I surrendered to the music, and felt some of the heaviness leave me.
Don't shoot. I want to live." I felt the command and affirmation in the music. When I jumped back in to the song, the ensemble grew louder and and the phrase shortened to "hands up." But by then, it had become a call to action, to get involved. Yet the richness of Jon's roux, of his rhythm section, kept it grounded in the musical experience. It was not a rally this was not a speech. Jang's music was artful energy work that was infusing us with a will to "upset the set up." This particular number set to my "Ferguson Diaries" made a chorus out of the phrase "Hands up. I watched as people's heads moved in time to the music. I watched Black people look delighted and surprised as they heard the depth of Jang's Black music engagement. Funk, Mingus, gospel, jazz and his own Chinese heritage. Nonetheless, I was caught by surprise this weekend by Jon Jang's "Can't Stop Cryin' for America." There I was on a stage at SF Jazz, listening to the Jon Jangtet go all in on one of his original compositions and it just hit me how much I really liked his music. Jon had invited me to collaborate on his new piece "Can't Stop Cryin' for America Black Lives Matter." I was sitting on a high stool waiting for my entrance.
Almost thirty years ago I heard an administrator with Luis Valdez's Teatro Campesino say "The art leads." How true that's been to me. When I didn't know what happened to my mother, my play told me she'd been in jail for five years. My mother later confirmed this. When I needed to switch careers, my character Jemima said "Stop hiding behind that podium." Art leads.Īrt circumvents the determinism and tiny self-focus of the mind art goes straight to the wisdom of the heart. Nothing creates community like art. Just this morning my violinist husband said he plays chamber music so that he can be with other people without their walls being up. Even religion relies on art to access divinity, God/Spirit within.
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