By Emmett G. Price III
Ever since its inception, the improvised-based music we know as jazz has faced jury after jury of naysayers who express loose sentiments that jazz is a passing fad, jazz is not art and most recently, jazz is not a legitimate creative expression worthy of legal protection.
Time and time again, jazz has successfully risen, bruised and often scarred, but overwhelmingly and abundantly victorious. Not only has jazz become an esteemed music of the world, it has also received controversial validation as "America's classical music," and/or "America's greatest gift to the world." Jazz, similar to the numerous people who create it, is a survivor. Nevertheless, as often occurs with a reigning victor, the challenges continue. Perhaps the most offensive or dangerous challenge facing jazz in the present is an actual personal attack against those who continue to innovate, transform and breathe life into the music--the composers.
The intersection of the terms jazz and composition has always been somewhat of an awkward juncture that most scholars and jazz historians avoid. Many acclaimed artists are praised for their musical prowess, technical mastery, grasp of repertoire and even their ability to produce music over a lengthy amount of time, yet the idea of jazz musicians as composers often falls second to the jazz musician as an improviser. Names of great composers such as Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, Mary Lou Williams, Benny Golson, Tadd Dameron, John Lewis, Horace Silver and others quickly rise to the top of the list. Yet, all jazz musicians are inherently composers. The essence of improvisation is spontaneous composition! One music dictionary defines "composition" with these words:
The art of putting together notes to create an original work of music.
(London: Sphere Books LTD., 1982)
Although most composers would claim that an initial inspiration is essential before such an act can take place, the process also requires a previous knowledge and study of compositional techniques, which are then applied to the creative process. These include harmony, counterpoint, and instrumentation as well as free composition itself. (London: Sphere Books Ltd., 1982)
As a musical genre heavily influenced by its African roots, jazz relies on certain characteristics and nuances prominent within music of the African Diaspora. According to composer, scholar and highly decorated and widely cited professor of music, Olly Wilson, the "conceptual approach to music-making that gives African and African-American music their shared distinctive qualities are:
* The approach to the organization of rhythm based on the principle of rhythmic and implied metrical contrast.
* The tendency to approach singing or playing any instrument in a percussive manner.
* The tendency to create musical forms in which antiphonal, responsorial, or call and response musical structures abroad.
* The tendency to create a high density of musical events within a relatively short musical time frame--tendency to fill up all of the musical space.
* The tendency to incorporate physical body motion as an intrinsic part of the music making process.
* The tendency to approach music making in which kaleidoscopic range of dramatically contrasting sound colors (or timbres) in both vocal and instrumental music are used. (also known as "the Heterogeneous Sound Ideal"--Wilson, 1983, p.3)"
(Wilson, 1992, p.157; Wilson, 1990, p.29; Wilson, n.p.)
Wilson sums up all of these tendencies when he writes that the conceptual approach to music of the African Diaspora is, "the way of doing something, not simply, something that is done." (Wilson, 1974, p.20)
Unfortunately, Wilson's analysis of the conceptual approaches to music-making within the African Diaspora or the definition of composition according to not only the mentioned citation but numerous other consenting opinions, did not assist jazz or flautist James Newton.
On May 10, 2000, musician, composer, and educator James Newton filed a lawsuit with the United States District Court of the Central District of California with the allegation of copyright infringement. The subject of the suit was a six and a half second sample of Newton's composition "Choir" that is looped continuously through the 1992 Beastie Boys recording "Pass the Mic," on the album Check Your Head. Newton's composition, recorded in 1981 and released on the highly regarded album Axum, was registered with the copyright office and ASCAP (American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers) in 1978. Yet two years after Newton's lawsuit, Judge Nora M. Manella considered the work a recording as opposed to a composition and found in favor of the Beastie Boys, who acquired the permission of ECM Records but not that of Newton. According to present copyright law, permission must be secured from the record label and the copyright holder, in this case Newton's JANEW Music.
Composed as a contemporary spiritual, Newton aimed to capture the sound and sentiment of four Black women singing in church in rural Arkansas. Newton not only utilized the conceptual approach to music making presented by Wilson, he also used the conceptual approach to capture the music on paper. The professor of music at California State University-Los Angeles, who is not only an expert in jazz but also classical/concert music as well, notated the composition as a modern spiritual as opposed to a classical composition. An admirable and perhaps impressive task. Yet, Judge Manella was all but impressed. Revealing her euro-centric perspective and ill-informed grasp of the subject, Judge Manella compared what she suggested as the lack of treatment of Newton's notation of "Choir" to the work of Purcell's "Dido and Aeneas" and Cole Porter's "Night and Day." This judgment is reminiscent of the era when western European music was considered "serious" music and all other was not. Similarly, it reflects the early sentiments that African and African-based music was and remains "primitive."
The creative expression we know as jazz remains under attack. If the fact that the composition was registered, copyrighted and captured on record is not enough, what is? Does the owner of the copyright no longer have the right of protection of his/her creative work? Must jazz continue to be judged against, compared or even held to a "standard" based on Western European music? Perhaps it is time to unveil the superficial respect and false prestige offered to jazz and challenge each other to invest in its reality. Perhaps this should be a lesson in respect. Respect not only the talent and artistic creation of others but more importantly respect the artistsÃÂÃÂÃÂÃÂ rights to control the art that they create. Be aware, be alert, now is the time to be loyal to jazz, for jazz and we as the jazz community are under attack!
Sources:
"Beastie Boys Respond to 'Pass the Mic' Lawsuit" Business Wire. May 24, 2000.
"composition" in Dictionary of Music. Edited by Alan Isaacs and Elizabeth Martin. London: Sphere Books, LTD, 1982.
Newton, James. "James Newton Loses To Beastie Boys: Amicus Support Requested--URGENT!!!" circulated online, August 2002.
Wilson, Olly. "Black Music as an Art Form," in Black Music Research Journal. Volume 3, 1983
_____. "Musical Analysis of African-American Music" n.p., n.d.
_____. "The Heterogeneous Sound Ideal in African-American Music" in Signifyin(g), Sanctifyin', & Slam Dunking: A Reader in African American Expressive Culture. Edited by Gena Dagel Caponi. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1999 [reprinted from New Perspectives on Music: Essays in Honor of Eileen Southern. Edited by Josephine Wright with Samuel A. Floyd, Jr. Warren, Michigan: Harmonie Park Press, 1992.]
_____. "The Influence of Jazz on the History and Development of Concert Music," in New Perspectives on Jazz. Edited by David N. Baker. Washington and London: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1990.
Wiltz, Teresa. "The Flute Case That Fell Apart: Ruling on Sampling has Composers Rattled" Washington Post. Thursday August 22, 2002; p.C01.
