By Javier Antonio Quiñones Ortiz

Familiarity can betray meaning. The development of concepts such as "genius," "creativity," "originality" and "inspiration," include the dilution of their kernel of significance into palatable social, intellectual and marketable portions. The same, of course, applies to that slippery reality we call "jazz." Such processes are inevitable as meaning and understanding themselves derive from the decantation of life into manageable portions. That, however, is one of the reasons why it is often necessary to retrace the steps taken into a journey of meaning in order to refresh one's understanding of the path taken up to that point. In this fashion, let us take a short trip along side roads that will lead us towards the crossroads of musical inspiration and South African jazz.

The framework of understanding suggested by the word inspiration comes to most of us in the West from a Greek and Judeo Christian background. Conceptually and linguistically, the archeology of that word points towards nature, the divine, beauty, sex, dreams and music.

At its most basic, inspiration is related to the crucial function of breathing and the flow of air in nature. The breath of air was also imbued with cosmological notions as it was considered a vital or energetic force present at the creation of earth. The "breath of life," therefore, was something given by the Creator to all. It is not coincidental that words such as "spirit," and "enthusiasm" derive from the same mythological and philosophical environment as inspiration. In fact, they are related in such a way that one could very well say that they share much of their "DNA," so to speak.

The diviners of inspiration were Aphrodite and Eros. Hence, it is not accidental that beauty, sex and music are projected into our notions of the divine and the arts. It was customary in Homeric times, for example, to say that the "sound" of flutes was "inspired" and later, in Christian influenced thought, the divine spirit was taken as the instrument striking a cither or a lyre. Certain dreams were a divine "breath of life." Hence, since remote times, inspiration was related in Western evolution to various life giving functions.

Enter the life robbing policies of apartheid. When apartheid became part of the political platform of the winning party of the South African election of 1948, its practices were already deeply entrenched in the societal relations within that country. Apartheid simply institutionalized and further developed the status quo of a society governed by a policy of racial separateness, the actual Afrikaans meaning of the word, later masked under the term "separate development." By 1948, on the other hand, jazz was already a presence among the South African population. Jazz and apartheid would inexorably grow together and, in time, only one would survive.

South African musicians, as their counterparts throughout human history have always done, were inspired or rather, led to squeeze life out of their oppressive conditions. When Africans came to the Americas as slaves, for example, they gave rise to immense musical riches inspired under brutal conditions. Their music was, among other things, a source of bemusement and resistance. In Psalm 137, the captive Jews in Babylon are said to have cried to their God because their captors, apparently seduced by the joyful tunes of Zion sung by their captives, were asking them to sing such happy tunes while the Jews were suffering captivity away from Zion. The passage relates that their lyres were hung on willow trees. Was that also an act of resistance on the part of the Israeli musicians? Either way, the captivities of the Jews throughout history also led to a wealth of musical, literary, artistic and theological inspiration that remains with us today. The Jews, however, have not been the only ones to ask themselves "How shall we sing the Lord's song in a foreign land?" as the same can be said of any number of human groups faced with oppression throughout times gone by. South Africans, however, were unfortunate enough to have the most recent stretch of racial or ethnic based oppression of its kind.

Predictably, musical inspiration in South Africa, under apartheid, was a breath of life. While apartheid was being systematized, the Manhattan Brothers, for example, were becoming leading emblems on the townships and beyond and they can be seen as an archetype for some of the issues of inspiration and jazz in South Africa.

Faced with an incipient apartheid, they managed to funnel their inspired musical amalgamation into sundry musical, cultural, social and political incarnations. For them, inspiration led to a synthesis of North American jazz and popular music, Christian choral traditions with African inflections, it informed their particular way of dressing, smoking, talking, engaging the music industry, behaving, as well as emotional sustenance during their eventual exile. Theirs is a tale of survival of the jazziest as they were actively persecuted by the authorities even during rehearsals, which in turn became a muse itself. They embodied a type of black urbanity that threatened the reigning system as the growing urban black South African masses jazzed-up their lives in apartheid-laden conditions.

As the first South African musical superstars, The Manhattan Brothers served as a launching pad for Miriam Makeba, who first recorded with them. Perhaps it would suffice to say that she was inspired enough to become a figure worth calling "Mama Africa." She overturned the asphyxiating effects of apartheid into a source of personal inspiration, leading to a successful career in music, literature, cinema and diplomatic endeavors. Makeba is Africa's "Mama Inspiration to the World" as she touched millions of lives throughout the world, and still does. Aside from her many accolades, many audiences are unaware, for example, that her 1967 hit "Pata Pata" was quite influential in the Spanish Caribbean and New York Hispanic musical circles that eventually lead to what became known as Salsa.

Dollar Brand, who upon his conversion to Islam in the late '60s became known as Abdullah Ibrahim, also was prepared for his encounters in inspiration through The Manhattan Brothers during the 50s. He and trumpeter Hugh Masekela, another disciple of the aforementioned quartet, were also inspired to further their influence and playing by the oppressive lunacy of apartheid. In time, both became South African world musical ambassadors of extant authority.

From The Manhattan Brothers, through every key musical genre or style, within and without jazz, as well as their corresponding national and international groups and artists, South Africans were able to breathe life into deadly conditions creating music of their own that entertained, refreshed, invigorated, sustained and inspired countless people throughout the globe, as well as themselves. Separateness died of asphyxia and harmony prevailed in the inspiration given and received by jazz pioneers whose careers in South Africa experienced many of the malaises that their historic counterparts experienced in the jazz past. Their inspiration, however, opened doors for the current bunch of South African jazz artists whose biggest challenge now is to inspire themselves and others to march through roads of unforeseen freedom.