The Implications of Jazz in A Poem for Players

In "A Poem for Players", Al Young made a connection between famous jazz musicians Louis "Satchmo" Armstrong and Dizzie "Diz" Gillespie. The tone of Al Young's poem implied that freedom was licensed, and not truly for all. The idea that certain actions were allowed as long as they didn't stray too far from the status quo, helped highlight the similarity between the White reception of jazz and the White reception of many other things mentioned both inside and outside the poem. Al Young seems to be getting at the ways talented African Americans were publicized seemingly made them Invisible, only showing what the White audience may have approved of. The times that African Americans were in the public spotlight, being acknowledged for their prowess, didn't provide true freedom. In the case of Diz, Satchmo, and specifically O.J. Simpson, white audiences patronized them, forcing them to adhere to the desires of the White audience. Maureen Anderson, the author of an article published in the African American Review, made an important observation. "In striving to analyze and to understand the concepts of jazz music, white critics often hid behind black stereotypes in order to explain the increased fascination the world had with jazz". Other than the music itself, the only exposure audiences have to the lives of both Diz and Satchmo was through media. Maureen Anderson points out that white critics hid behind black stereotypes, further exposing the public to this black stereotype, creating a feedback loop that pulled Diz and Satchmo further and further into white culture. It is undeniable that both Dizzie Gillespie and Louis Armstrong had a multiracial following, but the effect of white culture on both of them created a veneer of invisibility.

Comments

  1. MitchellSeptember 14, 2019 at 11:34 AM

    My earliest memory of Dizzie Gillespie was seeing him as a guest on "The Muppet Show." He was clowning around, as is appropriate for an appearance on such a distinguished and truly awesome kid-oriented program, and in particular I was blown away by his ability to inflate his cheeks really wide (he and Kermit the Frog were having a competition, as I recall). He was funny and entertaining, and there's nothing wrong with a guest appearance on "The Muppet Show," but I was stunned later in life when I learned that Dizzie Gillespie is one of the most important innovators in 20th century American music, one of the creators of a particularly difficult, avant-garde, and more stridently "black" form of jazz that emerged in the postwar years as a reaction against the kind of commercialized swing that Armstrong was producing at the time. Dizzie Gillepsie and Louis Armstrong are serious artists, and their most serious art exists within a distinctly African American context.

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