Cultural and Political Facts.

 

Jazz is more than one of the greatest forms of music in human history. It's a purely American art form in its origin being created by African American communities down in Delta at New Orleans, Louisiana. Some time ago, the Essence festival took place in New Orleans, which is a city filled with wonderful, vibrant cultural expression. You can't understand music in general without having a basic understanding of jazz music. By the late 19th century, Jim Crow was real and vicious, many black people were lynched, and society was in the midst of the Gilded Age. During this time of harsh events, music inspired people to carry on the fight for human justice. The music of jazz is filled with swing and blue notes. It has complex chords, call and response vocals, polyrhythms, and improvisation. Also, researchers have found African and some European influences in the music too. The term jazz was written as early as 1912. The beauty of jazz is that the performers don't have to have a single interpretation of the music. It can be different forms of expression. Long ago, many slaves in New Orleans were in a mark called Congo Square, where African dances took place. By 1866, almost 400,000 slaves were sent to North Africa from mostly West Africa and the Congo. The call and response style and the rhythms with power came from Africa. Some black musicians used European instruments by the early 19th century. Researchers have found Afro-Cuban musical influence on jazz when the genre of habanera spread globally. Black people playing the piano soon developed the genre of ragtime. Ragtime was expressed in bars, clubs, and other places. Composers like Tom Turpin and William Krell were popular in America. In New Orleans, early jazz musicians played in bars including the red-light district around Storyville, New Orleans. Jazz regularly uses brass, drums, and various scales. Many bands utilized jazz elements. By 1914, Black Americans and Creole musicians played jazz in vaudeville shows. This music spread in the North and the West Coast of America. The Creole Band with cornetist Freddie Keppard had the first jazz concert outside America at the Pantages Playhouse Theater in Winnipeg, Canada. This was in 1914 when jazz was international. Integrated black and white band members were done by a white bandleader named Papa Jack Laine in New Orleans. This was very much ahead of its time because of the obvious reason. He employed players like George Burines and Sharkey Boanono. Storyville was the origin of many jazz legends like Louis Armstrong, Buddy Bolden, Jelly Roll Morton, Lorenzo Tio, and Alcide Nunez. Jazz used the saxophone too. There was the New York jazz style from James Reese Europe's symphonic Clef Club orchestra, Baltimore rag style of Eube Blake, and it spread into Ohio. The banjo and saxophone were encouraged in jazz productions. 

The Jazz Age was from the 1920's to the 1930's when it was spreading to another level. This was the time when alcohol was banned in America, which was Prohibition. It was a decade filled with music, dancing, unique fashion, more traveling by cars, economic expansion, and the massive rise of extravagance. Dance songs, jazz, and show tunes were shown in many locations. Like many forms of music, some in the older generation called jazz immoral because it has been linked to the culture of the Roaring 20s (which was prelude to the Sexual Revolution of the 1960's. Nothing is new under the sun). In 1919, Kid Ory's Original Jazz Band of Musicians played in San Francisco and Los Angeles. By 1922, they were the first black jazz band of New Orleans to make recordings. In 1922, Bessie Smith made her first recordings too. Chicago had King Oliver and Bill Johnson. Bix Beiderbecke formed the Wolverines in 1924. There were orchestras formed by Fed Waring, Jean Goldkette, and Nathaniel Shillkret. Duke Ellington, Lionel Hampton, Fletcher Henderson, Earl Hines, Claude Hopkins, and Don Redman were black legendary jazz artists. Louis Armstrong did a great deal to popularize jazz in world culture. He toured the world. He made his own music, and he was very talented with solo improvisations. Armstrong also popularized scat singing which is still used today in all sorts of music. Armstrong worked in many bands like his Hot Five Band and the Fletcher Henderson dance band as early as 1924 (for a year). European jazz was found in the United Kingdom, France, and many other places. The French jazz band of the Quintette du Hot Club de France started in 1934. It included a merging of African American jazz and other French music. After WWII, swing jazz was dying out because of the lacking of experienced musicians, limitations of recording, etc. This caused a new generation of artists filled with experiments, harmonic substitutions, and further developments. This new generation of bebop jazz was filled with people like Thelonious Monk, Bud Powell, Max Roach, Kenny Clarke, Charlie Parker, and Dizzy Gillespie. This jazz was faster tempo, complex patterns, and a wider set of notes. Many vocalists of a large band who could into pop music like Frank Sinatra, Peggy Lee, Dick Haymes, and Doris Day. Some still used pre-war jazz like Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong. Bebop was listened to heavily. Around the 1940's, Afro-Cuban jazz was further popularized by artists like Mario Bauza, Chano Pozo, and other human beings. African jazz was done by Mongo Santamaria, who was a Cuban percussionist. As jazz evolved, we saw hard bop, modal jazz, and free jazz. Free jazz was done by Sun Ra, Bill Dixon, Steve Lacy, and other people. John Coltrane embraced free jazz too. John Coltraine wanted to go against the grain. So, his playing was more abstract and he used multiphonics, altissimo register, and other styles. John Coltraine in June of 1965 worked with 10 musicians to finish recording the work of Ascension, a 40-minute-long piece without breaks. Free jazz would spread into Europe to like artists like Ayler Taylor, Steve Lacy, Peter Brotzmann, etc. Jazz would spread in Latin America, Afro-Brazilian culture with the bossa nova style, and Africa. Jazz merged with rock with artists like Jimi Hendrix, Frank Zappa, and Miles Davis. Miles Davis would have rock elements in his albums like In a Silent Way. Jazz-funk and traditional jazz would come in the 1980's with trumpeter Wynton Marsalis. Wynton Marsalis is the artist that Generation X and older Millennials identify as the start of the modern age of jazz. 

Wynnton Marsalis used elements of free jazz and traditional music. By the 1980's, jazz legends were abundant with Chick Corea, Herbie Hancock, Bill Evans Miles Davis, Betty Carty, Art Blakey, etc. Smooth jazz was highly popular in the 1980's and beyond. The music of Anita Baker, Al Jarreau, Chaka Khan, Sade, and others had smooth jazz elements. We know about the jazz saxophonists like Grover Washington Jr., Kenny G, Kirk Whalum, Boney James, and David Sanborn making smooth jazz international in scope. As time went on, new forms of jazz existed like nu Jazz, Acid jazz, and Jazz rap. Hip hop artists sample jazz beats constantly like Rakim and Gang Starr. The Tribe Called Quest album of The Low-End Theory (1991) is filled with jazz sonic influences. M-Base of the 1990's, Harry Connick Jr., and 21st-century jazz have been going strong. The Epic is a azz album released by saxophonist Kamasi Washington. 

 

The blues have similarities and many differences from jazz music. The blues was created in the Deep South in the 1860's. It's a cousin to the spirituals and work songs. It has been filled with ballads, shouts, chants, and other forms of expression. That is why the blues and jazz are the origins of rock and roll, R&B, and even some aspects of hip hop music. The call and response style, the blues scale, and the bass deal heavily with the blues. The blues is not just about showing music about human pain or living through turmoil. It can be about joy, self-awareness, and courage too. The term blues has been used since the 1600's and 1700's. Back then, the blues have been referred to drinking alcohol or a depressed mood. The free-born black woman Charlotte Forten wrote the phrase of "the blues" on December 14, 1862 in her diary (when she was 25 years old). She was a schoolteacher in South Carolina educating both slaves and freed people. Many songs like Poor Rosy overcame her depression. The early blues lyrics were usually made of a single line repeated 4 times. The mother of the blues was Ma Rainey (1886-1939). She was a subject of a movie about her life. The blues of the early 20th century had a AAB pattern of a line sung over the four first bars, its repetition over the next four, and a longer concluding line over the last bars. Early blues songs were Dallas Blues in 1912 and Saint Louis Blues in 1914. W.C. Handy wrote his own style. African American blues singers talked about their personal realities of fighting racism, sadness, and pain. The Igbo had melancholic music too. The Blind Lemon Jefferson's Risin High Water Blues in 1927 described the deadly Great Mississippi Flood of 1927. Also, there were lyrics in blues that were different if you know what I mean. Decades before Lil Kim, Millie Jackson, and other singers, the blues had humorous, profanity-filled, and sexually explicit lyrics. There were songs from Tampa Red with controversial themes like gambling, magic, etc. People called these songs "dirty blues." Artists like Lil Johnson, Harry Roy, Dinah Washington, Bessie Smith, and Lucille Bogan (including Bo Carter, The Midnighters), etc. were very overt in showing sexual lyrics. Writer Ed Morales claimed that Yoruba mythology influenced early blues. He cited Robert Johnson's Cross Road Blues being a covert reference to Eleggua, the orisha in charge of the crossroads. There were many religious people involved in the blues too like Charley Patton, Skip James, Bland Willie Johnson, and Reverend Gary Davis (who were Christians). 

The cyclic musical form in blues with a repeating progression of chords is similar to the call and response theme found in African and African American music. I Got the Blues was the first blues sheet of the blues. It was published by New Orleans musician Antonio Maggio in 1908. The blues were spread by Hart Wand and W.C. Handy. The first recording by an African American singer was Mamie Smith's 1920 rendition of Perry Bradford's Crazy Blues. Blues existed in the 1890's. The blues spread into the Deep South and Texas. There were blues in Clarksdale, Mississippi. As juke joints grew, the blues were more common. The banjo and the words from the griots definitely influenced blues music. When the guitar was used in forms of expression, the sounds of blues flourished. In Memphis, there was the Memphis Jug Band. Frank Stokes and Memphis Minnie used many instruments. Also, Bessie Smith was the Queen of the Blues during the 1920's. She has shown urban blues or music about city life. There were Gertrude Ma Rainey, Bessie Smith, and Lucille Goban. Mamie Smith performed across the country too. Ma Rainey was the Mother of Blues. As time went onward, we saw electric blues shown in Chicago, Memphis, and St. Louis. People know about John Lee Hooker using the guitar. Muddy Waters shown out in his music. Many people spread the music from Mississippi to Chicago like Willie Dixon, Jimmy Reed, and Howlin' Wolf. The saxophone and the harmonica were commonly used in the blues as time went onward. Willie Dixon was a legend in the Chicago blues scene. By the 1940's and the 1950's, the blues gave birth to rock and roll and R&B music. The Chicago blues influenced Bo Diddley and Chuck Berry. B.B. King has been a legend of blues long before the 1960's. Artists like the Rolling Stones and the Beatles always give credit to African American music in their performances and albums. With the civil rights movement, the Free Speech Movement, and the anti-war movement, festivals like the Newport Folk Festival brought blues to many audiences. Stevie Ray Vaughan of Texas is a blues legend too. Rock groups used blues elements like Janis Joplin, Jefferson Airplane, the Doors, The Allman Brothers Band, and Jimi Hendrix was a blues-rock performer. From the 1980's to our time, blues artists of every color have shown their talent like ZZ. Hill, Bobby Rush, Denise LaSalle, Peggy Scott-Adams, and other human beings. The blues do deal with emotion, content, and expression like Duke Ellington using big band, bebop, and blues elements in his piano work. Even country music has been merging with the blues for decades. The blues is a universal artform that remains one premiere genre of America including the world. 

 

The 1993 movie of Demolition Man was more than a film about the future and advanced technology. Much of the things found in the movie are found throughout 2022 in modern-day society. Back in 1993, I was 10 years old. Today, I am almost 40 years old, and things have massively changed in almost 30 years since the movie came about. The film starred Sylvester Stallone and Wesley Snipes. Marco Brambilla directed the film. The film also stars Sandra Bullock and Nigel Hawthorne. Stallone plays John Spartan, who is a police officer fighting against the crime leader Simon Phoenix, who is played by Wesley Snipes. They are both sentenced to be cryogenically frozen in 1996. They come back in 2032 which is only 10 years from now. Spartan wants to arrest Phoenix. Phoenix harms California, especially after society is much more politically correct in the film by 2032. In the film, Stallone rebels against a society going over the line in trying to control crime. Snipes knows martial arts in real life, so he shows his martial arts skills in the film too. At the end of the film, Spartan defeats Phoenix in a final battle. The film has allusions to various works including Aldous Huxley's 1932 dystopian novel Brave New World and H.G. Wells's The Sleeper Awakes. The film was released in the United States on October 8, 1993. It earned $159 million worldwide. 

Symbolism is found all over the film. The movie deals with an oppressive society that a tyrannical doctor managed to control after an epidemic and social unrest. The movie depicts a brave new world society under the guise of "peace and security." Yet, the movie shows a society so rigid that hardly any freedom remains in it. Marco Brambilla also directed the symbolism-filled Power video of Kanye West. After Phoenix and Spartan (who was accused of involuntary manslaughter) wake up in 2032, they see people in robes. Spartans go about to disagree with the new police force. Society fines people for certain speech, which is similar to how many in the establishment suppress thoughts that deal with real conspiracies, rejection of imperialism, and other forms of alternative thought. In the film, Spartan has a microchip sein into his skin without his consent. The chip is used to buy things or enter one's home. Today, there are microchips everywhere, and some people want microchips in passports. The film shows Los Angeles merging with Santa Barbara and San Diego into a city of San Angeles. Dr. Cocteau controls it all, and bad language, caffeine, contact sports, meat, chocolate, gasoline, etc. are illegal. Even physical contact among humans is forbidden. The film shows VR devices that didn't exist in 1993 on a wide scale. We have this technology in a wider scale now in 2022. The film Demolition Man makes satire of how extreme political correctness can harm society overall. People, who rebel against Cocteau's society live in sewers and underground tunnels.  There are self-driving electric cars in the film that Telsa has promoted in our time. It has people conversing with Alexa/Siri-type machines, use of artificial intelligence, monopolistic chains, and other things. Therefore, it is fine to have justice and equal human rights. Yet, we should also have freedom of thought and make sure that society doesn't go into complete authoritarian fascism. That is the point of this groundbreaking film. 

 

There is a mystery about Abby Woodson for a time. A while ago, one person from Ancestry.com mentioned information about Abby Woodson. According to Virginia Census records, her parents were Thomas Crocker (who was an African American freeman) and Patsy (Betsy) Woodson. Patsy Woodson and her relatives were descendants of the Nottoway Native American people in Virginia. Patsy's parents are the black freeman Burwell Williams and the Nottoway Native American Winifred Woodson, who were my 6th great-grandparents. The farmer Thomas Crocker lived from ca. 1814 to 1877. According to the United States 1850 Census, her mother was Mima Crocker, who was born in ca. 1780. Winifred Woodson was born in ca. 1791. Thomas Crocker and my 5th great-grandaunt Patsy Williams Crocker (1810-1870) had many children like Martha (Patsy) Crocker (b. 1828), Indiana Bozeman Crocker (1831-18967), and Caroline Bozeman-Crocker (b. 1831). Abby Woodson-Crocker was born in 1847 at Virginia. Later, she married a man named Sam Marshall (b. 1846) on September 23, 1877, at Charles City, Virginia. The family moved to Dodge, Georgia by the year of 1880. In the 1880 United States Census, Abby Woodson and Sam Marshall had the following children: Joseph Marshall (b. 1863), Hillary Marshall (b. 1864), John Marshall (b. 1865), Anderson J. Marshall (b. 1869), Susa Marshall (b. 1871), Maggie Marshall (1875-1919), Emma Marshall (b. 1877), and James Marshall (b. 1880). These children are my 2nd cousins. My 2nd cousin John Marshall married Emma Reaves (1874-1961) on November 6, 1891, at Wilcox, Georgia. Their children are Ruby Marshall Brown (1898-1988), Moses Marshall (1903-1986), Donella Marshall Reid (1892-1969), and Bertha Marshall Adams (1896-1991). These are my 3rd cousins. My 3rd cousin Johnnie Bell Wilcox was born in September 22, 1903, at Rhine, Dodge, Georgia. She married Dan Johnson and had the following children of : Cleopatra Johnson (1922-1986), Roya J. Johnson (b. 1925), Estalla L. Johson (b. 1927), Bernice Lucile Johnson (b. 1933), and Oquin Johnson Wilcox (1935-2002). These are my 4th cousins. Many of these distant cousins moved from Georgia into New Jersey and Florida too. 

 

In the beginning, the start of the history of Texas started with the Native American people. Texas saw the intersection of many advanced Pre-Columbian civilizations. These civilizations were found long before European explorers came into the area. There were the Pueblo people in the upper Rio Grande region in the west of Texas. We know of the Mound Builders of the Mississippi culture. It spread among the Mississippi Valley and its tributaries. The Caddo nation was considered one of it many descendants. There were Mesoamerican civilizations in the south of Texas. The existence of Teotihuacan was in northern Mexico, which peaked in ca. 500 A.D. Many Native Americans lived in Texas between 9200 and 6000 B.C. They could be linked to the Clovis and Folsom cultures. These nomadic people hunted mammoths and bison latifrons including atlatls. There were extracted Alibates flint from quarries in the panhandle region. Beginning during the 4th millennium BC, the population of Texas increased despite a changing climate and the extinction of giant mammals. Many pictograms from this era, drawn on the walls of caves or on rocks, are visible in the state, including at Hueco Tanks and Seminole Canyon. Native Americans in East Texas began to settle in villages shortly after 500 BC, farming and building the first burial mounds. They were influenced by the Mississippian culture, which had major sites throughout the Mississippi basin. In the Trans-Pecos area, populations were influenced by Mogollon culture.

By the 700's A.D., Texas saw increases of the bow and arrow. There were more pottery developed. Native Americans depended on bison for survival. Many Texan cites have obsidian objects. There was trading from Mexico to the Rocky Mountains. As of the colonial period, Texas was largely divided between 6 cultural groups. The Caddoan peoples occupied the area surrounding the entire length of the Red River, and at the time of initial contact with Europeans they formed four collective confederacies known as the Natchitoches, the Hasinai, the Wichita & the Kadohadocho (Caddo). Along the Gulf Coast region were the Atakapa tribes. Southward from the Atakapa, along the Gulf Coast to the Rio Grande river, at least one Coahuiltecan tribe (a culture group primarily from Northeast Mexico) was located. The Puebloan peoples, situated largely between the Rio Grande & Peco rivers were part of an extensive civilization of tribes that lived in what are now the states of Texas, New Mexico, Colorado & Utah. While the northernmost Puebloan groups faced a cultural collapse due to drought, many of the southern tribes survive to the present. North of the Pueblos were the Apachean tribes who although commonly referred to as a single nation, were actually a culture group. Finally, north of the Apacheans, in the northern current-day Texas Panhandle region, were the Comanches.

Native Americans determined the fate of European explorers and settlers depending on whether a tribe was kind or warlike. Friendly tribes taught newcomers how to grow indigenous crops, prepare foods, and hunting methods for the wild game. Warlike tribes made life difficult and dangerous for explorers and settlers through their attacks and resistance to European conquest. Many Native Americans died of new infectious diseases, which caused high fatalities and disrupted their cultures in the early years of colonization.

Three federally recognized Native American tribes reside in present-day Texas: the Alabama-Coushatta Tribes of Texas, the Kickapoo Traditional Tribe of Texas, and the Ysleta Del Sur Pueblo of Texas. A remnant of the Choctaw tribe in East Texas still lives in the Mt. Tabor Community near Overton, Texas. The first European to see Texas was the Spanish man Alonzo Alvarez de Pineda, who led an expedition for the governor of Jamaica. Francisco de Garay came to Texas in 1520. de Pineda wanted to search for a passage between the Gulf of Mexico and Asia. He created the first map of the northern Gulf Coast. The map is the earliest recorded document of modern-day Texas history. Between 1528 and 1535, four survivors of the Narváez expedition, including Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca and Estevanico, spent six and a half years in Texas as slaves and traders among various native groups. Cabeza de Vaca was the first European to explore the interior of Texas. Estevanico is the first African to explore North America. He lived from 1500 to 1539. He was sold into slavery in 1522 at Morocco. His nickname was Estaban (Stephen) which means that he may have been baptized.  

 

Reparations for African Americans have not been made into reality. Yet, by the 21st century, the talk for reparations has increased. Even some liberals, unfortunately, don't agree with reparations for black Americans. It is hypocritical for anyone to support reparations for some Japanese Americans (for the mistreatment that they have suffered in internment camps during WWII), support reparations for Native Americans (who suffer dilapidated homes, discrimination, and genocide for centuries), support reparations for the Jewish victims of the Shoah or Holocaust but oppose reparations for African Americans. We, who are black Americans, suffered slavery, the Maafa, Jim Crow, peonage, and genocide in America. This reality is more than enough documentation to promote reparations for our people. There are sincere people who desire reparations for black Americans. There are other groups of people who are xenophobic and harbor hatred of black people in the African Diaspora (who are not African American) who claim to be for reparations, but they are actually for division in the black community based upon nationality. These groups are heavily found in many sectors of the ADOS and FBA movements respectively. I made my views known on my disagreements with both movements. I disagree with Tariq Nasheed, Antonio Moore, and Yvette Carnell on many issues. The most important thing is to advocate for reparations for black Americans. That fight will continue. With the recent developments of reparations talk in California, we witness a new era. Reparations are not just about money. It's about eliminating structural racism and other forms of oppression to create a system of justice for everyone (with investments and other revolutionary solutions). 

 

We live in urgent times in American history. We predicted that this time will come. Back in 1964, Barry Goldwater was explicitly on his agenda to destroy the New Deal liberalism as we know it. Goldwater is the person who didn't agree with the 1964 Civil Rights Act for states' rights reasons. States' rights have always been used by extremists to deprive the human rights of black people and other groups of people. Many people didn't believe him. Ronald Reagan was overt in his hatred of not only Medicare back in the 1960's, but progressive governmental programs have helped the least of these for numerous generations. Some didn't believe him. When the Tea Party had tons of racists and extremists lying about President Barack Obama (which was beyond the legitimate critiques of some of his neoliberal policies), some didn't believe him. Now, with Trump and his allies destroying many of the blessings of a progressive society, some are finally starting to resist far-right extremism. Far-right extremism is wrong because its ideals are antithetical to the Golden Rule and the hallowed precept that all human beings are created equal and entitled to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Clarence Thomas made it known that he wants contraception restricted heavily to be on the table. Many of the moderates are so concerned with the status quo that they let their guards down when fascism runs wild in American society and in other countries too (fascist movements are in Brazil, the UK, Hungary, Belarus, Russia, and other places of the world currently). This is the fight of our generation. Right now, (not in the 1950's), anti-racism books are being banned, some in Texas want to call slavery "involuntary migration," (which is offensive and insensitive to black human suffering), and the right to protest has been restricted. Voting rights have been attacked at every corner from cutting the days when we can vote to the restrictions of voting boxes. You have to resist evil constructively in order to advance goodness. That is common sense. We are dealing with authoritarian fascist Trump white nationalism here. Trump and his allies were complicit in the attempted insurrection on January 6, 2021, against the U.S. Capitol in attempting to destroy American democracy. The Supreme Court could end affirmative action and other election policies as we know them in 2023 when they decide on new cases. My concern is that Trump and his allies won't be charged after conclusive evidence shows that they not only planned to overthrow the government, but they promoted interference against election procedures (including in the state of Georgia) which are felonies. Trump obstructed the work of Congress, conspired to defraud America, destroyed government records, tried to deprive state residents of a fair election process, tried to obstruct an official procedure, etc. This is ten times worse than Watergate. Yet, these fascists are still here causing mayhem in the world. Trump, Bannon, Eastman, Meadows, Flynn, Giuliani, Brooks, Perry, and others are total disgraces. There were warnings about this too. As early as May 1, 2017, Chancy de Vega wrote a column at Salon citing the view of Historian Timothy Synder that Trump will try to stage a coup and overthrow democracy. Many moderates appease white racist fascists too. The important point is to get organized in standing up for our rights. 

By Timothy