George Lewis to do book on AACM

[trane_fanatic]

George Lewis is doing a signing at City Lights here in The City near the end of the month. Maybe some of you guys can bring up the issues you have w/ the tome direct to him.

http://www.citylights.com/info/?fa=event&event_id=344

Edited July 9, 2008 by trane_fanatic

[blajay]

George Lewis is doing a signing at City Lights here in The City near the end of the month. Maybe some of you guys can bring up the issues you have w/ the tome direct to him.

http://www.citylights.com/info/?fa=event&event_id=344

Thanks trane. I'll try to be there to check that out.

[Chuck Nessa]

George Lewis is doing a signing at City Lights here in The City near the end of the month. Maybe some of you guys can bring up the issues you have w/ the tome direct to him.

http://www.citylights.com/info/?fa=event&event_id=344

Thanks trane. I'll try to be there to check that out.

Say "hey" from me.

[trane_fanatic]

The City Lights event is tonight. I'm planning on going. First time I've gone out for leisure in a while.

[blajay]

The City Lights event is tonight. I'm planning on going. First time I've gone out for leisure in a while.

Well trane, I would have introduced myself if I had known what you look like--I was sitting on the right in black sweater with glasses and dark hair. What a genius George is (I guess he did get the MacArthur after all)! I haven't heard someone that eloquent speak in a long time. He read portions of his book on the Great Migration, the AACM in Paris, gender roles in the AACM, and race, among other themes, such as his methodology, that he touched on in a question and answer format.

While he signed my book, I had a pleasant albeit brief discussion with him on ethnography/cultural studies and his friendship with another author I admire a lot--Robin Kelley (who will be coming out with a Thelonious Monk bio soon). I dream of studying with one of them some day.

Roscoe Mitchell was in the room, too, and I got him to sign it also!

All in all, a very stimulating evening at City Lights.

-Jay

[AllenLowe]

I'm not a Robin Kelly fan, I've seen him at enough conferences to sense that jazz is really a foreign language for him, though I hear the Monk bio has possibiities - though I worry that he's relying too much on the family, and so we'll get a portrait sanitized of mental illness and infidelity which, like it or not, are part of the picture - may be won't - and at the risk of getting people mad, been reading the Lewis book and though it is interesting, his writing style is maddening - sometimes I wanna put it through google translation -

Edited July 30, 2008 by AllenLowe

[jlhoots]

I'm about 80% through the Lewis book.

While some of it is rather "dense" reading, I've enjoyed it & learned a lot.

[blajay]

I'm not a Robin Kelly fan, I've seen him at enough conferences to sense that jazz is really a foreign language for him, though I hear the Monk bio has possibiities - though I worry that he's relying too much on the family, and so we'll get a portrait sanitized of mental illness and infidelity which, like it or not, are part of the picture - may be won't - and at the risk of getting people mad, been reading the Lewis book and though it is interesting, his writing style is maddening - sometimes I wanna put it through google translation -

Yeah, I was wondering the same thing about Kelley being sort of new to Jazz. I've only studied his works in other contexts. Freedom Dreams is an excellent Black Radical history book--not a lot of jazz there (if any). I do admire him and feel like minded enough politically, socially, and it seems ontologically to believe he'll come out with something I'll find nice on Monk, though.

[blajay]

I'm not a Robin Kelly fan, I've seen him at enough conferences to sense that jazz is really a foreign language for him, though I hear the Monk bio has possibiities - though I worry that he's relying too much on the family, and so we'll get a portrait sanitized of mental illness and infidelity which, like it or not, are part of the picture - may be won't - and at the risk of getting people mad, been reading the Lewis book and though it is interesting, his writing style is maddening - sometimes I wanna put it through google translation -

Yeah, I was wondering the same thing about Kelley being sort of new to Jazz. I've only studied his works in other contexts. Freedom Dreams is an excellent Black Radical history book--not a lot of jazz there (if any). I do admire him and feel like minded enough politically, socially, and it seems ontologically to believe he'll come out with something I'll find nice on Monk, though.

Just saw this: http://www.organissimo.org/forum/index.php...ic=3313&hl=

I guess we can keep this thread to George Lewis--organissimo has yet again already covered the topic at hand haha.

[AllenLowe]

years ago Kelly wrote a really dumb article for the NY Times on Miles as pimp - talking about Miles' as emulating a pimp in appearance and attitude - real bad piece -

[7/4]

years ago Kelly wrote a really dumb article for the NY Times on Miles as pimp - talking about Miles' as emulating a pimp in appearance and attitude - real bad piece -

Dis it?

Miles Davis: The Chameleon of Cool; A Jazz Genius In the Guise Of a Hustler

[AllenLowe]

dat be it - hope youse gwine to read it -

[trane_fanatic]

Really? I was sitting up front in the first chair on the left with the green jacket. Yeah, it was a very educational event overall. Great turnout! George's kid couldn't leave him alone. His wife, Miya Masaoka was there also. Haha! Roscoe being present was a pleasant surprise. Wish I had brought my Art Ensemble box with me for him to sign. Apparently, there were other AACM members in the house too.

The City Lights event is tonight. I'm planning on going. First time I've gone out for leisure in a while.

Well trane, I would have introduced myself if I had known what you look like--I was sitting on the right in black sweater with glasses and dark hair. What a genius George is (I guess he did get the MacArthur after all)! I haven't heard someone that eloquent speak in a long time. He read portions of his book on the Great Migration, the AACM in Paris, gender roles in the AACM, and race, among other themes, such as his methodology, that he touched on in a question and answer format.

While he signed my book, I had a pleasant albeit brief discussion with him on ethnography/cultural studies and his friendship with another author I admire a lot--Robin Kelley (who will be coming out with a Thelonious Monk bio soon). I dream of studying with one of them some day.

Roscoe Mitchell was in the room, too, and I got him to sign it also!

All in all, a very stimulating evening at City Lights.

-Jay

Edited July 30, 2008 by trane_fanatic

[trane_fanatic]

George Lewis is doing a signing at City Lights here in The City near the end of the month. Maybe some of you guys can bring up the issues you have w/ the tome direct to him.

http://www.citylights.com/info/?fa=event&event_id=344

Thanks trane. I'll try to be there to check that out.

Say "hey" from me.

I did, Chuck. He extends his greetings to you and said you're an integral part of the history in the book. He even asked what board you post on and I mentioned the Big-O, of course.

[blajay]

George Lewis is doing a signing at City Lights here in The City near the end of the month. Maybe some of you guys can bring up the issues you have w/ the tome direct to him.

http://www.citylights.com/info/?fa=event&event_id=344

Thanks trane. I'll try to be there to check that out.

Say "hey" from me.

I did, Chuck. He extends his greetings to you and said you're an integral part of the history in the book. He even asked what board you post on and I mentioned the Big-O, of course.

Glad you did trane because I forgot to.

[Chuck Nessa]

Say "hey" from me.

I did, Chuck. He extends his greetings to you and said you're an integral part of the history in the book. He even asked what board you post on and I mentioned the Big-O, of course.

Thanks for remembering. George is a fine fellow.

[Alexander Hawkins]

I'm not a Robin Kelly fan, I've seen him at enough conferences to sense that jazz is really a foreign language for him, though I hear the Monk bio has possibiities - though I worry that he's relying too much on the family, and so we'll get a portrait sanitized of mental illness and infidelity which, like it or not, are part of the picture - may be won't - and at the risk of getting people mad, been reading the Lewis book and though it is interesting, his writing style is maddening - sometimes I wanna put it through google translation -

Allen - [p.s. not getting mad here ] - I agree there is the occasional rather dense sentence - although I think Lewis' sense of humour comes into play here too: the densest sentence I read in the whole book, I think, was probably exactly the one (first chapter or so) in which he was acknowledging critiques of his work as dense.

However, my sense was that the book was extremely readable, and very jargon-free by the standards of academic monographs (especially in the social sciences) - [i say this as someone who has taught law social sciences at University level for a couple of years a few years back, and has a burning hatred of that over-dense, jargon-filled, basically-inscrutable nonsense!]

Of course, he does use 'technical terms' etc., but I think his defence of this in the opening stages is a good one: that certain terms serve to cue certain understandings in a readership, and not to use these terms would result in a lot more wordiness. Plus, not to use the terms of the discourse would risk locating the book outside that discourse, and that's a risk, especially when one of the functions of the book is to bring greater understanding/study of the AACM!

[AllenLowe]

I know what you mean, but respectfully disagree - honestly, I think the jargon is for academic cover, to make it most aceptable in the millieu in which he works - and this may come completely naturally to him, may not be an affectation, though, paradoxically, it really is. The language, for me, tends to obscure the discourse, to make it less meaningful as, paradoxically once again, it mimics the surface of meaning. Lewis does this less than a lot of academics, but he still does it on every page. Ironically or not, it does the opposite of what he intends, creating, as academics regularly do, a wall between the experience and the description of that experience. The ultimate effect is to replace linguistic style with mannerism -

[Larry Kart]

I know what you mean, but respectfully disagree - honestly, I think the jargon is for academic cover, to make it most aceptable in the millieu in which he works - and this may come completely naturally to him, may not be an affectation, though, paradoxically, it really is. The language, for me, tends to obscure the discourse, to make it less meaningful as, paradoxically once again, it mimics the surface of meaning. Lewis does this less than a lot of academics, but he still does it on every page. Ironically or not, it does the opposite of what he intends, creating, as academics regularly do, a wall between the experience and the description of that experience. The ultimate effect is to replace linguistic style with mannerism -

Here's an email (it's very close to Red's view, perhaps with a twist) that I sent about this problem to a friend of mine several weeks ago, thinking in particular of the particularly dense Lewis sentence in defense of dense academic writing that Red cites. Unfortunately, I've had to put the Lewis book on hold for a while, in the face of library books that seem to demand immediate attention, but will get back to it eventually:

"Have finally begun to read G. Lewis' book. I see that quite early on he mounts a firm (or at least vigorous) defense of his use of what some might call academic jargon -- implicitly linking it to his view that there can and should be no stylistic "jazz world" restrictions on the nature of "Black experimental music." I bridled a bit initially at this justification for jargon and don't like some of the jazz studies authors and texts he cites, but in practice so far I'm coming to see his point. If nothing else, that is what George himself feels, intellectually and emotionally, the stance that he's arrived at over the course of his life, and because it's vital to the life of the book that he be fully present in every reasonable, appropriate respect, there it is; for him to have adopted any pose of disguise in this area would have been a big mistake. In any case, while I might demur at this or that touch, overall so far I find it gripping, immensely informative, thought-provoking, etc."

[Lazaro Vega]

Well put.

[AllenLowe]

"...his view that there can and should be no stylistic "jazz world" restrictions on the nature of "Black experimental music."

if he is connecting this to his use of language - as in his argument in the book against the stylistic stereotyping of African American musicians as being outside of the 'classical' avant garde - than I think he is making a grave intellectual error. Surely he is correct that black musicians should not be typed as traditional jazz perfomer/composers (thinking, eg, of Stanley Crouch's attacks on Anthony Davis) but I would argue that 1) this is largely a straw man argument - in this day and age few serious jazz critics do this and 2) he is probably speaking about academic snobbery and stereotyping - but who cares what the academics think here? by working to justify himself to them he is acceding to their racism and artistic prejudices; and 3) he is seeking a cure that is possibly worse than (or at least as bad as) the disease -

I like the book by the way, just feel it is, at times, too much of a chore to read it - and I will mention, by the way, that I am in a small minority here, judging by what reviews I have seen (Kevin Whitehead gave it a rave on Fresh Air this week) -

[Larry Kart]

"...his view that there can and should be no stylistic "jazz world" restrictions on the nature of "Black experimental music."

if he is connecting this to his use of language - as in his argument in the book against the stylistic stereotyping of African American musicians as being outside of the 'classical' avant garde - than I think he is making a grave intellectual error. Surely he is correct that black musicians should not be typed as traditional jazz perfomer/composers (thinking, eg, of Stanley Crouch's attacks on Anthony Davis) but I would argue that 1) this is largely a straw man argument - in this day and age few serious jazz critics do this and 2) he is probably speaking about academic snobbery and stereotyping - but who cares what the academics think here? by working to justify himself to them he is acceding to their racism and artistic prejudices; and 3) he is seeking a cure that is possibly worse than (or at least as bad as) the disease -

I like the book by the way, just feel it is, at times, too much of a chore to read it - and I will mention, by the way, that I am in a small minority here, judging by what reviews I have seen (Kevin Whitehead gave it a rave on Fresh Air this week) -

I think I know what you mean, Allen, but it seems to me like some of the ways that Lewis has learned, and even likes, to think are these ways (relatively new-fangled and frequently dubious, at least in tone, to the likes of you and me), and further that he is not then really "working to justify himself to them" etc. at all -- rather (and I certainly haven't read enough to be sure about this, but it's what I think so far), it's almost as though he's playing the "dozens" with this choctaw, though with a much straighter face than "dozens" implies. I know the above sounds weird and double dubious itself, but when I actually see him at work here on material that really needs to be worked on and worked over, I feel that the work is being done -- more comprehensively and soundly than I thought it could be. Also, I don't recall a moment yet where a major point in the story has been bent the wrong way around (IMO) in order to serve any external academic body of interests that was visible to me.

[AllenLowe]

gotta think about it and do more reading - I agree that I see no point at which he is bending to please the academics in terms of his own opinions - I do think that, likely, the style is ingrained in him and I don't doubt his absolute sincerity in not only what he says but how he says it, but I do question the quality of the language -

[Alexander Hawkins]

gotta think about it and do more reading - I agree that I see no point at which he is bending to please the academics in terms of his own opinions - I do think that, likely, the style is ingrained in him and I don't doubt his absolute sincerity in not only what he says but how he says it, but I do question the quality of the language -

Yes...I think I agree to a large extent...obviously depending on what we mean by 'the quality of the language', but yes..!

[Chuck Nessa]

Not sure why we have a tendency to eat our children.

I think all/most interested parties think George is/was the right person to write this book at this time. Sniping at details of language obscures the real product and scares off folks on the edge.