Waiting For the Overture

The Thomas Pynchon character, Ethelmer, said of Plato in "his 'Republick',-'When the Forms of Musick change,'tis a Promise of civil Disorder.' " How accurately Plato's vision seems to trace the history of our Republic. Evolving taste in music appears to have repeatedly anticipated devolving events on our nation's horizon.

Back in the 1830 and 40s a growing anxiety over the expansion of slavery was reflected in the tunes of the day. " Bless Dat Lubly Yaller Gal", "De Boatman Dance"and "Little Topsy's Song" were the choice of sheet music buyers and on the lips of many. What society may have been anticipating was the tension building all around that culminated in 1846 in the War with Mexico. This calculated aggression added huge chunks of territory but was divisive and led to sectional rifts that simmered for decades.

Minstrel tunes inspired by Black bondage flared up again in the culture but began to be mixed with patriotic airs in the years leading up to the election of Lincoln and the secession of the South. The range was startling from; "The Female Slaves Lament", " Poor Old Slave , "Poor Uncle Tom", "The Aristocratic Nigger" to such rousers as; "Our Country Now Is Great and Free", "Stand by the Union" in 1850, " Our Union Right or Wrong" in 1857, "The Flag of Our Union" and "Honest Old Abe" in 1860.
Were these popular renderings harbingers of the trouble that ensued as Plato opined?

After the cessation of hostilities the Nation began reconstruction and looked to attain a greater place among the nations of the world. The public favored a lot of nonsense music as always: notably; "Father's a Drunkard and Mother Is Dead", " Ta-Ra-Ra Boom-De-Ay!",and "A Hot Time in the Old Town". But towards the end of the century a new idiom was appearing. With roots in Cake Walk and Coon Song airs and John Philip Sousa rousing martial themes, "Raggedy-Time " was born. Heard everywhere were "Harlem Rag", "Tickled to Death" and the infamous, "All Coons Look Alike to Me", which sold a million copies.

Jingoism came into the mix soon after with "Shout the Battle Cry" in 1887 and then "Our Country" in 1890. After the sinking of a battleship in Cuba, the War with Spain was on and led to "My Father Was a Sailor on the Maine" in 1898. The war was notable for acquiring vast territory and, among other things, the systematic slaying of tens of thousand of Moslems by our forces in the Philippine Islands. Ragtime matured with the publication of Scott Joplin's "Maple Leaf Rag" after the war and kept the public's attention until the onset of the "Jazz Age".

The 20's did indeed roar. The dances, the booze joints, Prohibition made it all so daring, went on non-stop. From Chicago the big innovators of "Hot Jazz" poured Eastward to New York where the reception was sizzling. Jelly Roll Norton, Earl Hines and the perennial favorite, Louis "Satchmo" Armstrong, led the way. It could scarcely have been believed the culture could intuit anything dreadful over this glorious horizon.

Alas, the party was over in 1929. The Great Depression dampened everything and was followed after an agonizing decade by World War Two. The planet was torn apart until the end of hostilities. Then the fifties. "Your Hit Parade" had provided the musical menu for two decades. It was bland fare but all ages gathered to share what "Tin Pan Alley" had to offer. Enter now rock and roll. Borrowed from an unsavory past it was corny at first, Rockabilly bubblegum music, but then: Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis, Chuck Berry and big drum roll , Beatles and Stones! And then, Vietnam for ten years. Bummer. Metastatic change in popular music is just too darn prophetic.

Here's were we stand now. Starting in the late 70's Rock 'n Roll eased aside to make room for Hip hop and rap. The early rappers like Grandmaster Flash, DJ Hollywood and Lovebug Starski turned on a generation and swept the nation. An amalgam of ingredients linked performance poetry, scat singing and funk with talking blues and the spoken word. Always lurking in the mix was that old trickster, the "signifying monkey", to keep things from boiling over or growing stale.

We can't know for certain if this metamorphosis anticipated the series of adventures in the Mid East that have occupied the nation for two decades but it does follow a pattern. With no clear resolution in sight, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan remain to haunt us.

What will be the nature of the change in musical form that promises the next disorder and when will it appear on stage? We can only await its hearing. Meanwhile our future may be thrashing about in utero waiting for the overture to begin.