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Blues People: Negro Music in White America
"A must for all who would more knowledgeably appreciate and better comprehend America's most popular music." — Langston Hughes "The path the slave took to 'citizenship' is what I want to look at. And I make my analogy through the slave citizen's music—through the music that is most closely associated with him: blues and a later, but parallel development, jazz... [If] the Negro represents, or is symbolic of, something in and about the nature of American culture, this certainly should be revealed by his characteristic music." So says Amiri Baraka (previously known as LeRoi Jones) in the Introduction to Blues People, his classic work on the place of jazz and blues in American social, musical, economic, and cultural history. From the music of African slaves in the United States through the music scene of the 1960's, Baraka traces the influence of what he calls "negro music" on white America—not only in the context of music and pop culture but also in terms of the values and perspectives passed on through the music. In tracing the music, he brilliantly illuminates the influence of African Americans on American culture and history.
256 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1963
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6808 people want to read
About the author
Amiri Baraka
154 books396 followersPoems and plays, such as
Dutchman
(1964), of American writer Amiri Baraka originally Everett LeRoi Jones focus on racial conflict.
He attended Barringer high school. Coyt Leverette Jones, his father, worked as a postal supervisor and lift operator. Anna Lois Russ Jones, his mother, worked as a social worker.
He studied at Rutgers, Columbia, and Howard universities but left without a degree and attended the new school for social research. He won a scholarship to Rutgers in 1951, but a continuing sense of cultural dislocation prompted him to transfer in 1952 to Howard. He studied philosophy and religion, major fields. Jones also served three years in the air force as a gunner. Jones continued his studies of comparative literature at Columbia University. An anonymous letter accused him as a Communist to his commanding officer and led to the discovery of Soviet literature; afterward, people put Jones on gardening duty and gave him a dishonorable discharge for violation of his oath of duty.
In the same year, he moved to Greenwich Village and worked initially in a warehouse for music records. His interest in jazz began in this period. At the same time, he came into contact with Beat Generation, black mountain college, and New York School. In 1958, he married Hettie Cohen and founded Totem Press, which published such Beat Generation icons as Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg.
Jones in July 1960 visited with a delegation of Cuba committee and reported his impressions in his essay Cuba libre . He began a politically active art. In 1961, he published Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note , a first book. In 1963, Blues People: Negro Music in White America of the most influential volumes of criticism, especially in regard to the then beginning free jazz movement, followed. His acclaimed controversy premiered and received an Obie Award in the same year.
After the assassination of Malcolm X (1965), Jones left his wife and their two children and moved to Harlem. His controversial revolutionary and then antisemitic.
In 1966, Jones married Sylvia Robinson, his second wife, who later adopted the name Amina Baraka. In 1967, he lectured at San Francisco State University. In 1967, he adopted the African name Imamu Amear Baraka, which he later changed to Amiri Baraka.
In 1968, he was arrested in Newark for allegedly carrying an illegal weapon and resisting arrest during the riots of the previous year, and people subsequently sentenced him to three years in prison; shortly afterward, Raymond A. Brown, his defense attorney, convinced an appeals court to reverse the sentence. In that same year, Black Music, his second book of jazz criticism, collected previously published music journalism, including the seminal Apple Cores columns from Down Beat magazine. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Baraka penned some similar strongly anti-Jewish articles to the stance at that time of the Nation of Islam to court controversy.
Around 1974, Baraka himself from Black nationalism as a Marxist and a supporter of third-world liberation movements. In 1979, he lectured at Africana studies department of State University of New York at Stony Brook. In 1980, he denounced his former anti-Semitic utterances, declaring himself an anti-Zionist.
In 1984, Baraka served as a full professor at Rutgers University, but was subsequently denied tenure. In 1989, he won a book award for his works as well as a Langston Hughes award.
In 1990, he co-authored the autobiography of Quincy Jones, and 1998 , he served as supporting actor in Bulworth, film of Warren Beatty. In 1996, the red hot organization produced Offbeat: A Red Hot Soundtrip, and Baraka contributed to this acquired immune def
He attended Barringer high school. Coyt Leverette Jones, his father, worked as a postal supervisor and lift operator. Anna Lois Russ Jones, his mother, worked as a social worker.
He studied at Rutgers, Columbia, and Howard universities but left without a degree and attended the new school for social research. He won a scholarship to Rutgers in 1951, but a continuing sense of cultural dislocation prompted him to transfer in 1952 to Howard. He studied philosophy and religion, major fields. Jones also served three years in the air force as a gunner. Jones continued his studies of comparative literature at Columbia University. An anonymous letter accused him as a Communist to his commanding officer and led to the discovery of Soviet literature; afterward, people put Jones on gardening duty and gave him a dishonorable discharge for violation of his oath of duty.
In the same year, he moved to Greenwich Village and worked initially in a warehouse for music records. His interest in jazz began in this period. At the same time, he came into contact with Beat Generation, black mountain college, and New York School. In 1958, he married Hettie Cohen and founded Totem Press, which published such Beat Generation icons as Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg.
Jones in July 1960 visited with a delegation of Cuba committee and reported his impressions in his essay Cuba libre . He began a politically active art. In 1961, he published Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note , a first book. In 1963, Blues People: Negro Music in White America of the most influential volumes of criticism, especially in regard to the then beginning free jazz movement, followed. His acclaimed controversy premiered and received an Obie Award in the same year.
After the assassination of Malcolm X (1965), Jones left his wife and their two children and moved to Harlem. His controversial revolutionary and then antisemitic.
In 1966, Jones married Sylvia Robinson, his second wife, who later adopted the name Amina Baraka. In 1967, he lectured at San Francisco State University. In 1967, he adopted the African name Imamu Amear Baraka, which he later changed to Amiri Baraka.
In 1968, he was arrested in Newark for allegedly carrying an illegal weapon and resisting arrest during the riots of the previous year, and people subsequently sentenced him to three years in prison; shortly afterward, Raymond A. Brown, his defense attorney, convinced an appeals court to reverse the sentence. In that same year, Black Music, his second book of jazz criticism, collected previously published music journalism, including the seminal Apple Cores columns from Down Beat magazine. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Baraka penned some similar strongly anti-Jewish articles to the stance at that time of the Nation of Islam to court controversy.
Around 1974, Baraka himself from Black nationalism as a Marxist and a supporter of third-world liberation movements. In 1979, he lectured at Africana studies department of State University of New York at Stony Brook. In 1980, he denounced his former anti-Semitic utterances, declaring himself an anti-Zionist.
In 1984, Baraka served as a full professor at Rutgers University, but was subsequently denied tenure. In 1989, he won a book award for his works as well as a Langston Hughes award.
In 1990, he co-authored the autobiography of Quincy Jones, and 1998 , he served as supporting actor in Bulworth, film of Warren Beatty. In 1996, the red hot organization produced Offbeat: A Red Hot Soundtrip, and Baraka contributed to this acquired immune def
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January 30, 2018
After learning that Amiri Baraka had passed away (October 7, 1934 - January 9, 2014), I wanted to commemorate him by reading some of his work. Blues People was a book he published in 1963 back when he was still LeRoi Jones and African Americans were called Negroes. I didn’t purchase the book until sometime in the 1990s---at least 30 years after its initial publication. The book was too deep for me and I set it aside for another 20+ years. It’s still pretty deep but I wanted to wrap my mind around this dense, yet, succinct text that traces how the blues developed NOT with enslaved Africans but from their enslaved descendants: American born and bred; disenfranchised, not accepted as full citizens with inalienable rights. Their earliest experiences, work songs, field hollers and spirituals incubated and invented the musical genres known as “blues” and “jazz.”
When I was younger I remember people saying that black people had a natural talent for music and dancing and being emotionally “soulful” and sexually uninhibited. It was a dismissive shortcut that denied historical layers of injustice experienced by blacks in white america, while diminishing a people’s creative and intellectual power and cultural gifts. LeRoi Jones’ book restores some of the humanity and dignity absent from those old assumptions.
While I found this text challenging to read, it was also illuminating, and shrewd; written by someone with a deep love and long memory for music, black people, and other folks. I tried to imagine how fresh and bracing it might have been to read it in 1963.
When I was younger I remember people saying that black people had a natural talent for music and dancing and being emotionally “soulful” and sexually uninhibited. It was a dismissive shortcut that denied historical layers of injustice experienced by blacks in white america, while diminishing a people’s creative and intellectual power and cultural gifts. LeRoi Jones’ book restores some of the humanity and dignity absent from those old assumptions.
While I found this text challenging to read, it was also illuminating, and shrewd; written by someone with a deep love and long memory for music, black people, and other folks. I tried to imagine how fresh and bracing it might have been to read it in 1963.
May 13, 2023
gone where the Southern cross the yella dog
The other day a friend rashly claimed that art and music were equally hard to describe in words. I asked him to tell me about a certain painting of Picasso's. He did, but claimed it wasn't accurate. "OK," I said, "you're right, but now tell me about Mozart's Jupiter Symphony." He opened his mouth, closed it, looked at me, and said, "Yeah, I see what you mean." Writing a book about the blues would be equally hard, it seems to me. So, LeRoi Jones did what he could, back in 1963, to tie the indescribable to the more concrete. He wrote a social history of African-Americans in the USA through the prism of music or---maybe on the principle of red and yellow tile floors (are they red with yellow designs or yellow with red designs ?)---he wrote a book on African-American music through the prism of social history. It is one of the most important books on American music (and American society) that you can find. It has stood the test of time. He begins from the Africans who came to North America as slaves bearing very different cultures, confronted by an absolutely different view of the world emanating from their new masters. Here he tries to show how African music became transformed into African-AMERICAN music and then American. He continues then up through the generations of slavery, to Emancipation, migration to the cities, World War I, the Depression, World War II and the bebop age of the Fifties. The book is pre-Civil Rights movement, pre-Martin Luther King. Jones may have looked down on the NAACP and its allies as "white liberal supported organizations", I'm not sure, but they don't appear. The times are symbolized by the use of "Negro" throughout. I agree, the tome is dated, but don't reject it, don't pooh-pooh the man. This is a very intelligent, very worthwhile book. Anyone, particularly from outside the USA, who wants to know the history of African-American music within its social environment ought still to read BLUES PEOPLE. He writes, "If Negro music can be seen to be the result of certain attitudes, certain specific ways of thinking about the world (and only ultimately about the ways in which music can be made), then the basic hypothesis of this book is understood." [p.153] Jones goes to great lengths to get to the bottom of those attitudes and thoughts.
My main criticism, apart from the fact that history dictates that we must be left over a half century behind contemporary realities, is that though Jones obviously knew and loved the blues and jazz and all the various styles ( if not swing), his approach is coldly academic, highly dispassionate. He may criticize people who tried to make money, he may downplay all those who "abandoned" their roots, but my disappointment is that there is nothing of himself in the work barring a few mentions of his family. He does not share his enthusiasm. Music is beauty after all. I am sure he wanted the book to be taken as a serious essay, which it is. But in keeping himself removed from the discussion, being so analytic and professional in the style of the day, he has robbed us "readers of the future" of many of his personal insights.
African-American experience in the USA expressed itself most particularly in the blues, only later did that musical mode become part of the general American culture, often watered down, sometimes imitated by those who didn't wish to fit in or who wished to cash in. When conditions have changed, when the black middle class has entered mainstream America, and the urban underclass is wrapped up in hip-hop, gangsta rap culture, which is relentlessly commercialized by the powerful media, talking about the blues may seem a matter for historians or ethnomusicologists. Still, BLUES PEOPLE resonates strongly if we try to understand where we have been. As for where we are going---that old line sums it up---we're goin where the Southern cross the yella dog.
The other day a friend rashly claimed that art and music were equally hard to describe in words. I asked him to tell me about a certain painting of Picasso's. He did, but claimed it wasn't accurate. "OK," I said, "you're right, but now tell me about Mozart's Jupiter Symphony." He opened his mouth, closed it, looked at me, and said, "Yeah, I see what you mean." Writing a book about the blues would be equally hard, it seems to me. So, LeRoi Jones did what he could, back in 1963, to tie the indescribable to the more concrete. He wrote a social history of African-Americans in the USA through the prism of music or---maybe on the principle of red and yellow tile floors (are they red with yellow designs or yellow with red designs ?)---he wrote a book on African-American music through the prism of social history. It is one of the most important books on American music (and American society) that you can find. It has stood the test of time. He begins from the Africans who came to North America as slaves bearing very different cultures, confronted by an absolutely different view of the world emanating from their new masters. Here he tries to show how African music became transformed into African-AMERICAN music and then American. He continues then up through the generations of slavery, to Emancipation, migration to the cities, World War I, the Depression, World War II and the bebop age of the Fifties. The book is pre-Civil Rights movement, pre-Martin Luther King. Jones may have looked down on the NAACP and its allies as "white liberal supported organizations", I'm not sure, but they don't appear. The times are symbolized by the use of "Negro" throughout. I agree, the tome is dated, but don't reject it, don't pooh-pooh the man. This is a very intelligent, very worthwhile book. Anyone, particularly from outside the USA, who wants to know the history of African-American music within its social environment ought still to read BLUES PEOPLE. He writes, "If Negro music can be seen to be the result of certain attitudes, certain specific ways of thinking about the world (and only ultimately about the ways in which music can be made), then the basic hypothesis of this book is understood." [p.153] Jones goes to great lengths to get to the bottom of those attitudes and thoughts.
My main criticism, apart from the fact that history dictates that we must be left over a half century behind contemporary realities, is that though Jones obviously knew and loved the blues and jazz and all the various styles ( if not swing), his approach is coldly academic, highly dispassionate. He may criticize people who tried to make money, he may downplay all those who "abandoned" their roots, but my disappointment is that there is nothing of himself in the work barring a few mentions of his family. He does not share his enthusiasm. Music is beauty after all. I am sure he wanted the book to be taken as a serious essay, which it is. But in keeping himself removed from the discussion, being so analytic and professional in the style of the day, he has robbed us "readers of the future" of many of his personal insights.
African-American experience in the USA expressed itself most particularly in the blues, only later did that musical mode become part of the general American culture, often watered down, sometimes imitated by those who didn't wish to fit in or who wished to cash in. When conditions have changed, when the black middle class has entered mainstream America, and the urban underclass is wrapped up in hip-hop, gangsta rap culture, which is relentlessly commercialized by the powerful media, talking about the blues may seem a matter for historians or ethnomusicologists. Still, BLUES PEOPLE resonates strongly if we try to understand where we have been. As for where we are going---that old line sums it up---we're goin where the Southern cross the yella dog.
May 18, 2020
"The idea of a white blues singer seems an even more violent contradiction of terms than the idea of a middle-class blues singer. The materials of blues were not available to the white American, even though some strange circumstance might prompt him to look for them. It was as if these materials were secret and obscure, and blues a kind of ethno-historic rite as basic as blood."
When Amiri Baraka published Blues People in 1963 he was still LeRoi Jones, and was still on his way to becoming the outspoken (and of course controversial) advocate for black power and black art he's remembered as today. He cited the assassination of Malcolm X two years later as the catalyst for his radicalization, but ideologies don't develop overnight and it's not hard to find hints of the later Baraka's thought in this socio-cultural history of black music in America.
The book is concerned, essentially, with three interlocking ideas: 1) that the history of black people in America is best illustrated by the evolution of their music, and that this music itself reflects a gradual and complex process of Americanization; 2) that black and white musical forms have always been closely intertwined in the U.S., leading to an ongoing (and often fraught) cycle of musical appropriation and reinvention; and 3) that black music differs most crucially from its white reproductions (and ultimately transcends them) because at its best it possesses an inborn "blues" impulse which can only ever be imitated by white performers, never fully embodied.
Baraka presents his case chronologically. He starts with slavery, when black captives were deprived of their freedom, their religion, and their traditional songs and presented instead with forced labor, Christianity, and the Protestant hymnbook. From these components enslaved Africans crafted the first spirituals and work songs, which would evolve in time into gospel music and the blues, respectively. Whites in turn took to performing a bastardized mimickry of this music in minstrel shows, and from there, well,
The first several chapters are relatively breezy, but Baraka really dives deep in the book's second half, all about the turbulent years between 1900 and 1963 and particularly the development of the music which clearly intrigues him most: jazz. Even more than the blues, which seem to interest Baraka more as an embodied attitude than as a codified genre, jazz is the battlefield upon which he sees the war for America's musical spirit being waged most fiercely and revealingly.
This, Baraka argues, is because jazz was the first truly black genre which was still broadly accessible enough that white people could understand and perform it with at least a tenuous degree of authenticity. Predictably, this meant that white jazz bands quickly became the most popular and best selling of all (apparently, says Baraka, the earliest known jazz recordings are all by white groups), as well as the most highly-praised: Benny Goodman was crowned the "King of Swing," Chet Baker was the "King of Cool," and so on.
Of course, these sanitized white distillations of black source material inevitably inspired a creative backlash from black players, which in turn birthed new subgenres: from New Orleans jazz (mostly black) came swing (mostly white), which gave way to bebop (mostly black), which spawned cool jazz (mostly white), which led to hard bop (mostly black)... It's not quite that straightforward, of course, which Baraka acknowledges, but I think his general thesis holds true, and it can be applied to pretty much all subsequent popular music in America. Just look at hip-hop, a genre which is now in its forties and is at least as storied and multifarious as jazz was when this book was published. There, too, you see the repeated black call and white response, the continuous reinvention whenever old forms become too stale or safe.
At times Blues People veers a bit farther than I'd have liked towards academic abstruseness, and certain chapters will be pretty slow going if you—like me—haven't brushed up recently on the meanings of music theory terms like "polyrhythmic" or "contrapuntal." Baraka's obvious preference for jazz over other forms can also be vexing in what is supposed to be a general musical overview: his coverage of different blues subgenres (ironically) leaves a lot to be desired, ragtime is only ever treated offhandedly, and rock 'n' roll is glossed over in a couple of hasty paragraphs (in a book written in the early sixties, no less!).
On the other hand, this study is perhaps extra valuable as a glimpse into a moment when rock and soul were still in their infancy, rhythm and blues hadn't yet morphed into R&B, and soon-to-be-giant black-led genres like funk, disco, and hip-hop were still forthcoming. When he published Blues People, Baraka conceived the future of African American music primarily in jazz terms; by the time he passed away more than half a century later, it would have been abundantly clear that the truth was much more varied and expansive than even he could have predicted.
When Amiri Baraka published Blues People in 1963 he was still LeRoi Jones, and was still on his way to becoming the outspoken (and of course controversial) advocate for black power and black art he's remembered as today. He cited the assassination of Malcolm X two years later as the catalyst for his radicalization, but ideologies don't develop overnight and it's not hard to find hints of the later Baraka's thought in this socio-cultural history of black music in America.
The book is concerned, essentially, with three interlocking ideas: 1) that the history of black people in America is best illustrated by the evolution of their music, and that this music itself reflects a gradual and complex process of Americanization; 2) that black and white musical forms have always been closely intertwined in the U.S., leading to an ongoing (and often fraught) cycle of musical appropriation and reinvention; and 3) that black music differs most crucially from its white reproductions (and ultimately transcends them) because at its best it possesses an inborn "blues" impulse which can only ever be imitated by white performers, never fully embodied.
Baraka presents his case chronologically. He starts with slavery, when black captives were deprived of their freedom, their religion, and their traditional songs and presented instead with forced labor, Christianity, and the Protestant hymnbook. From these components enslaved Africans crafted the first spirituals and work songs, which would evolve in time into gospel music and the blues, respectively. Whites in turn took to performing a bastardized mimickry of this music in minstrel shows, and from there, well,
Northern Negro pre-jazz music was almost like the picture within a picture within a picture. . . Ragtime was a Negro music, resulting from the Negro's appropriation of white piano techniques used in show music. Popularized ragtime, which flooded the country with songsheets in the first decades of [the 20th] century, was a dilution of the Negro style. And finally, the show and 'society' music the Negroes in the pre-blues North made was a kind of bouncy, essentially vapid appropriation of the popularized imitations of Negro imitations of white minstrel music which, as I mentioned earlier, came from white parodies of Negro life and music. . . . The hopelessly interwoven fabric of American life where blacks and whites pass so quickly as to become only grays!
The first several chapters are relatively breezy, but Baraka really dives deep in the book's second half, all about the turbulent years between 1900 and 1963 and particularly the development of the music which clearly intrigues him most: jazz. Even more than the blues, which seem to interest Baraka more as an embodied attitude than as a codified genre, jazz is the battlefield upon which he sees the war for America's musical spirit being waged most fiercely and revealingly.
This, Baraka argues, is because jazz was the first truly black genre which was still broadly accessible enough that white people could understand and perform it with at least a tenuous degree of authenticity. Predictably, this meant that white jazz bands quickly became the most popular and best selling of all (apparently, says Baraka, the earliest known jazz recordings are all by white groups), as well as the most highly-praised: Benny Goodman was crowned the "King of Swing," Chet Baker was the "King of Cool," and so on.
Of course, these sanitized white distillations of black source material inevitably inspired a creative backlash from black players, which in turn birthed new subgenres: from New Orleans jazz (mostly black) came swing (mostly white), which gave way to bebop (mostly black), which spawned cool jazz (mostly white), which led to hard bop (mostly black)... It's not quite that straightforward, of course, which Baraka acknowledges, but I think his general thesis holds true, and it can be applied to pretty much all subsequent popular music in America. Just look at hip-hop, a genre which is now in its forties and is at least as storied and multifarious as jazz was when this book was published. There, too, you see the repeated black call and white response, the continuous reinvention whenever old forms become too stale or safe.
At times Blues People veers a bit farther than I'd have liked towards academic abstruseness, and certain chapters will be pretty slow going if you—like me—haven't brushed up recently on the meanings of music theory terms like "polyrhythmic" or "contrapuntal." Baraka's obvious preference for jazz over other forms can also be vexing in what is supposed to be a general musical overview: his coverage of different blues subgenres (ironically) leaves a lot to be desired, ragtime is only ever treated offhandedly, and rock 'n' roll is glossed over in a couple of hasty paragraphs (in a book written in the early sixties, no less!).
On the other hand, this study is perhaps extra valuable as a glimpse into a moment when rock and soul were still in their infancy, rhythm and blues hadn't yet morphed into R&B, and soon-to-be-giant black-led genres like funk, disco, and hip-hop were still forthcoming. When he published Blues People, Baraka conceived the future of African American music primarily in jazz terms; by the time he passed away more than half a century later, it would have been abundantly clear that the truth was much more varied and expansive than even he could have predicted.
March 14, 2020
Perhaps not the best book for the blues initiate, but probably one of the best you could read on the subject, with a non-obnoxious, somewhat sociological slant on the theme.
Jones/Baraka digs deep into the American psyche for this, approaching slavery and its aftermath as the seed bed from which a rich African-American tradition arose. Taking as read the unique situation of alienation for American slaves, J/B shows how the weird, forced syncretism of African tropes with an accepted Christian milieu turned out some of the best goddamn music you'll ever hear. J/B moves beyond that period, though, touching on the role of the church in freedmen's lives, and, most interestingly, the early split after emancipation between a nascent middle-class black strata and the largely poor majority. J/B avers that this caused the early division in African-American music, jazz and swing peeling off one way under the influence of a more classical European tradition (but splicing itself later) and blues, which was more down-home focused, stemming out of less secular mores.
I'm probably making this sound way more complicated than J/B does, so just ignore me and go read it.
Jones/Baraka digs deep into the American psyche for this, approaching slavery and its aftermath as the seed bed from which a rich African-American tradition arose. Taking as read the unique situation of alienation for American slaves, J/B shows how the weird, forced syncretism of African tropes with an accepted Christian milieu turned out some of the best goddamn music you'll ever hear. J/B moves beyond that period, though, touching on the role of the church in freedmen's lives, and, most interestingly, the early split after emancipation between a nascent middle-class black strata and the largely poor majority. J/B avers that this caused the early division in African-American music, jazz and swing peeling off one way under the influence of a more classical European tradition (but splicing itself later) and blues, which was more down-home focused, stemming out of less secular mores.
I'm probably making this sound way more complicated than J/B does, so just ignore me and go read it.
June 21, 2021
"In my time of dying/don't want nobody to mourn. All I want for you to do is take my body home." .Starting with slave hymns, work camp songs, gospel, and jazz the blues IS the sound of America; its greatest contribution to world culture. Amiri Baraka situates the blues in the dialectic between white systems of oppression and Black response and resistance.
April 28, 2014
While I have major reservations about a lot of Amiri Baraka's ideas and statements as expressed in his poetry and elsewhere, I have to acknowledge that Blues People is mostly excellent. It's not really a musical history of the jazz/blues, so anyone looking for lots of discussion of musical theory and the compositional development of those styles will probably need to look elsewhere.
What it is, is a social history of how black music both responded to and developed in relation to black culture and black self-perception from a time of bondage into an era where there was a nascent black middle class. Baraka's perspective is necessarily insular and dated, he's not interested in ideas of cross cultural assimilation/appropriation or multicultural influences (which to be honest, are concepts that didn't really fully develop in these kinds of analysis until decades after this was written). He is only interested in black people as they relate to themselves and as their music relates to them. Of course it's more or less common knowledge now that rock and roll and by extension almost all popular music in America is traced right back to the blues and the R&B that came out of it, but this is one of the books that took the trouble to really exhaustively point out that connection and to trace back its genealogy.
Beyond this, Baraka points out one of the most salient points of cultural musical analysis: a form or style is invented, disseminated, popularized, then at some point people get sick of it and change it into something new. That's a HUGE, brilliant observation. And with regards to popular music, its not a huge over-generalization to say that the people who are usually responsible for those transformations are almost always black. The ascendency of hip-hop/rap only bears that point out further. Someone really needs to write a version of Blues People for Hip-hop specifically and the musical sources and world it comes out of.
To be honest, the excellence of Blues People's analysis just makes Amiri Baraka seem even more problematic to me. How could someone capable of such a brilliant, thoughtful examination not be able to see the vulgarity of his own prejudices? Baraka's bigotry wasn't just some fluke of ignorance or youth, he made it an unapologetic part of his creative aesthetic (thankfully, not in this work) over decades. This is an essential work by a deeply flawed person.
What it is, is a social history of how black music both responded to and developed in relation to black culture and black self-perception from a time of bondage into an era where there was a nascent black middle class. Baraka's perspective is necessarily insular and dated, he's not interested in ideas of cross cultural assimilation/appropriation or multicultural influences (which to be honest, are concepts that didn't really fully develop in these kinds of analysis until decades after this was written). He is only interested in black people as they relate to themselves and as their music relates to them. Of course it's more or less common knowledge now that rock and roll and by extension almost all popular music in America is traced right back to the blues and the R&B that came out of it, but this is one of the books that took the trouble to really exhaustively point out that connection and to trace back its genealogy.
Beyond this, Baraka points out one of the most salient points of cultural musical analysis: a form or style is invented, disseminated, popularized, then at some point people get sick of it and change it into something new. That's a HUGE, brilliant observation. And with regards to popular music, its not a huge over-generalization to say that the people who are usually responsible for those transformations are almost always black. The ascendency of hip-hop/rap only bears that point out further. Someone really needs to write a version of Blues People for Hip-hop specifically and the musical sources and world it comes out of.
To be honest, the excellence of Blues People's analysis just makes Amiri Baraka seem even more problematic to me. How could someone capable of such a brilliant, thoughtful examination not be able to see the vulgarity of his own prejudices? Baraka's bigotry wasn't just some fluke of ignorance or youth, he made it an unapologetic part of his creative aesthetic (thankfully, not in this work) over decades. This is an essential work by a deeply flawed person.
February 16, 2016
"This book should be taken as a strictly theoretical endeavor. Theoretical, in that none of the questions it poses can be said to have been answered definitively or for all time, etc. In fact, the book proposes more questions than it will answer." ~ Amiri Baraka from the Introduction to "Blues People"
There are some moments when I find myself reading a subject of historical analysis that I am filled with a desire to ask the author if they would provide a multimedia study guide to follow along with the text itself. One has the work citations and the bibliography, but what I am considering is a chapter matched outline of books, films, and albums that one should study in order to garner an even deeper understanding of the material that is being discussed within that chapter.
Baraka's writing in this text has the flow of a great uncle who finds it particularly irresistible to not dispense forth a stream of history when he has access to even a single listening ear. At certain times, it has the language of a diatribe as Baraka decries the varying periods of blues and jazz innovation which inevitably lead to mainstream acceptance and the eventual commercialization which eliminates the emotional nuance of a formerly "negro music". At other times, it reads as a doctoral thesis with Baraka casting forth a jargon heavy exultation of the changes brought by the geniuses of strings, woodwinds, and keys that gave birth to blues and jazz movements in ragtime, dixieland, brass, swing, bebop, cool, hard bop, avant garde and other musical forms of that ilk.
When you are finished, you won't be an expert on the subject of blues or jazz music, but he does manage to fill you deeply with a sense of ownership and responsibility for holding and transmitting the history. I had an initial criticism of his coverage of "The Modern Scene" at the time of reading because the chapter was so voluminous compared to how neatly Baraka had broken down the other chapters, but I had merely to remind myself that when the book was composed, he was awash in the fresh memory of that modern musical movement whereas I am looking at the work of Coleman, Coltrane, and Rollins with an eye towards the past as one of the new antiquities of music.
For lack of a film directly from Baraka himself, I would offer up for analysis the documentary series "Ken Burns' Jazz" though for a different reason than you might think. Ken Burns' perspective on jazz music and the criticism that his documentary received actually serves to highlight one of the issues that Baraka covers in the text. It stands to portray that where initially the newer innovations made in jazz music are derided and given little appreciation, they are in time shelved and then rediscovered to be given their glory in the future.
In a sense, the present era keepers of jazz classify certain forms as "anti-jazz" and toss them aside only to have the future keepers of jazz say "Hey. That was genius." It is an exercise described throughout the book that I might classify in accordance with the title as "negro music navel gazing". Only the cool that was cool yesterday is acceptable to the mainstream when initial innovators have already moved on to something new.
In that respect, the attention given by Burns to the swing era and more classical Dixieland styles, his lack of attention to more modern and progressive forms is symbolic of this sort of navel gazing in practice. That does not mean that the documentary is without historical merit, but one should always be aware that everyone has an angle and even when they are trying to be objective, they inevitably shine the prism brightest on the corner of the room which they like the best.
There are some moments when I find myself reading a subject of historical analysis that I am filled with a desire to ask the author if they would provide a multimedia study guide to follow along with the text itself. One has the work citations and the bibliography, but what I am considering is a chapter matched outline of books, films, and albums that one should study in order to garner an even deeper understanding of the material that is being discussed within that chapter.
Baraka's writing in this text has the flow of a great uncle who finds it particularly irresistible to not dispense forth a stream of history when he has access to even a single listening ear. At certain times, it has the language of a diatribe as Baraka decries the varying periods of blues and jazz innovation which inevitably lead to mainstream acceptance and the eventual commercialization which eliminates the emotional nuance of a formerly "negro music". At other times, it reads as a doctoral thesis with Baraka casting forth a jargon heavy exultation of the changes brought by the geniuses of strings, woodwinds, and keys that gave birth to blues and jazz movements in ragtime, dixieland, brass, swing, bebop, cool, hard bop, avant garde and other musical forms of that ilk.
When you are finished, you won't be an expert on the subject of blues or jazz music, but he does manage to fill you deeply with a sense of ownership and responsibility for holding and transmitting the history. I had an initial criticism of his coverage of "The Modern Scene" at the time of reading because the chapter was so voluminous compared to how neatly Baraka had broken down the other chapters, but I had merely to remind myself that when the book was composed, he was awash in the fresh memory of that modern musical movement whereas I am looking at the work of Coleman, Coltrane, and Rollins with an eye towards the past as one of the new antiquities of music.
For lack of a film directly from Baraka himself, I would offer up for analysis the documentary series "Ken Burns' Jazz" though for a different reason than you might think. Ken Burns' perspective on jazz music and the criticism that his documentary received actually serves to highlight one of the issues that Baraka covers in the text. It stands to portray that where initially the newer innovations made in jazz music are derided and given little appreciation, they are in time shelved and then rediscovered to be given their glory in the future.
In a sense, the present era keepers of jazz classify certain forms as "anti-jazz" and toss them aside only to have the future keepers of jazz say "Hey. That was genius." It is an exercise described throughout the book that I might classify in accordance with the title as "negro music navel gazing". Only the cool that was cool yesterday is acceptable to the mainstream when initial innovators have already moved on to something new.
In that respect, the attention given by Burns to the swing era and more classical Dixieland styles, his lack of attention to more modern and progressive forms is symbolic of this sort of navel gazing in practice. That does not mean that the documentary is without historical merit, but one should always be aware that everyone has an angle and even when they are trying to be objective, they inevitably shine the prism brightest on the corner of the room which they like the best.
December 14, 2024
Leroi Jones (a.k.a. Amiri Baraka) wrote his book "Blues People: Negro Music in White America" in 1963, and it is still one of the definitive texts about the blues.
Jones approaches this musical genre from a sociological, historical, and political standpoint, starting with the early slave trade in America. He looks at the many African influences of the blues, as well as its opposition to more classical Western (as in Western Civilization) styles of music, and how it has evolved.
Jones focuses most of his attention, in later chapters, on the birth of jazz, and how it (as well as country, folk, rock and roll) owe their creation to the blues. I'm not sure, but I think Jones followed up this book with a sequel, which would also be worth reading.
My only real complaint with the book is that it focuses more on jazz than the blues, and it only gives a very brief and fleeting description of the many schools of blues: Mississippi Delta, Chicago, country.
It also stops at around the time that blues music was taking off into some very interesting and different directions, especially in regards to the late-60s with Jimi Hendrix, Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Etta James, etc. (This may be covered in the sequel.) Still, this is a must-read for die-hard blues fans.
Jones approaches this musical genre from a sociological, historical, and political standpoint, starting with the early slave trade in America. He looks at the many African influences of the blues, as well as its opposition to more classical Western (as in Western Civilization) styles of music, and how it has evolved.
Jones focuses most of his attention, in later chapters, on the birth of jazz, and how it (as well as country, folk, rock and roll) owe their creation to the blues. I'm not sure, but I think Jones followed up this book with a sequel, which would also be worth reading.
My only real complaint with the book is that it focuses more on jazz than the blues, and it only gives a very brief and fleeting description of the many schools of blues: Mississippi Delta, Chicago, country.
It also stops at around the time that blues music was taking off into some very interesting and different directions, especially in regards to the late-60s with Jimi Hendrix, Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Etta James, etc. (This may be covered in the sequel.) Still, this is a must-read for die-hard blues fans.
October 21, 2021
Essential reading for any practitioner or student of American music, which is to say, Black music.
August 10, 2010
Great book! This is to blues and jazz history what Zinn’s People’s History is to U.S. history. It’s an overview, but it covers a lot of ground and there is no nonsense to be found.
Blues People is great because it communicates so clearly the evolution of blues and jazz from the fields to the urban centers, from the 1800’s to 1960’s. Baraka’s writing is superb, never too wordy or too sparse. He has a nice economy to his writing, a concision that really speaks to the reader.
There was one passage I found particularly interesting, a discussion of relative originality among the very early recorded blues singers. “Though certain techniques and verses came to be standardized among blues singers, the singing itself remained arbitrary and personal as the shout. Each man sang a different blues: the Peatie Wheatstraw blues, the Blind Lemon blues, the Blind Willie Johnson blues, etc. The music remained personal because it began with the performers themselves and not with formalized notions of how it was to be performed.” This seems to be a general truth that can be applied to any music when comparing those who did it first with those who came later. That it is a truth, I have no doubt.
Another one that stood out: “Rock ‘n’ roll is the blues form of the classes of Americans who lack the “sophistication” to be middle brows, or are too naïve to get in on the mainstream American taste; those who think that somehow Melachrino, Kostelanetz, etc., are too lifeless.” Melachrino (George) and Kostelanetz (Andre) were classical musicians and composers, so it seems like Baraka is saying rock ‘n’ roll is for those who are incapable of appreciating jazz and find little excitement in modern, mainstream orchestral music. I disagree with what he’s saying, though there is truth in it. I think he’s fallen into the same easy trap many jazz heads fall into, considering jazz (or whatever music) superior to rock ‘n’ roll (or whatever other music) because of a perceived complexity or lack of. I agree Charlie Christian was a more technically advanced and skilled player than, say, Johnny Ramone, but let’s face facts; Charlie Christian could no more have played Johnny Ramone’s parts than Johnny Ramone could have played Charlie Christian’s.
I have to admit that my ignorance of jazz and jazz players meant some of this book was lost on me. I understood the points Baraka made but it would have communicated more if I was familiar with the recordings he referenced.
What was really interesting is, there was no mention of Robert Johnson. I thought this was strange until I gave it some thought. Blue People was first published in 1963, just two years after the Johnson collection King Of The Delta Blues Singers was released. It seems likely Baraka (and probably most people) were more or less unaware of Robert Johnson in 1963. Imagine; a time when Robert Johnson was not immediately understood to be the best and greatest of the bluesmen. Elijah Wald would say, “I told you so.”
Blues People is an important read for anyone interested in blues and jazz or in the people who created them.
Blues People is great because it communicates so clearly the evolution of blues and jazz from the fields to the urban centers, from the 1800’s to 1960’s. Baraka’s writing is superb, never too wordy or too sparse. He has a nice economy to his writing, a concision that really speaks to the reader.
There was one passage I found particularly interesting, a discussion of relative originality among the very early recorded blues singers. “Though certain techniques and verses came to be standardized among blues singers, the singing itself remained arbitrary and personal as the shout. Each man sang a different blues: the Peatie Wheatstraw blues, the Blind Lemon blues, the Blind Willie Johnson blues, etc. The music remained personal because it began with the performers themselves and not with formalized notions of how it was to be performed.” This seems to be a general truth that can be applied to any music when comparing those who did it first with those who came later. That it is a truth, I have no doubt.
Another one that stood out: “Rock ‘n’ roll is the blues form of the classes of Americans who lack the “sophistication” to be middle brows, or are too naïve to get in on the mainstream American taste; those who think that somehow Melachrino, Kostelanetz, etc., are too lifeless.” Melachrino (George) and Kostelanetz (Andre) were classical musicians and composers, so it seems like Baraka is saying rock ‘n’ roll is for those who are incapable of appreciating jazz and find little excitement in modern, mainstream orchestral music. I disagree with what he’s saying, though there is truth in it. I think he’s fallen into the same easy trap many jazz heads fall into, considering jazz (or whatever music) superior to rock ‘n’ roll (or whatever other music) because of a perceived complexity or lack of. I agree Charlie Christian was a more technically advanced and skilled player than, say, Johnny Ramone, but let’s face facts; Charlie Christian could no more have played Johnny Ramone’s parts than Johnny Ramone could have played Charlie Christian’s.
I have to admit that my ignorance of jazz and jazz players meant some of this book was lost on me. I understood the points Baraka made but it would have communicated more if I was familiar with the recordings he referenced.
What was really interesting is, there was no mention of Robert Johnson. I thought this was strange until I gave it some thought. Blue People was first published in 1963, just two years after the Johnson collection King Of The Delta Blues Singers was released. It seems likely Baraka (and probably most people) were more or less unaware of Robert Johnson in 1963. Imagine; a time when Robert Johnson was not immediately understood to be the best and greatest of the bluesmen. Elijah Wald would say, “I told you so.”
Blues People is an important read for anyone interested in blues and jazz or in the people who created them.
September 11, 2017
Simply one of the greatest pieces of musical criticism I have ever read. Steeped in cultural and economic critique, history, and an astounding talent of keen observation into human nature and how it demands that art be created under unimaginable oppression. A must read for anyone interested in music or US history.
October 27, 2017
I picked up the 1963 first edition of Blues People in a used bookstore. Many of the themes running through Baraka's book still feel relevant in the 21st century as we face down renewed crises of racism and a stifling capitalistic focus in our culture.
Amiri Baraka (then Leroi Jones) traces the musical ancestry of jazz, rhythm and blues, and rock music back to the first slave ships to land in North America. In doing so, he also weaves into the narrative an examination of black Americans' history from "day one" as being a history set apart from the cultural, social, and value norms of mainstream American culture. Early in Blues People, Baraka wrote about what distinguished many black slaves in America from their enslaved counterparts throughout history (west Africa, Rome, Greece, Babylon, etc.) was that the black slave in America wasn't even considered human in the ways that whites understood the word. They were thought of as a a piece of property, a sub-species, certainly not "equal" to the white man in any way. As such, they could never blend into society through time and exposure the way Italians or the Irish quickly did. With this mindset, acculturation and assimilation of slaves and ex-slaves into American society was impossible. In turn, that dominant society paradoxically expressed extreme hostility that assimilation did not occur and on the other hand used any manner of coercion to ensure it couldn't happen. Baraka writes: "It is absurd to assume, as has been the tendency, among a great many Western anthropologists and sociologists, that all traces of Africa were erased from the Negro's mind because he learned English." The resulting cultural, social, and value differences, claims Baraka, persist in white and in black communities to this day. Those differences can be seen in the evolution of one of America's greatest artistic contributions to the world: jazz and rock n' roll music.
The notion of being a permanent outsider is a theme that runs from Baraka's discussion of early conceptions of black society in America up until the end of the book where he discusses art, artists, and bohemian lifestyles being in direct opposition to America's pervasive money-minded "economic sensibility." Though he was talking about the late 1950s and early 1960s, it's not hard to superimpose the themes and history examined in this book onto the world today.
Amiri Baraka (then Leroi Jones) traces the musical ancestry of jazz, rhythm and blues, and rock music back to the first slave ships to land in North America. In doing so, he also weaves into the narrative an examination of black Americans' history from "day one" as being a history set apart from the cultural, social, and value norms of mainstream American culture. Early in Blues People, Baraka wrote about what distinguished many black slaves in America from their enslaved counterparts throughout history (west Africa, Rome, Greece, Babylon, etc.) was that the black slave in America wasn't even considered human in the ways that whites understood the word. They were thought of as a a piece of property, a sub-species, certainly not "equal" to the white man in any way. As such, they could never blend into society through time and exposure the way Italians or the Irish quickly did. With this mindset, acculturation and assimilation of slaves and ex-slaves into American society was impossible. In turn, that dominant society paradoxically expressed extreme hostility that assimilation did not occur and on the other hand used any manner of coercion to ensure it couldn't happen. Baraka writes: "It is absurd to assume, as has been the tendency, among a great many Western anthropologists and sociologists, that all traces of Africa were erased from the Negro's mind because he learned English." The resulting cultural, social, and value differences, claims Baraka, persist in white and in black communities to this day. Those differences can be seen in the evolution of one of America's greatest artistic contributions to the world: jazz and rock n' roll music.
The notion of being a permanent outsider is a theme that runs from Baraka's discussion of early conceptions of black society in America up until the end of the book where he discusses art, artists, and bohemian lifestyles being in direct opposition to America's pervasive money-minded "economic sensibility." Though he was talking about the late 1950s and early 1960s, it's not hard to superimpose the themes and history examined in this book onto the world today.
December 17, 2017
This book was assigned for my History of Jazz class I took this semester taught by the pretty legendary trumpet player Bobby Bradford. Bobby always emphasized the way in which music made him feel and how it was difficult to articulate certain aspects of music because it was more of an emotion than the type of thing that could be written out in a textbook. And hearing him tell stories and speak with first-hand knowledge about these influential jazz musicians made me feel the same way about the development of Blues/Jazz music. I always thought such nuance, the experience of being black in 20th century America, combined with the cultural divide between white and black participation in Jazz music was so difficult to actually put into words that did it all justice. But this book does it! It’s amazing. I really enjoyed reading it especially because my reading had been supplemented by listening to these famous musicians songs and the class’s lectures. If anybody is interested in Blues/Jazz music and how it came to be this truly is the book to read. Jones is able to explain how and why this music is so closely tied to the American black experience, how white musicians roles so often fit somewhere between appropriation and misunderstanding, and how each new style of Blues/Jazz music grew out of both the styles before it as well as the current events in America at the time. I’m really glad I read this because I definitely wouldn’t have if it had not been for the class, but I feel like I have such a deeper appreciation and understanding of this music now. Also Jones’ writing actually often made me stop reading to say wow and underline certain sentences that said things I thought nobody could ever have words to explain. Five stars for all that it is.
July 3, 2015
A fascinating, thorough, and exhilarating social document of the development of black music in America. A must read, I would say.
BONUS: When I was 19 I saw Baraka speak at the University of Missouri. It was such a critical and ecstatic speech that afterwords my buddies and I met him. I literally told him I thought he was a God.
BONUS: When I was 19 I saw Baraka speak at the University of Missouri. It was such a critical and ecstatic speech that afterwords my buddies and I met him. I literally told him I thought he was a God.
December 19, 2022
Quite possibly one of my favorite books of all time. Heavy in the most informative, deep way.
It has changed the way I consider myself a steward of music. I’m a better black musician, and black man having read this.
It has changed the way I consider myself a steward of music. I’m a better black musician, and black man having read this.
June 5, 2020
Published in 1963, this book not only stands up as an exceptional history of black music in America, but also as an incisive work of cultural, economic, and social history.
March 7, 2022
Published in 1963 under the name LeRoi Jones, Amiri Baraka's Blues People: Negro Music in White America, is a compelling look at the roots of American blues and jazz, tracing those roots back to the experiences of the first Africans brought over to the New World.
From African folk songs to slave work songs, blues really started to take shape after Reconstruction, becoming increasingly realized at certain monumental junctions in history, especially as freedom and possibility became further realized along with the gaps that existed between White and Black opportunity - notably during and after the two world wars, the Great Depression and the war in Korea.
The book is not only an exploration of Black history and how it contributed to the music of African Americans, but it also explores the appropriation of new Black musical forms by White musicians, in addition to acknowledging the contributions of certain White jazz artists. It also delves into the intersectionality of race and class (and gender), with many middle class African Americans looking at the Blues with contempt, as a lower cultural form, and as something they wanted to distance themselves from, with integration into White society being their principal goal.
The book crosses hundreds of years of history and oppression in lightning speed, but thoroughly and with hardly a dull moment to be found, from the first Africans brought to the new world as property to the movement from Blues and Jazz to R&B and rock and roll in the twentieth century. It's a fascinating read for anyone interested in music, but also for those with an interest in history, not just music history or the African American experience, but American and even to an extent world history; for it's impossible to separate the music from the people and the history, their struggles and their triumphs, the slaveowner and the slave, the beboppers and the hipsters, the middle class and the poor and working class, the Black experience in Europe during the world wars versus their experience in White America. It is the story of the Black experience in White America, but we're all tied up in it to some degree or another.
From African folk songs to slave work songs, blues really started to take shape after Reconstruction, becoming increasingly realized at certain monumental junctions in history, especially as freedom and possibility became further realized along with the gaps that existed between White and Black opportunity - notably during and after the two world wars, the Great Depression and the war in Korea.
The book is not only an exploration of Black history and how it contributed to the music of African Americans, but it also explores the appropriation of new Black musical forms by White musicians, in addition to acknowledging the contributions of certain White jazz artists. It also delves into the intersectionality of race and class (and gender), with many middle class African Americans looking at the Blues with contempt, as a lower cultural form, and as something they wanted to distance themselves from, with integration into White society being their principal goal.
The book crosses hundreds of years of history and oppression in lightning speed, but thoroughly and with hardly a dull moment to be found, from the first Africans brought to the new world as property to the movement from Blues and Jazz to R&B and rock and roll in the twentieth century. It's a fascinating read for anyone interested in music, but also for those with an interest in history, not just music history or the African American experience, but American and even to an extent world history; for it's impossible to separate the music from the people and the history, their struggles and their triumphs, the slaveowner and the slave, the beboppers and the hipsters, the middle class and the poor and working class, the Black experience in Europe during the world wars versus their experience in White America. It is the story of the Black experience in White America, but we're all tied up in it to some degree or another.
January 8, 2020
Great book that gives an insight not just to the history of Blues music and its further developments, but also gives a history of the sociocultural context in which it arose.
February 19, 2008
The central argument of this book - all American popular music is stolen from blacks by whites - seems reasonable enough. But every time I read this book, the magnitude of the Baraka's argument seems more preposterous. But man, does he argue it well.
Baraka is so passionate - angry even - that in my younger days, I was actually afraid to argue against him. But his research is full of holes. When empirical evidence falters, Baraka resorts to - to paraphrase and take great liberty with the text - "it's a black thing" and "you wouldn't understand" (addressing the predominantly white audience which he is presumably writing for). His concepts of rhythm, soul and racial memory intentionally exclude whites, making his evidence of their existence impossible for whites to know. Therefore, Baraka is correct and you'll just have to take his word for it.
Blues People and Black Music set a new standard for scholarship, and opened new doors for exploring the ideas of racial essentialim as a positive thing, instead of a negative. When it was written, this was a breakthrough work. No black scholar had dared fly in the face of the establishment like this.
Baraka is so passionate - angry even - that in my younger days, I was actually afraid to argue against him. But his research is full of holes. When empirical evidence falters, Baraka resorts to - to paraphrase and take great liberty with the text - "it's a black thing" and "you wouldn't understand" (addressing the predominantly white audience which he is presumably writing for). His concepts of rhythm, soul and racial memory intentionally exclude whites, making his evidence of their existence impossible for whites to know. Therefore, Baraka is correct and you'll just have to take his word for it.
Blues People and Black Music set a new standard for scholarship, and opened new doors for exploring the ideas of racial essentialim as a positive thing, instead of a negative. When it was written, this was a breakthrough work. No black scholar had dared fly in the face of the establishment like this.
July 23, 2014
Take it with some grains of salt, and it's a hearty meal.
I came looking for a book to inform me about blues (and to a lesser extent, jazz), and boy, did I get it. Starting from the time of slavery and moving all the way through cool jazz, the author covers everything in great historical detail. There's analysis of individual musicians, styles, cultural movements, historical events, migrations, etc. Baraka weaves everything together quite well, whether it is talking about one musician's direct influence on another, or drawing comparisons to earlier events. If you have never read books on blues, it's hard to beat starting with this one.
It is true that the author colors the book with his opinion. In my opinion, this is necessary. I do not read just to be informed; I want to have my ideas challenged, to argue or agree with the author in my head, and find out what his thoughts are, rather than mere historical facts. I don't think his opinions skew the facts that much, and it is easy to separate the facts from the thoughts. Essentially, in my opinion you can't write a good history on blues without some bias.
I came looking for a book to inform me about blues (and to a lesser extent, jazz), and boy, did I get it. Starting from the time of slavery and moving all the way through cool jazz, the author covers everything in great historical detail. There's analysis of individual musicians, styles, cultural movements, historical events, migrations, etc. Baraka weaves everything together quite well, whether it is talking about one musician's direct influence on another, or drawing comparisons to earlier events. If you have never read books on blues, it's hard to beat starting with this one.
It is true that the author colors the book with his opinion. In my opinion, this is necessary. I do not read just to be informed; I want to have my ideas challenged, to argue or agree with the author in my head, and find out what his thoughts are, rather than mere historical facts. I don't think his opinions skew the facts that much, and it is easy to separate the facts from the thoughts. Essentially, in my opinion you can't write a good history on blues without some bias.
Read
December 29, 2015Before he became the voice of black nationalist poetry, a young man named Amiri Baraka wrote a book that, while still widely read, deserves to be a primer for understanding the evolution of pop music. Blues, jazz, soul, and funk have all fully entered the white American songbook, and hip-hop, while it's been slow getting there, is on its way. Despite the fact that it was written a full 15 years before a rapper first stepped into the studio, Baraka seems to have anticipated it with his analysis of jazz. A music that terrifies white people, wrinkles the foreheads of the black bourgeoisie, and still has a rough, menacing edge, even in an era when you'll hear Q-Tip on NPR. And fuck, everything he says, Baraka's way ahead of his time. Henry Louis Gates employed a lot of the same ideas, African tradition feeding black America's art being subsumed by white America. Baraka used the example of black minstrels in blackface imitating white minstrels imitating black people imitating the white ruling class. At the end of the day, how different was late '90s Outkast? And when Baraka is talking about white performers feeling more comfortable with Bix Beiderbecke or Dave Brubeck due to some kind of intrinsic whiteness, how do we feel when we find that the only hip-hop in some suburban kid's library is Macklemore?
April 8, 2014
This book is essential to anyone who loves blues, jazz, R&B, or even roots rock n' roll, and desires to understand the contribution of the Negro culture to these music forms and, thereby, to American culture. It also reveals the little understood reciprocal impact on Black culture in this country. While doing so, Baraka also provides a deepened understanding of American history, economics, and culture.
The book is extremely well written and well researched. Because it was published in 1963, it traces the history of Negro music from its African roots, through early "field hollers" and "gospel" in the days of slavery, and then through what Baraka refers to as "the so-called Emancipation", to early jazz as a formalization of the blues, and on to New Orleans style jazz, swing, bebop, cool jazz, and hard bop, ending with the avant garde of the early 60s, and innovators such as John Coltrane, Cecil Taylor, and Ornette Coleman.
Fascinating and important book in the history of American culture and the arts.
The book is extremely well written and well researched. Because it was published in 1963, it traces the history of Negro music from its African roots, through early "field hollers" and "gospel" in the days of slavery, and then through what Baraka refers to as "the so-called Emancipation", to early jazz as a formalization of the blues, and on to New Orleans style jazz, swing, bebop, cool jazz, and hard bop, ending with the avant garde of the early 60s, and innovators such as John Coltrane, Cecil Taylor, and Ornette Coleman.
Fascinating and important book in the history of American culture and the arts.
February 22, 2013
A really crucial (and short) read. I'm sure it helped that I have a fairly thorough knowledge of the basic timeline of the major jazz styles and players. Anyway, some of the great things I took away from this book were an attempt to situate blues and jazz musicians within their racial, class, and cultural context and think about how this affected the social/communal act of making (and hearing) music - as opposed to the very typical practice of venerating unique musical "geniuses". Another point that I found really fascinating (and that I think many other reviewers here have missed) has to do with Baraka's acknowledgement that early African-American music took as much from white-American music as the other way around. I remember European instruments and French/creole quadrilles as examples.
This book just gave me a whole different way of understanding American music. Highly recommended.
This book just gave me a whole different way of understanding American music. Highly recommended.
May 30, 2020
This book was NOT what I expected from reading the reviews. It is not "the definitive source of Blues history"! It is book about African American culture and history with music involved. The author said it best, "a theoretical work". It was his theories on how "Negroes" thought and felt to make them create the music. He uses a lot of excerpts from other peoples work and a lot of "because they felt this way" or "they thought that way" type writing. I am honestly having a hard time understanding most of these reviews. Did they read the same book? I don't even consider this book non fiction since so much is theory, so how can this be a "definitive book of blues history"? I have already read books about "Negro" history in America. I wanted to learn actual facts about the beginnings of the Blues. The reviews said this was.... It wasn't even close. I learned more from reading books about the lives of men like Huddie "Leadbelly" Ledbetter and Blind Willie McTell about TRUE Blues history than anything I read in this book. This is a African American history lesson with a lot of theory and a bit of music. Want a book that will teach you actual historical facts about the Blues? Look elsewhere. I am a huge fan of ONLY pre 1940 Blues..... this book was not what I expected or was looking for.
January 21, 2025
I found some parts of this deeply insightful. Baraka's fundamental argument is that to understand Black music like blues (and these days I would argue, rap), you must understand how that music grew out of the history, psychology, and culture of those people. This is a fascinating and I think, absolutely true, approach to music history. That said, Baraka's text is both historical and personal, in that Baraka's own opinions on certain musicians/musical styles/etc. form a large part of his analysis. My frustration is that he never stops to delineate these two things - history and editorial opinion. Of course there is no objective history - all stories can be told from many directions - but still I found myself wondering how much of this book was verifiable and how much of it was (well-reasoned) speculation on Baraka's part. I did, however, find his written tone deeply engaging. Whether history was separated from "fact" or not, I always appreciate an author who takes a firm stance and doesn't back down.
That said, this book would probably work better for readers more familiar with blues and jazz than I am. The last chapters, where Baraka left the world of history and strayed more into music theory, were quite lost on me.
That said, this book would probably work better for readers more familiar with blues and jazz than I am. The last chapters, where Baraka left the world of history and strayed more into music theory, were quite lost on me.
September 1, 2019
"La música puede considerarse el resultados de ciertas actitudes, ciertos modos específicos de pensar el mundo, y sólo en último término sobre las posibles maneras de hacer música"
May 23, 2023
4.5 - idiosyncratic but provocative and insightful.
June 23, 2015
This is a case of a book being important in its time but whose claims have become outdated. Or so it seems to me. Granted, I come from a knowledge base primarily focused on Brazil, Afro-Brazilian culture, and the African diaspora as experienced there. So the overlap is obviously imperfect, and I am unfamiliar with the debates concerning blues/jazz and the U.S. historical context of their development.
Having said that, some of the claims in this book are problematic--Baraka essentializes Africa as, well, first a cohesive whole with a single cultural and musical tradition. "African" music could mean a lot of things. He treats it as a place with a certain unchanging history and sense of tradition--Africa has been and always will be a place of certain traditions. This ignores the existence of change, innovation, creativity, and individual distinctions in favor of a nostalgic celebration of AFRICA. This book is politically important--pointing out the contributions of African American artists and drawing in the legacy of slavery and ongoing prejudice and discrimination in music-making. But because of its sweeping declarations (which HAVE to be made, which deserve hearing) its political slant takes over its historical rigor. I mean that the point of this book IS political, IS to make broad statements that generate discussion and to serve a larger purpose, rather than to be an esoteric study designed to strip the music under discussion of any life, meaning, or ongoing political significance.
He's at his best describing the historical setting. But again, this is an extended, genre-bending essay, so he draws on a lot of inference, sympathy, and supposition to make emotional claims alongside the historical ones. I found the discussion of bebop and jazz, the last chapter on "The Modern Scene" to be more of a music critic's rant about other critics as well as musicians piggybacking on others' work and the loss of meaning apparent in some of their works. At a certain point, whether or not something is "authentic" merely implies a particular set of criteria meaningful to the author, not necessarily something that everyone would agree on or even based in verifiable historical conditions. Same for whether it's "moving."
An interesting side note: he claims that the phrase "The Devil is beating his wife" (used to described the meteorological condition when it rains while the sun is out) is of African origin. He says this without a reference, although in the same paragraph he provides a note for a different phrase. My grandmother said this phrase to me in German when I was growing up, so if it has an African origin, it has a WAY more complicated derivation. These are my problems: I want to know more, I want to see the support. Sometimes he leaves a quotation to speak for itself, and I'm not always sure what he expects me to get out of it, to support his argument.
His most important claim, to me (the one I got the most out of), was the idea that certain white artists and musicians as well as white audiences identify and identify with the alienation coming out of blues and jazz--they adopt these positions of nonconformity that are forced upon the black population. This is a really important point and suggests all the others: the ideas of appropriation and expression and historical relationships projected into the present. The idea that patronage of a musical form is not devoid of a variety of political positions: as much as those white artists/audiences may want to reject racism and discrimination, they do so from a very different position that black artists/audiences. It's worthwhile to recognize this, to inject power relations into a discussion of music, commercial success, consumerism and all of that.
Having said that, some of the claims in this book are problematic--Baraka essentializes Africa as, well, first a cohesive whole with a single cultural and musical tradition. "African" music could mean a lot of things. He treats it as a place with a certain unchanging history and sense of tradition--Africa has been and always will be a place of certain traditions. This ignores the existence of change, innovation, creativity, and individual distinctions in favor of a nostalgic celebration of AFRICA. This book is politically important--pointing out the contributions of African American artists and drawing in the legacy of slavery and ongoing prejudice and discrimination in music-making. But because of its sweeping declarations (which HAVE to be made, which deserve hearing) its political slant takes over its historical rigor. I mean that the point of this book IS political, IS to make broad statements that generate discussion and to serve a larger purpose, rather than to be an esoteric study designed to strip the music under discussion of any life, meaning, or ongoing political significance.
He's at his best describing the historical setting. But again, this is an extended, genre-bending essay, so he draws on a lot of inference, sympathy, and supposition to make emotional claims alongside the historical ones. I found the discussion of bebop and jazz, the last chapter on "The Modern Scene" to be more of a music critic's rant about other critics as well as musicians piggybacking on others' work and the loss of meaning apparent in some of their works. At a certain point, whether or not something is "authentic" merely implies a particular set of criteria meaningful to the author, not necessarily something that everyone would agree on or even based in verifiable historical conditions. Same for whether it's "moving."
An interesting side note: he claims that the phrase "The Devil is beating his wife" (used to described the meteorological condition when it rains while the sun is out) is of African origin. He says this without a reference, although in the same paragraph he provides a note for a different phrase. My grandmother said this phrase to me in German when I was growing up, so if it has an African origin, it has a WAY more complicated derivation. These are my problems: I want to know more, I want to see the support. Sometimes he leaves a quotation to speak for itself, and I'm not always sure what he expects me to get out of it, to support his argument.
His most important claim, to me (the one I got the most out of), was the idea that certain white artists and musicians as well as white audiences identify and identify with the alienation coming out of blues and jazz--they adopt these positions of nonconformity that are forced upon the black population. This is a really important point and suggests all the others: the ideas of appropriation and expression and historical relationships projected into the present. The idea that patronage of a musical form is not devoid of a variety of political positions: as much as those white artists/audiences may want to reject racism and discrimination, they do so from a very different position that black artists/audiences. It's worthwhile to recognize this, to inject power relations into a discussion of music, commercial success, consumerism and all of that.
July 9, 2025
LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka's classic work on the history of the blues is a powerful look at not just blues music, but the history of music in relation to race, as a method of tracing the development of culture and people. By examining music in relation to the historical progression from slavery up to civil rights, the author argues that self-identification as an African-American and/or American (as opposed to a displaced/enslaved African)--and a feeling of connection and cultural grounding in America vs. Africa--is directly tied to the development of music over these last centuries. It's the sort of nuanced look at history and development which, to be blunt, isn't offered in schools but should be. Examining race, politics, music, identity, and psychology as they are all tied up together in a progression of time, Baraka paints a fascinating history that's well worth reading even now.
Readers who are less familiar with blues music and different performers may find the very last section a bit more detailed than they'd prefer (in relation to intricacies of music and the blues and specific performers), but up through that point, the book is incredibly accessible to any reader who cares to move through history with a talented writer and thinker.
Absolutely recommended.
Readers who are less familiar with blues music and different performers may find the very last section a bit more detailed than they'd prefer (in relation to intricacies of music and the blues and specific performers), but up through that point, the book is incredibly accessible to any reader who cares to move through history with a talented writer and thinker.
Absolutely recommended.
March 5, 2016
Blues People is an alternate history of American music. There's times when it deviates so far from the accepted story that it feels like a transmission from another planet. And that's the best thing about it - sometimes there's nothing better than learning that everything you know is wrong.
The second best is the vitriol Baraka has for just about every facet of 200 years of popular American culture. In this history, music doesn't reach mainstream ears until it has been corrupted, diluted and stripped of meaning.
Most of the book is about jazz, rather than blues - although the distinction becomes less clear in his telling. I don't know as much about jazz, but this turned out to be to my benefit. According to Baraka, most of the accepted canon is bullshit anyways. Ragtime is an embarrassment, Swing is a bland and timid adulteration, BeBop is serious music but Hard Bop is a failed experiment. Cool Jazz is boring, middlebrow dinner party music. Chet Baker goes down in a mere two sentences. Dave Brubeck gets more space, but doesn't fare any better. Even Miles Davis gets some side-eye. Like I said, everything you know is wrong.
It's fascinating that this book is from 1963 - coming in just before the entire mainstream culture took a hard turn towards the underground, or at least the illusion of it. I get the impression that Amiri Baraka could already see 'The Man Can't Bust Our Music' coming and was trying to throw the first brick back.
The second best is the vitriol Baraka has for just about every facet of 200 years of popular American culture. In this history, music doesn't reach mainstream ears until it has been corrupted, diluted and stripped of meaning.
Most of the book is about jazz, rather than blues - although the distinction becomes less clear in his telling. I don't know as much about jazz, but this turned out to be to my benefit. According to Baraka, most of the accepted canon is bullshit anyways. Ragtime is an embarrassment, Swing is a bland and timid adulteration, BeBop is serious music but Hard Bop is a failed experiment. Cool Jazz is boring, middlebrow dinner party music. Chet Baker goes down in a mere two sentences. Dave Brubeck gets more space, but doesn't fare any better. Even Miles Davis gets some side-eye. Like I said, everything you know is wrong.
It's fascinating that this book is from 1963 - coming in just before the entire mainstream culture took a hard turn towards the underground, or at least the illusion of it. I get the impression that Amiri Baraka could already see 'The Man Can't Bust Our Music' coming and was trying to throw the first brick back.
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