This was a special event honoring MLK and the struggle for equal rights. This was a group of 8 musicians: 6 African-American and 2 Caucasian (including me). That got me thinking about the role of music, and in particular jazz. For many people, integration began in 1947 when Jackie Robinson joined the Brooklyn Dodgers. But in fact, the world of jazz was highly integrated long before that.
It was as if White America told the slaves, "You can't own property. You can't get an education. You can't hold positions of authority. But music? Yeah, we don't see anything wrong with that." And so the Negro community took their roots of spiritual music and evolved a distinctly American art form.
I have always been amazed at how open black musicians have been to allow whites to join them in this music. Most black folks are essentially color blind. There is, naturally, an initial distrust, but if a white person is seen as genuine, black musicians are almost always welcoming. And this tradition goes all the way back -- long before Jackie Robinson.
It is true that most of the traveling bands were not integrated before about 1950 or so, but that wasn't because of the musicians. That was because of the club owners. But even so, many jazz musicians that couldn't perform publicly in integrated bands got together frequently in unofficial ensembles to share the music.
I will go to me grave without understanding why it is the white people who are mostly the racists. Who ever did anything to white people? It was the blacks who were kidnapped and made slaves, yet they are generally not the ones behind racism.
Anyway, I said it was apropos to nothing. Here are a few other interesting historical tidbits.
http://jazz.about.com/od/historyjazztimeline/a/JazzCivilRights.htm
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