'Left of Black': Episode #25 featuring Guy Ramsey, Jr. and Esther Iverem

Left of Black #25
w/Guthrie “Guy” Ramsey, Jr. and Esther Iverem
March 14, 2011

Left of Black host Mark Anthony Neal is joined via Skype by musician, author, professor and curator Guthrie Ramsey, Jr.. Later Black indie digital media pioneer and SeeingBlack.com founder Esther Iverem, joins Neal, also via Skype.

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→Guthrie Ramsey, Jr. is the Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn Term Professor of Music at the University of Pennsylvania and co-curator of Ain’t Nothing Like the Real Thing: How the Apollo Theater Shaped American Entertainment, currently exhibited at the Museum of the City of New York. Ramsey is the author of Race Music: Black Cultures from Bebop to Hip-Hop ( University of California Press, 2003) and the forthcoming In Walked Bud: Earl “Bud ” Powell and the Modern Jazz Challenge.

→Esther Iverem is founder and editor of SeeingBlack.com, which celebrates its 10th anniversary this year. A journalist, poet and author, Iverem’s most recent book is We Gotta Have It: Twenty Years of Seeing Black at the Movies, 1986-2006 (Thunder’s Mouth Press). A former staff writer for several newspapers, including The Washington Post and New York Newsday, she is the recipient of numerous honors, including a USC Annenberg/Getty Arts Journalism Fellowship, a National Arts Journalism Fellowship and an artist’s fellowship from the D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities. She is also a member of the Washington Area Film Critics Association and the Alliance of Women Film Journalists.

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Left of Black is a weekly Webcast hosted by Mark Anthony Neal and produced in collaboration with the John Hope Franklin Center at Duke University.

Is America's 'Race Music' Past Hurting Janelle Monae?

How a segregated music industry makes it almost impossible for genre-busting musical talent to succeed.

Is America's 'Race Music' Past Hurting Janelle Monae?

by Latoya Peterson

Kitschy, socially conscious singer and songwriter Janelle Monae has all the tools for a successful debut music career--interesting and dynamic production, a melodic singing voice, an interesting look, a new dance--and one of hip-hop's heavy hitters (Big Boi, of Outkast fame) as her mentor and co-collaborator. So why hasn't her new single torn up the airwaves? Is it because the world isn't ready for Monae's tuxedoed swagger and retro-meets-R&B supersonic sound? Or is it the music industry's stubborn adherence to narrowly defined genres, coupled with monopolization of the airwaves?

As an independent artist, Janelle Monae's fresh sound may actually be her downfall. Since her music crosses conventions, a logical conclusion would be that the Atlanta-based singer/songwriter has a broad appeal. Unfortunately, thanks to a system where music is market tested and distilled down to appeal to just one demographic, ''innovating'' means ''liability.'' Our current state of musical affairs stems from America's racial past. Before euphemisms like ''urban'' took hold, music was strictly divided among racial lines--black music for black audiences, white music for white audiences. These boundaries began eroding in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s as music consumers would twist the radio dials in search of their favorite sound. However, as racial boundaries fell, new barriers sprang into place. The music business began tightening its model for ''success.'' Instead of allowing artists to organically flourish from record to record, the industry started favoring bands that would churn out hits. And musical artistry has suffered for it.

In The Hip Hop Wars, scholar Tricia Rose discusses the commercialization of music, and the influence that consolidation has had on playlists, noting, ''Commercially established major-label acts, because of their visibility and notoriety, are easily packaged for a national audience and easily transportable across regions. Thus they dominate their genre specific playlists across the country'' (p.19). In conjunction with overall control of media shifting to just a handful of companies, this move effectively discouraged stations from taking risks with their content. While most regions have been able to hold on to a small hour or so in the daily programming to promote local music and local artists, the vast majority of airtime is dedicated to artists who have the backing of major labels, artists who fit a certain type of sound.

Most black artists who fall outside of the accepted bounds of the ''urban'' genre (which is hip-hop, R&B, and the occasional gospel tune) find themselves sidelined, unable to hear their music on the stations they love. Though breakout star Santigold toured with everyone from Jay-Z to Björk and collaborated with GZA and Res, most of her record sales and airplay have come from rock and pop stations. The Los Angeles duo, J*Davey, with their eclectic sound and rocker styling, have made waves in smaller circles but have yet to translate to mainstream play. And musical history is littered with the careers of women like Macy Gray and Kelis, who found more support for their music overseas than they ever found stateside.

Read the Full Essay @ The Root

MusiQology 101 with Guthrie Ramsey, Jr.

MusiQology 101 with Dr. Guy
by Mark Anthony Neal

By day Guthrie Ramsey, Jr. is a not-so-mild-mannered ethnomusicologist and college professor (and part-time baseball player), but by night he dons his Funkenstein cape and transforms into Dr. Guy, an accomplished pianist and leader of Dr. Guy’s MusiQology. Y the Q?, the first release from Dr. Guy’s MusiQology, pushes the boundaries of what some might refer to as “Smooth Jazz," and draws on references like Quincy Jones, Joe Sample, Toni Morrison (“Sula’s Groove, “Dorcas’s Lament” and “Milkman’s Dues”), Herbie Hancock and the Doobie Brothers, while giving love to the Philly community that he now claims.

Read More at CriticalNoir @ Vibe.com