentions, that counts. That stirring sentence he uttered last month will ring hollow unless he returns to next year’s United Nations summit meeting with a meaningful, inclusive plan, one that gets results for the billion or more people living on less than $1 a day. Difficult. Very difficult. But doable.
The Nobel Peace Prize is the rest of the world saying, “Don’t blow it.”
But that’s not just directed at Mr. Obama. It’s directed at all of us…
Hmmm. I wonder if we stopped arguing about whether Obama deserved the Nobel and rolled up our sleeves on the Millennium Development Goals, what then?
(Photo credit.)
October 25th, 2009
“You can tell that you have made God in your own image when it turns out that He hates all the same people that you do.”
—Anne Lamott
(Hat tip to Lea.)
October 18th, 2009
In the book, Abraham by Bruce Feiler, he tells the story of an American who after winning fourteen thousand dollars on Wheel of Fortune, decided to come to Israel for a year. Fifteen years later he hadn’t left. He tells a story to answer why:
Two brothers live on either side of a hill. One is wealthy and has no family; the other has a large family but limited wealth. The rich brother decides one night that he is blessed with goods and, taking a sack of grain from his silo, carries it to the silo of his brother. The other brother decides that he is blessed with many children, and since his brother should at least have wealth, he takes a sack of grain from his silo and carries it to that of his brother. Each night they go through this process, and every morning each brother is astounded that he has the same amount of grain as the day before. Finally one night they meet at the top of the hill and realize what’s been happening. They embrace and kiss each other.
And at that moment a heavenly voice declares, “This is the place where I can build my house on earth.”
“That story is shared by all three religions,” David said. “And our tradition says that this is that hill, long before the Temple, long before Abraham. And the point of the story is that this degree of brotherly love is necessary before God can be manifest in the world.”
…This is not only the Spot where it is possible to connect with God, it’s the spot where you can connect with God only if you understand what it means to connect with one another.
“The relationship between a person and another human being is what creates and allows for a relationship with God. If you’re not capable of living with each other and getting along with each other, than you’re not capable of having a re1ationhip with God.” He gestured up at the Wall, the Dome, the churches.
Then he turned back to me. “So the question is not whether God can bring peace into the world. The question is: Can we?”
(Photo credit.)
September 20th, 2009
James 1:19-27:
“You must understand this, my beloved: let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger; for your anger does not produce God’s righteousness. Therefore rid yourselves of all sordidness and rank growth of wickedness, and welcome with meekness the implanted word that has the power to save your souls. But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in a mirror; for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like. But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act – they will be blessed in their doing. If any think they are religious, and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their hearts, their religion is worthless. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.”
(Photo credit.)
September 6th, 2009
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