Has Conscious Black music gotten more of a voice in the Obama era?
'How We Got Over?': John Legend and The Roots Look Back
by Mark Anthony Neal | TheLoop21
As the myth goes, Clara Ward, one of the most influential Gospel singers of the 20th Century, wrote the song “How I Got Over” after a racist incident in the deep South. The Clara Ward singers were driving down South when their Cadillac was surrounded by a group of White men, upset that a group of Black women were driving in such a fine car. Supposedly Ward feigned being possessed by the devil and the men ran off. The subsequent song “How I Got Over,” which was later popularized by Mahalia Jackson and Aretha Franklin, and recently invoked by The Roots, is not only a testament to “God’s deliverance,” but also a tribute to African-American ingenuity in the face of danger and trauma.
Ward knew, as well as anyone, that the song’s title tapped into the spirit of improvisation that manifested itself in the everyday survival skills of African-Americans, and it was the music that animated both that creative spirit and the will for freedom that marked earlier generations of Black culture. Conventional wisdom suggest that the irrepressible spirit that help Blacks transcend From Slavery to Freedom, to invoke the late great historian John Hope Franklin, is not present among this generation of artists and creative intellectuals. Wake Up! by John Legend & the Roots, suggest the error of conventional wisdom.
The thing that is perhaps most striking about Wake Up! is that it was even made; prior to Barack Obama election it’s easy to imagine record labels frowning on such project, particularly for artists who already presented a mainstream marketing challenge because of their “conscious” personas. It’s a different story in 2010 and what the Obama era has meant for many recording artists, is the total collapse of the music industry’s most recent business model. While the industry tries to chart an exit strategy (perhaps mirroring the Obama administration), some artists are suddenly finding the freedom to just simply get back to the music. Longtime Public Enemy front-man Chuck D, for example, recently suggested that conditions for recording artists are the best they have been in more than a generation.
by Mark Anthony Neal | TheLoop21
As the myth goes, Clara Ward, one of the most influential Gospel singers of the 20th Century, wrote the song “How I Got Over” after a racist incident in the deep South. The Clara Ward singers were driving down South when their Cadillac was surrounded by a group of White men, upset that a group of Black women were driving in such a fine car. Supposedly Ward feigned being possessed by the devil and the men ran off. The subsequent song “How I Got Over,” which was later popularized by Mahalia Jackson and Aretha Franklin, and recently invoked by The Roots, is not only a testament to “God’s deliverance,” but also a tribute to African-American ingenuity in the face of danger and trauma.
Ward knew, as well as anyone, that the song’s title tapped into the spirit of improvisation that manifested itself in the everyday survival skills of African-Americans, and it was the music that animated both that creative spirit and the will for freedom that marked earlier generations of Black culture. Conventional wisdom suggest that the irrepressible spirit that help Blacks transcend From Slavery to Freedom, to invoke the late great historian John Hope Franklin, is not present among this generation of artists and creative intellectuals. Wake Up! by John Legend & the Roots, suggest the error of conventional wisdom.
The thing that is perhaps most striking about Wake Up! is that it was even made; prior to Barack Obama election it’s easy to imagine record labels frowning on such project, particularly for artists who already presented a mainstream marketing challenge because of their “conscious” personas. It’s a different story in 2010 and what the Obama era has meant for many recording artists, is the total collapse of the music industry’s most recent business model. While the industry tries to chart an exit strategy (perhaps mirroring the Obama administration), some artists are suddenly finding the freedom to just simply get back to the music. Longtime Public Enemy front-man Chuck D, for example, recently suggested that conditions for recording artists are the best they have been in more than a generation.
Read the Full Essay @ theLoop21
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