I found that Langston Hughes’s
piece on Memphis Minnie at the 230 club described a superstar musician, evident
to everyone inside the venue on that particular night. While Minnie uses a “scientific
guitar,” one that had gained popularity in the years following the second world
war, Hughes is deliberate in conveying that the rhythm she played was “as old
as Minnie’s most remote ancestor.” This sound resonates insofar as it is a natural
rhythm that seemed to have been inherent and euphonic. However, the operation of the club didn’t seem
to be enjoying the musical expression, but rather they used the sound and the
venue to commercialize Black music for their own financial gain. “…The men who
run the place – they are not Negroes – never smile. …At this year’s end the
sales are better than they used to be.” Minnie was a dynamic woman in a
commercial blues scene dominated by Black male performers and white male everything
else, letting it be well known that she was the conduit of the oft-desired rhythm.
“Our archive too becomes a site for
the subversion and transformation of the dominant ‘mechanisms of historical
memory.’” The connection I draw between Hughes and Habell-Pallan, Retman, and
Macklin is that of a thematic challenge to the historical stratification of
musical expression. Both pieces emphasize the contributions of women in music
as a way to combat the unnecessarily white and male narratives of musical
historical development and operation. To this point, I want to highlight some contributions
by women in male-dominated musical narrative histories.
Blending elements of multiple
genres – a clear synth influence, 808 bass drum, and “scientific” sounding
guitar – Santigold, a Black woman, challenges whatever narrative there was to
describe a woman’s mainstream musical space, and particularly that of a woman
of color. Even in the not-so-sure-how-to-describe indie rock melody that she
sings, she manages to transform who it is we envision when we attempt to
describe genre in that way.
I chose the song “To Zion” by Ms. Lauryn
Hill and Carlos Santana, another blend of cultures, this time African American
and Latin American. I found this a significant addition to my entry because of song’s
major theme. Lauryn Hill attained worldwide acclaim in her time with the Fugees,
having achieved a spot in many critics’ rap pantheon. For someone with those
credentials to express her experience with pregnancy while backed up by one of the
most famous guitar players in history is unprecedented. I considered it a full
challenge to the white male narrative of musical history.
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