Love and Appreciation For the XYZ of Jazz

It is always a pleasure for me when I can indulge in the sweetness of jazz. It captivates me like no other genre and I joyfully indulge in it when presented with the opportunity to embrace the pomp and pageantry of it.

I remember the day when my good friend presented the thought to me of being the featured vocalist at his weekly jazz event. Imagine how filled with curiosity the Roman Catholic church raised choir girl that I was who was more accustomed to singing R&B than any other genre was. How could I not look at him with a quizzical gaze? The idea made me take a hard look at myself, but I decided to try my best to handle the weight of the idea and I did it.

If for nothing, my good friend affected my life like none other because from that point on, I

have been on this non-stop journey of discovery, research and mind-blowing experiences to remember. If it were not for him, I would have never decided to approach jazz with more intentionality or accumulate knowledge of its history to base my 30-paged college thesis on jazz and racism. Or, I may not have ever decided to become more indulged in studying music theory and practicing my craft. And if it were not for him, I would have never started my radio show on jazz. And so, whenever I am afforded with the opportunity to sing in this beautiful genre of music, I simply rejoice because I love how jazz has truly made a personal connection with me.  

Jazz Appreciation Month

Every April is Jazz Appreciation Month. The Smithsonian Institute started this cultural celebration in 2001 and since, it has been a way to honor those influential innovators who have come before us in history and jazzed up the world with their beautiful music.  

And so, it was with great zeal to have joined in the plethora of performers in Eric Frazier’s 2018 Fort Greene Park Spring Jazz Festival which happened in the midst of Jazz Appreciation Month in Brooklyn, NY. Jazz is not a fossilized genre of music; it is very much alive. So, with that in mind, I must say that the afternoon was filled with a full swath of emotions.

What makes jazz so appealing to me is that no matter who is playing their instrument or vocalizing, each comes with their own individual expression and create very genuine reactions. Each comes with their own spunk of character with their difference in method based on culture and environment, and the joy of the company and the spirit of the music is what is felt in the air.

And so, it was a pretty nice event from the music, to the musicians, to the beautiful spring day that it was, to the people and everything that made the afternoon a splendid occasion.

To my delight, I felt enchanted to sing one of my favorite jazz standards. It is by Harry Warren and Al Dublin and what makes me like it so much is for one simple reason. I am a big English nerd and there is a play-on-words in the song. Its title, September in the Rain, would suggest it is a song for the fall season but in the song, the lyrics say, "though spring is here." I think it is the way the writers wrote these tunes that give me butterflies the most. They truly had a way with words and I just love that. In that particular Brooklyn environment and in the warmth of that spring day, it felt right to sing this song.

I invite you to check out the performance from the festival here: https://youtu.be/BK8faET7Nn4 

Today’s blog post was prompted by love and I threw myself into writing mode with that in mind and come to this point with a roar of satisfaction. I hope that I sparked in you, even a small bit of interest n my story. 

The warm feeling in my heart can’t even truly define my gratitude. You richly bless me by taking the time out the routine of your day to read my thoughts and I thank you for your continued support.

James Weldon Johnson's Masterpiece Takes Beyonce

“Life is nothing but a dream, and if we are artists, then we can create our life with love, and our dream becomes a masterpiece of art”

(Don Miguel Ruiz)

I remember reading James Weldon Johnson’s “The Diary of an Ex-Black Man” and in it he spoke about an experience where he realized he was black and ran home to ask his mother if he really was black because he did not know until a teacher told him.

The innocence in that amazes me. The beauty of his writing thrilled me. The masterpiece of his song that came to be known as “The Black National Anthem” moves me.

He showed people of color that we can lift our voices to be heard because we have identities and we can own our own ambitions to march on being perfectly black even though we labor to open eyes to a vision of being not so different and lovable though we are different simply because our skin colors are not the same.

Beyonce and the fierce fighting woman that she is, proved how the hope that this song has always built in people of color and also provides a a sense of empowerment in using our voices to daily renew the fire within. 

She did it with visual presentations of what reporting to active duty as a soldier in the war for true equality looks like when she levels the playing field and makes black life across the globe know in truth that beauty in identity is not a one-size-fits-all kind of thing when she showcases the beauty of the normal physiology of her skin and sings James Weldon Johnson's song live. Her performance on Coachella resonated with me and I tried to capture my thoughts of it in a poem since it is National Poetry Month. I hope you will read it.  

James Weldon Johnson’s Masterpiece 
Takes Beyonce

Black Woman

Strong Woman

Good Woman

I am Woman

I am Daughter

I am Sister

I am Cousin

I, the Writer

I am Blessed

I Confess

I am Set

I am First

I am History

I Have a Ministry

I the American

I the Woman

I the American Woman

I the Black Woman

I the Strong Black Woman

I who Lift My Voice in Sing

‘Til Earth and Heaven Ring

I’m down with the Kings

Because, I the Queen

I Am the First

To show all the Haters

I Did it

Like a Teacher

Schooling us to own our Blackness

To possess Pride

Of being who you are

In your Blackness

In your status

In your number

Because you are a Number

Because you are in the Number

Because you Are

Because you have an Identity.

Rings with the Harmony

Of Liberty

Like a church bell on Sunday Morning

In Brooklyn

High as the glistening Skies

March on Beyonce.

I respect who you are.

You are Cultural!

You are Strong!

You are Fierce!

You are Black!

You are a Soldier in the Army of God!

And you are Shining Your Light!

Now Even the Young, Gifted and Black Youth will be able to Sing the Black National Anthem

Who may not have known there was a

Black National Anthem

Until they saw Coachella in 2018.

______________________________________________________

Hey speaking of culture.

I wrote a song about the beauty of my family’s culture.

The video does a better job of displaying it though and I hope that you will take a minute to watch my video entitled Saut D’eau Song written and produced by Stephanie Jeannot. Though it only shows bits and pieces of beautiful Haiti, I am glad to have been able to see it with mine own eyes. The beauty in culture moves me. 

Thank you so much for stopping by my page and for taking the time to read my blogpost. Be so wonderfully blessed.

A Heart of Love for Culture and Music

I fall into the arms of love every time music fills the air and I am blessed with the opportunity to enjoy it. I am left with a cheerful disposition and a sunny temperament; especially when I can experience the great reward of performing songs that I wrote.

It is not every day that I am bursting in creativity. There are times when I have writer’s block and it kills me in so many ways. I can make up a cacophony of excuses for the days when trying to put words to the paper does not happen in the manner I would like, but at those moments when a flood of good thoughts just doesn’t seem to push through, there is nothing I can do to change that. It just happens. 

But then in that season of your life, someone comes along and inspires you with an idea and boom, there you go with a feeling of empowerment that allows you to once again, regain control of the writing process and productivity happens. I guess such was the case with the song my mom asked me to write. 

She had this confident expectation that a song would come out of her mere request. I guess the intention and hope that I had of being able to fulfill it was all I needed to be able to write Saut D’eau Song, a song about a region in Haiti where one of the most beautiful waterfalls in the world lives. 

The words came like an army of love, marching with intention to tear down the mountain that once blocked the free flow of words and at that particular moment, had a burning need to be released. If you are interested, you can check out the original tune here: https://open.spotify.com/track/6OgJmDcNvmBdnQzoNwOkp7?si=bILPJgF3SiObfMI92URzUw

I will admit that it was a bit different for me to write a song like this and I still can’t say why I had never intentionally written about the Haitian culture that was introduced to me as a child and that I grew up coming to know. But this tune gave me a reason to go deeper into my thoughts, share my own experiences about a place I had seen with my own eyes and confidently share a bit of my identity and story. And so, you can say it was a spirited event to actually perform this song live with my band for the first time. 

To grow up in the margins of cross-culturalization is to know a bit of more than one cultural background, practice the mores and behavioral patterns from a bit of each yet to dance to the beat of where you are, because you are there. But to be able to share a piece of what makes you different with people from all walks of life in the atmosphere of a musical gathering, and without fearing being exactly who you are, feels good. 

All I can say is that if you see a beatific smile across my face, it is because the other evening, under the brilliant sparkle of the moon, I turned the musical focus of interest to Haiti and shared a glamorized view of my ancestor’s home through song and had appreciable results. Drums by Richie Johnson echoed through the room as Kenny Alston plucked his bass with fierceness, Prrrl tickled the ivories with peculiar phraseology and Herb Lewis added a nice shaft of light with his saxophone which made me sing my lyrics with a heart of love. Together we performed this song for the first time at Silvana which is located in the Harlem section of New York and I would so love it if you would check it out here.The song is called Saut D’Eau Song and this is the live version that I was telling you about: https://youtu.be/Lls4VddAe_8

Thank you for allowing me to enthrall your attention to the detailed content of my story for just a bit. I admit that I can be a bit dramatic when reporting the good things that happened to me in my daily life, but such is the art of conversation. 

I hope my words did not meet you with a frozen silence, a blank gaze or find you determined to reach to the end of this post without any interest for what was being discussed but rather, that it reproduced a blossom of joy through your mental boundary in some way or another. Everybody is full of opinions which is something that cannot be avoided, I know. Yet still I hope that yours of me, based on this post was a good one. 

I must thank you for allowing this interlude from your song and dance, to waltz into the seductive tempo that is my life. Much love and respect to you!