nikole hannah-jones

From The New York Times Magazine, I’m Nikole Hannah-Jones. This is “1619.” This week, Wesley Morris on the birth of American music.

[music]

wesley morris

So last fall, I am at my friend’s house. We are making dinner. I’m chopping vegetables. And I asked my friend Brett, who was cooking with me, can you put on some music? And he said, what do you want to listen to? And I said, have you ever heard of yacht rock? And he said, what? I said, yacht rock, have you ever heard of this? And he goes, no, I have not. So he finds the yacht rock station in Pandora, which — I don’t know why or how he’s still a Pandora guy, with all due respect to Pandora. He is one. And he finds the yacht rock station. At some point, Brett has to go run an errand. I think I might have sent him on one, I don’t remember. But he’s gone. So I’m alone, just me, with the vegetables and the yacht rock. It gives me plenty of time to really think about the songs I’m hearing.

archived recording [MUSIC - PLAYER, “BABY COME BACK”] Baby come back, any kind of fool could see —

wesley morris

We’re talking about music made between the years of, I don’t know, I would say, like, 1975 to about 1983. Things like —

archived recording [MUSIC - ACES, “HOW LONG”] How long has this been going on?

wesley morris

— Aces, “How Long.”

archived recording [MUSIC - SEALS AND CROFTS, “SUMMER BREEZE”] Summer breeze makes me feel fine —

wesley morris

Seals and Crofts, doing “Summer Breeze.” I’m hearing things like —

archived recording [MUSIC - ROBBIE DUPREE, “STEAL AWAY”] Why don’t we steal away —

wesley morris

“Steal Away” by Robbie Dupree.

archived recording [MUSIC - ROBBIE DUPREE, “STEAL AWAY”] — steal away, why don’t we —

wesley morris

And The Doobie Brothers, “What a Fool Believes.”

archived recording [MUSIC - THE DOOBIE BROTHERS, “WHAT A FOOL BELIEVES”] He came from somewhere back in her long-ago, the sentimental fool don’t see, trying hard to —

wesley morris

It is like our soft rock-est period in American popular music. The joke of yacht rock is that whoever invented it, and whoever’s making a playlist out of these songs, is basically saying that they’re inconsequential and that what’s in them doesn’t matter.

archived recording [MUSIC - SUPERTRAMP, “GOODBYE STRANGER”] Goodbye stranger, it’s been nice —

wesley morris

But what I know I’m hearing is something bigger and deeper than that.

archived recording [MUSIC - SUPERTRAMP, “GOODBYE STRANGER”] Tried to see your point of view —

wesley morris

Every song has something about it that is similar to the other songs.

archived recording [MUSIC - TOTO, “ROSANNA”] All I want to do when I wake up in the morning is see your eyes —

wesley morris

I’m hearing things like “Rosanna” by Toto.

archived recording [MUSIC - TOTO, “ROSANNA”] Rosanna, Rosanna —

wesley morris

Which seems perfectly banal, has a really good beat, sort of builds to its chorus.

archived recording [MUSIC - TOTO, “ROSANNA”] All I want to do in the middle of the evening is hold you tight —

wesley morris

But then at the end —

archived recording [MUSIC - TOTO, “ROSANNA”] Not quite a year since she went away —

wesley morris

I’m hearing —

archived recording [MUSIC - TOTO, “ROSANNA”] Rosanna, yeah —

wesley morris

The great doo-wop harmonies of the ‘50s and ‘60s.

archived recording [MUSIC - TOTO, “ROSANNA”] — and I have to say.

wesley morris

There is something jazz-like in the syncopated music of something like Steely Dan.

archived recording [MUSIC - STEELY DAN, “DO IT AGAIN”]

wesley morris

You can hear in somebody like Michael McDonald —

archived recording [MUSIC - THE DOOBIE BROTHERS, “WHAT A FOOL BELIEVES”]

wesley morris

Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah-ah. That is, like, a gospel breakdown.

archived recording [MUSIC - THE DOOBIE BROTHERS, “WHAT A FOOL BELIEVES”]

wesley morris

What I’m hearing in all of these songs is, basically, blackness.

archived recording [MUSIC - KENNY LOGGINS, “THIS IS IT”]

wesley morris

And the song in which I am hearing it the deepest, and strongest, and most powerfully, at least to me, standing in that kitchen, chopping those vegetables, was when Kenny Loggins’s “This is It” comes on.

archived recording [MUSIC - KENNY LOGGINS, “THIS IS IT”] There’ve been times in my life, I’ve been wondering why —

wesley morris

It’s got a kind of loosely disco-like rhythm to it. There’s a lot of percussion sort of going back and forth and around.

archived recording [MUSIC - KENNY LOGGINS, “THIS IS IT”] Now I’m not so sure —

wesley morris

“Sure” — Kenny Loggins is basically sing-whispering the verses in this song.

archived recording [MUSIC - KENNY LOGGINS, “THIS IS IT”] One good reason to try.

wesley morris

Doing this very light coo —

archived recording [MUSIC - KENNY LOGGINS, “THIS IS IT”] But what more can I say?

wesley morris

And then in the pre-chorus, Kenny Loggins disappears, and who shows up? Michael McDonald.

archived recording [MUSIC - KENNY LOGGINS, “THIS IS IT”] You think that maybe it’s over, only if you want it to be —

wesley morris

Giving Kenny Loggins plenty of time to gather himself.

archived recording [MUSIC - KENNY LOGGINS, “THIS IS IT”] Are you going to wait for a sign — your miracle.

wesley morris

When he sings the word miracle, he doesn’t sing, miracle! He goes, mirr — a — cle!

archived recording [MUSIC - KENNY LOGGINS, “THIS IS IT”] Your miracle.

wesley morris

Like he is scraping the bottom of a pan to get all of the good bits off of it before you pour the gravy in.

archived recording [MUSIC - KENNY LOGGINS, “THIS IS IT”] Make no mistake where you are. This is it! Your back’s to the corner. This is it.

wesley morris

Scraping the pan is the blackest thing you can do as a singer, and here is Kenny Loggins, as this white artist, doing it.

archived recording [MUSIC - KENNY LOGGINS, “THIS IS IT”] The waiting is over, so don’t you run, no —

wesley morris

And then the gravy comes —

archived recording [MUSIC - KENNY LOGGINS, “THIS IS IT”] This is it, make no mistake where you are. This is it —

wesley morris

He is at the top of the church at this point. He has elevated himself to the rafters. There’s no more — he is at the roof, trying to clear a way to get to heaven, but there’s just church roof in the way.

archived recording [MUSIC - KENNY LOGGINS, “THIS IS IT”] This is it! No one can tell what the future holds. This is it! Your back’s to the corner.

wesley morris

He’s not the greatest singer, but there’s a kind of gumption and nerve to the singing of this song —

archived recording [MUSIC - KENNY LOGGINS, “THIS IS IT”] The waiting is over.

wesley morris

— that cannot be denied. A tip of the hat to him. I just had to stand there, and I just — I actually cracked up. I just put down the knife, and I cracked up. And it felt so pleasurable. And then I started thinking about all these other singers I love.

archived recording [MUSIC - AMY WINEHOUSE, “BACK TO BLACK”] We only said goodbye with words —

wesley morris

I’m thinking about Amy Winehouse.

archived recording [MUSIC - AMY WINEHOUSE, “BACK TO BLACK”] I died a hundred times.

wesley morris

I’m thinking about Annie Lennox.

archived recording [MUSIC - ANNIE LENNOX, “LITTLE BIRD”] Give me the strength to carry on.

wesley morris

I’m thinking about George Michael.

archived recording [MUSIC - GEORGE MICHAEL, “FAITH”] Before this river becomes an ocean, before you throw my heart back on the floor.

wesley morris

I think about Chris Stapleton —

archived recording [MUSIC - CHRIS STAPLETON, “TENNESSEE WHISKEY”] — used to spend my nights out in a barroom.

wesley morris

— who practices a kind of muscly blues that gets written off as country because he’s a big white guy in a hat.

archived recording [MUSIC - CHRIS STAPLETON, “TENNESSEE WHISKEY”] Liquor was the only love I’d known.

wesley morris

And one of the many phases in which David Bowie really wanted to make R&B and soul music.

archived recording [MUSIC - DAVID BOWIE, “YOUNG AMERICANS”] Young American — the young American — I want the young American —

wesley morris

This is the sound not just of black America, but the sound of America. It is deeply American, almost especially when it’s sung by British people like David Bowie and Annie Lennox and Amy Winehouse. And it fills me with pride. Like, I know that there is something irresistible and ultimately inevitable about black music being a part of American popular music. But it also reminds me that there’s a history to this, a very painful history. And in the most perversely ironic way, it’s this historical pain that is responsible for this music.

archived recording [MUSIC - “OLD SHIP OF ZION”]

wesley morris

Some of the oldest recordings we have of black American music are from the 1930s.

archived recording [MUSIC - “OLD SHIP OF ZION”]

wesley morris

And they’re songs that would have been sung by Americans born into slavery. There’s this one called “Old Ship of Zion.” You can hear in it these four men, their voices are moving in and out of each other.

archived recording [MUSIC - “OLD SHIP OF ZION”]

wesley morris

And it’s beautiful, and it’s also sad.

archived recording [MUSIC - “OLD SHIP OF ZION”]

wesley morris

You can feel that in your bones. And then there’ll be music that was completely the opposite, like “Old Coon Dog,” for instance.

archived recording [MUSIC - “OLD COON DOG”]

wesley morris

You can hear the playfulness in this song.

archived recording [MUSIC - “OLD COON DOG”]

wesley morris

And you’ve got this banjo, this great African instrument that becomes the bedrock of American music in so many ways. And that thing is dancing.

archived recording [MUSIC - “OLD COON DOG”]

wesley morris

And then —

archived recording [MUSIC - BILLY MCCREA, “BLOW, CORNIE, BLOW”] We soon will be to the landing corner.

wesley morris

— you have someone like Billy McCrea.

archived recording [MUSIC - BILLY MCCREA, “BLOW, CORNIE, BLOW”] Blow, Cornie, blow —

wesley morris

And oh, my God, you can hear in his singing what we would now call something like the livelong day.

archived recording [MUSIC - BILLY MCCREA, “BLOW, CORNIE, BLOW”] Blow, Cornie, blow —

wesley morris

Years and years of hard work and unimaginable sorrow.

archived recording 1 [MUSIC - BILLY MCCREA, “BLOW, CORNIE, BLOW”] Blow, Cornie, blow — archived recording 2 [MUSIC - “OLD SHIP OF ZION”] Landed, landed, landed —

wesley morris

You can also hear in all of this music —

archived recording [MUSIC - “OLD SHIP OF ZION”] Landed, landed, landed, mighty mother.

wesley morris

— this undeniable sound of hope.

archived recording [MUSIC - “OLD SHIP OF ZION”] Get on board, get on board.

wesley morris

All of these melodies and cadences and emotions are things that would have been passed down generation after generation. It’s what you would have heard on a plantation. It’s what you would have heard walking by a plantation. It’s what you would have heard passing a black person doing his job, entertaining himself doing the drudgery of work, the way a guy named Thomas Dartmouth Rice did sometime around the 1830s. As the story goes, T.D. Rice, a white man, this anonymous nobody actor trying to make ends meet, one day he’s touring with a troupe in Cincinnati, or maybe it was Pittsburgh, we don’t really know. But the myth basically goes, T.D. Rice happened upon an old black man cleaning a horse in a stable. The man was doing his job on property owned by a white man named Crow.

archived recording [MUSIC - BILLY MCCREA, “BLOW, CORNIE, BLOW”] Blow, Cornie, blow.

wesley morris

He heard the tune this old black man was singing. He saw the way this man moved his body as he was cleaning this horse. Now, we don’t know what tune this old man would’ve been singing.

archived recording [MUSIC - BILLY MCCREA, “BLOW, CORNIE, BLOW”]

wesley morris

Whatever Rice hears coming out of this man’s mouth is captivating to him. And what he sees is an opportunity.

archived recording [MUSIC]

wesley morris

Because showbiz in the 1830s looked like this.

archived recording [MUSIC - WILLIAM BYRD, “PAVANE & 2 GALLIARDS IN A MINOR”]

wesley morris

Italian operas, British plays, entertainment imported from Europe. All the people performing this stuff would have been white. The audiences would have been white. After all, it’s 1830. Slavery is in full effect. And when it came to entertainment, there was nothing new, nothing truly American. And so when T.D. Rice hears this black man singing this song and moving his body in this particular way, ding, a light bulb goes off. And he takes that light bulb and runs all the way to the theater. He figures out a way to melt down some cork. Lets it cool, presumably takes a rag, or maybe even his hand if it’s cool enough. And then he paints his face black. He goes out on stage, but instead of doing his regular act, he’s got this horse groomer’s tune. Except now, he’s given the tune lyrics.

archived recording Come listen, all you gals and boys. I’m just from Tuckahoe. I’m going to sing a little song. My name’s Jim Crow. (SINGING) Wheel about and turn about and do just so. Every time I wheel about, I jump Jim Crow.

wesley morris

And the lyrics give the horse groomer a name. And the name is Jim Crow. So the crowd goes crazy. They go so bananas, the man gets 20 encores. This is the first time a paying audience is basically electrified by a white man with a black face. This is the night that Jim Crow was allegedly introduced to America, this mascot of American racism. And this is what America really wanted, which was its own original art form that is not an Italian opera, and isn’t some British guy coming over and thespianing all over them. And here is Thomas Dartmouth Rice giving it to them. This is the night that American popular culture was born.

archived recording [MUSIC - “OLD UNCLE NED”] There was an old [racial slur]. They called him Uncle Ned. He is dead long ago, long ago.

wesley morris

Oh, boy. I mean, you know how it goes. This sensational thing happens, and then everybody wants to get on the bandwagon and do their own. So you have other minstrel acts who come along and try to do what Thomas Dartmouth Rice is doing — a song and a dance, and a black face on their white skin.

archived recording [MUSIC - “OLD UNCLE NED”] Oh, oh, oh, hang up the fiddle and the bow.

wesley morris

And then from these solo acts, you have, basically, bands forming.

archived recording [MUSIC - CHRISTY MINSTRELS]

wesley morris

And the bands have all the instruments that you would have in a band that you’d recognize now. There is a banjo and a fiddle and some tambourines, and percussion in the form of bones, which would come from a pig sometimes.

archived recording [MUSIC - CHRISTY MINSTRELS]

wesley morris

That is the formation of what will become the minstrel troupe. And the place that minstrelsy took hold was in the North — places like Philadelphia and New York and Boston, where you’d have these theaters dedicated to minstrel acts, where minstrel acts would just move into a theater and do their act night after night after night after night after night. And a lot of these performers had never been meaningfully south to have a meaningful relationship with black people. And so they just made stuff up, based on what they thought black people were like.

archived recording (SINGING) I want you to know that Im ragged but right, hobo-like and living like you people ask why.

wesley morris

They were able to draw on things that were coming to America from other parts of Europe, like the polka.

archived recording [MUSIC - EDISON MINSTRELS, “MINSTREL POTPOURRI”] Come all you colored people now and gather ‘round me close, and listen to what I’m gonna sing.

wesley morris

And so you had, over the course of the formation of this culture, an inherent mixing. You had some amazing mix of —

archived recording [MUSIC - DAN EMMETT, “DE BOATMAN’S DANCE”]

wesley morris

— an imagined blackness, real, actual Irish melodies, and Polish music, with what we would now call gospel, but spiritual harmonies, interlaced together with this African banjo —

archived recording [MUSIC - DAN EMMETT, “DE BOATMAN’S DANCE”]

wesley morris

— basically welding into a fusion that becomes the thing that everybody wants to try to do.

archived recording [MUSIC - DAN EMMETT, “OLD DAN TUCKER”]

wesley morris

The whole thing just sweeps the nation. And for the rest of the 19th century, this is the shit. Can we say that?

andy mills

Oh, very much so.

annie brown

I think so!

wesley morris

And so, for the rest of the 19th century, this is the shit.

archived recording [MUSIC - DAN EMMETT, “DE BOATMAN’S DANCE”]

wesley morris

This is America’s primary form of entertainment. People are going crazy for blackface minstrels. You have little boys going to bed and dreaming about how they can become part of this minstrel show. Some of those people having these dreams go on to become people like Stephen Foster.

archived recording [MUSIC - VICTOR LIGHT OPERA COMPANY, “OH! SUSANNA”] I came from Alabama with my banjo on my knee, I’m going to Louisiana, my true love for to see.

wesley morris

Stephen Foster, the man widely credited as being the father of American music.

archived recording [MUSIC - VICTOR LIGHT OPERA COMPANY, “OH! SUSANNA”] Oh, Susanna! Oh, don’t you cry for me.

wesley morris

Some of his songs, some of his most famous songs, songs you know, songs you love, songs you still sing, songs your children, if you have them, they still sing, some of those songs were written for blackface performers.

archived recording [MUSIC - CHRISTY MINSTRELS, “CAMPTOWN RACES”] The camptown ladies sing this song, doo-dah, doo-dah.

wesley morris

And if you listen to something like “Camptown Races,” you can hear in it all of its minstrel properties.

archived recording [MUSIC - CHRISTY MINSTRELS, “CAMPTOWN RACES”] I go back home with a pocketful of tin, oh doo-dah day.

wesley morris

The song, of course, is written in so-called “Negro” dialect. I mean, instead of saying “going,” you’re saying “gwine.”

archived recording [MUSIC - CHRISTY MINSTRELS, “CAMPTOWN RACES”] Gwine to run all night, gwine to run all day.

wesley morris

Like, instead of saying, O-F for of, you get a lot of D-E for de.

archived recording [MUSIC - CHRISTY MINSTRELS, “CAMPTOWN RACES”] The blind horse sticking in a big mud hole — doo-dah, doo-dah.

wesley morris

This is a white person imagining how a black person would sing this song. And that was a gold rush-era hit.

archived recording [MUSIC - STEPHEN FOSTER, “CAMPTOWN RACES] Gwine to run all night, gwine to run all day. I’ll bet my money on the bobtail nag.

wesley morris

This is the “I Want to Hold Your Hand” of 1851.

archived recording [MUSIC - STEPHEN FOSTER, “CAMPTOWN RACES”] Somebody bet on the bay.

wesley morris

Part of the problem that we still live with now is that it was so much the heart and soul of American culture that it wasn’t that it became not racist, it just was a thing that you did. If you wanted to be an entertainer at any point after 1830, you, in all likelihood, were at least going to try to be a blackface minstrel, even if you were black.

archived recording [MUSIC - BROTHER BONES]

wesley morris

After the Civil War ends, and there’s an opportunity for black people to perform, they have to do what the nation wants. And what the nation wants at that point is blackface.

archived recording And now, giving you noise in tempo, F.E. Miller and Scatman Crothers.

wesley morris

So black people blacked up and performed as black people who weren’t actually black.

archived recording (f.e. miller) You the laziest man I ever did see. What’s wrong with you, now? What’s wrong with you? archived recording (scatman crothers) I’m tired, tired.

wesley morris

By the time you have black people painting their faces black to perform as black people, the only question you can really ask at this point is, what the hell is going on? Why is this happening? What was so captivating about seeing black people represented this way? Why would a white audience have clamored for it so much? I think one of the things that it offered was an opportunity to feel good about a thing that actually felt really bad at the time. People were really torn about whether to continue with slavery or whether to abolish it. The minstrel show didn’t really give you an answer, but it provided a platform by which you could either escape from actually having to think about that question that really was tearing the nation apart, or depending on which show you would wind up seeing, it fully engaged you in the lightest possible way about enslaved people and how you didn’t really have to feel so bad for them, because they like being enslaved. You got to laugh at a thing that you actually felt so anguished about. You get to watch these black people, who are really a source of national agony outside the theater, become fools inside the theater. And in sitting in that theater, watching these white men in blackface make fools of black people, a white audience could feel cultured. They could feel civilized. They could feel superior to the people they were watching be made fun of. And in a crazy way, watching them dehumanize would really have been an opportunity for a white audience to feel so much better about their own humanity. By the time you get to the 20th century, minstrelsy is still with us. It is the basis upon which American movies are built. This country’s first movie blockbuster, D.W. Griffith’s “The Birth of a Nation,” full of white men villainously in blackface. ^ARCHIVED RECORDING (“THE JAZZ SINGER“)^: I am privileged to say a few words to you — And America’s first talking motion picture — ^ARCHIVED RECORDING (“THE JAZZ SINGER“)^: — in this most modern and novel manner. — “The Jazz Singer,” about a Jewish man who feels most himself not as a Jewish man struggling with his Jewish identity and pleasing his cantor father, no, no — ^ARCHIVED RECORDING (“THE JAZZ SINGER“)^: Mammy, I’m coming. Oh, God, I hope I’m not late. It’s when he blacks his face up and performs “Mammy” as a Negro. ^ARCHIVED RECORDING (“THE JAZZ SINGER“)^: [MUSIC - AL JOLSON, “MAMMY”] I’d walk a million miles, for one of your smiles, my Mammy. Some of America’s favorite stars did numbers in blackface.

archived recording [MUSIC - JUDY GARLAND, “SWING LOW, SWEET CHARIOT”] Oh, I come from South, from the deep, deep South.

wesley morris

Judy Garland performed in blackface.

archived recording [MUSIC - JUDY GARLAND, “SWING LOW, SWEET CHARIOT”] And my pappy reads Esquire with delight, while my Alabama mammy plays bridge all night, way down South in Dixie. Swing low —

wesley morris

Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire both performed in blackface. ^ARCHIVED RECORDING (“WHITE CHRISTMAS“)^: (SINGING) I’d rather see a minstrel show than any other show I know. “White Christmas” has a whole number. The most famous number in “White Christmas” involves a blackface tune. ^ARCHIVED RECORDING (“WHITE CHRISTMAS“)^: (SINGING) — I’d pawn my overcoat and vest to see a minstrel show. But at the same time, there’s the beginnings of a recording industry. And you had black artists who had access to recording studios. Out of these recordings, you have people like Muddy Waters —

archived recording [MUSIC - MUDDY WATERS, “YOU’RE GONNA MISS ME”] Well, now, let me tell you people a low-down thing or two, I just can’t stand that old evil way she do. She’s gonna miss me.

wesley morris

— inventing and perfecting blues rhythm, blues ideas, blues expression, the expression of —

archived recording [MUSIC - MUDDY WATERS, “YOU’RE GONNA MISS ME”] Oh, you gonna miss me, child, when I’m dead and gone.

wesley morris

— of a fully human black self in American popular art.

archived recording [MUSIC - MUDDY WATERS, “YOU’RE GONNA MISS ME”] She wouldn’t let me in. Told me, go away, Muddy, I’ve got too many friends. She’s gonna miss me.

wesley morris

He had a kind of confidence that most people would never have heard coming from a black person before.

archived recording [MUSIC - MUDDY WATERS, “YOU’RE GONNA MISS ME”] All right, son.

wesley morris

And this is just the beginning.

archived recording [MUSIC - SIDNEY BECHET, “ALL OF ME”]

wesley morris

You have the advent of a place like Blue Note Records, where lots of amazing jazz was created and then released into the world. People like Sidney Bechet.

archived recording [MUSIC - LOUIS ARMSTRONG, “LA VIE EN ROSE”]

wesley morris

And then Louis Armstrong.

archived recording [MUSIC - LOUIS ARMSTRONG, “LA VIE EN ROSE”]

wesley morris

And Duke Ellington.

archived recording [MUSIC - DUKE ELLINGTON, “JACK THE BEAR”]

wesley morris

You have black musicians thinking about how to move not only music forward, but American culture forward. Thinking about how these instruments can do other things besides make what we think of as Western European classical music.

archived recording [MUSIC - CHARLES MINGUS, “BETTER GIT IT IN YOUR SOUL”]

wesley morris

And taking music to a place that nobody had ever tried to previously take it.

archived recording [MUSIC - JOHN COLTRANE, “BLUE TRAIN”]

wesley morris

People who just kept pushing it forward and beyond.

archived recording [MUSIC - MILES DAVIS AND CHARLIE PARKER, “A NIGHT IN TUNISIA”]

wesley morris

Then you have the development of the single most important movement black people have ever had artistically. And that is the advent of Motown Records.

archived recording [MUSIC - MARTHA REEVES AND THE VANDELLAS, “NOWHERE TO RUN”] Nowhere to run to, baby, nowhere to hide.

wesley morris

Motown is the most powerful mass-produced expression of black glamour, of black self-confidence, of black self-reliance.

archived recording [MUSIC - BARRETT STRONG, “MONEY (THAT’S WHAT I WANT)”] The best things in life are free, but you can give them to the birds and bees. I need money —

wesley morris

Its project was to get black producers, black musicians, black singers to take, quote, “white,” quote, “Western” musical ideas of orchestration, strings and horns —

archived recording [MUSIC - THE DRIFTERS, “THIS MAGIC MOMENT”] This magic moment —

wesley morris

— and straightforward harmonies —

archived recording [MUSIC - THE DRIFTERS, “THIS MAGIC MOMENT”] — so different and so new —

wesley morris

— and you marry them to a black weekend.

archived recording [MUSIC - THE CONTOURS, “DO YOU LOVE ME”] Do you love me? I can really move —

wesley morris

Where on Saturday night, you’re at a juke joint, having a good time with rhythm and blues music, guitar and drum and bass.

archived recording [MUSIC - THE CONTOURS, “DO YOU LOVE ME”] Now that I can dance — dance —

wesley morris

Sex, basically.

archived recording [MUSIC - THE CONTOURS, “DO YOU LOVE ME”] Watch me now — work, work — oh, work it out, baby — work, work —

wesley morris

And then you go home, slightly hung over. And you wake up, and you go to church on Sunday morning.

archived recording [MUSIC - MARVIN GAYE AND TAMMI TERRELL, “AIN’T NO MOUNTAIN HIGH ENOUGH”] Listen, baby, ain’t no mountain high, ain’t no valley low, ain’t no river wide enough, baby —

wesley morris

Where there’s a whole other musical experience involving hand claps, and different harmonic arrangements, and call and response.

archived recording [MUSIC - MARVIN GAYE AND TAMMI TERRELL, “AIN’T NO MOUNTAIN HIGH ENOUGH”] No matter how far. Don’t worry, baby. Just call my name —

wesley morris

A lot of feeling, a lot of oomph, a lot of gratitude.

archived recording [MUSIC - FOUR TOPS, “BABY I NEED YOUR LOVING”] Baby, I need your loving, got to have all your loving —

wesley morris

You have the combination of these three different areas of musical expression happening at the same time in just about every single Motown record.

archived recording [MUSIC - FOUR TOPS, “REACH OUT I’LL BE THERE”] Darling, reach out — come on, girl —

wesley morris

Whether it’s the Four Tops doing “Reach Out I’ll be There.”

archived recording [MUSIC - FOUR TOPS, “REACH OUT I’LL BE THERE”] I’ll be there —

wesley morris

Or Martha and the Vandellas doing “Heat Wave.”

archived recording [MUSIC - MARTHA AND THE VANDELLAS, ”(LOVE IS LIKE A) HEAT WAVE”] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, girl, oh —

wesley morris

On something like “Heat Wave,” you can hear hands slapping the tambourine like it actually is Sunday morning.

archived recording [MUSIC - MARTHA AND THE VANDELLAS, ”(LOVE IS LIKE A) HEAT WAVE”] I feeling it burning right here in my heart —

wesley morris

Then when everything is firing —

archived recording [MUSIC - FOUR TOPS, “I CAN’T HELP MYSELF (SUGAR PIE, HONEY BUNCH)”] Girl, it starts the flame, burning in my heart, tearing it all apart. No matter how I try, my love I cannot hide. Oh, sugar pie, honey bunch — sugar pie, honey bunch —

wesley morris

It’s just the most exciting, romantic sound you’re ever going to hear. And at the center of it is what can only be described as a refulgent, tasteful blackness. Here you have in Motown a force that is actively combating these ideas of black people as being inherently inferior. Motown is the antidote to American minstrelsy.

archived recording 1 [MUSIC - THE SUPREMES, “BABY LOVE”] Ooh, baby love, my baby love, I need you, oh, how I need you. archived recording 2 [MUSIC - THE JACKSON 5, “I WANT YOU BACK”] Oh, just let me tell you now — archived recording 3 [MUSIC - SMOKEY ROBINSON AND THE MIRACLES, “YOU’VE REALLY GOT A HOLD ON ME”] Really got a hold on me. Really got a hold — archived recording 4 [MUSIC - MARVIN GAYE, “I HEARD IT THROUGH THE GRAPEVINE”] A man ain’t supposed to cry, but these tears I can’t hold inside. Losing you would end my life you see — archived recording 5 [MUSIC - PLAYER, “BABY, COME BACK”] Baby, come back, oh, baby, any kind of fool could see there was something in everything about you.

wesley morris

And this is what I was thinking about standing there in that kitchen, chopping those vegetables. It’s — the thing that made me laugh was just how all that history is just very silently coursing through this music. It might not even be aware that it’s even there. It’s so thoroughly atomized into American culture. It’s going to show up in a way that even people making the art can’t quite put their finger on. What you’re hearing in black music that’s so appealing to so many people of all races across time is possibility, struggle. It is strife. It is humor. It is sex. It is confidence. And that’s ironic. Because this is the sound of a people who, for decades and centuries, have been denied freedom. And yet what you respond to in black music is the ultimate expression of a belief in that freedom, the belief that the struggle is worth it, that the pain begets joy, and that that joy you’re experiencing is not only contagious, it’s necessary and urgent and irresistible. Black music is American music. Because as Americans, we say we believe in freedom. And that’s what we tell the world. And the power of black music is that it’s the ultimate expression of that belief in American freedom.

[music]