Ferdi
(almost as presented at Margaret Reil's "Debate" at Tel*Ed '93)
How many of you are Jazz musicians? I thought so...Well, how many of you know how to improvise. Hmmm...only a few more. Let's see if I can put this in perspective.
As I travel around my school, at neighboring districts, and recently away from home at conferences and workshops, there is a sense of deja vu. Although heads nod vertically about all the good words we say concerning telecomm and the internet, under the surface, there is sometimes a good deal of hesitation, if not outright resistance to coming online. It struck me recently that I've been through this before, in my former "incarnation" as a Jazz Artist in Residence, and that some of these dues may be relevant to those we're paying now.
Over a period of 5 years, I visited 35 communities, and over 25,000 people actually played solos on the instruments I brought with me. But I guess it didn't result in a mass conversion to bebop, since so few of you spoke up in the first question!
Where I hope it did succeed is in showing everyone how Jazz is a language, born in the Call and Response traditions of Africa, now given to the world by heroic African American as a great gift to the world. Johnny Griffin said "Blues is feeling good *in spite of*..." and this attitude propells the improvisations into a realm which is best discussed where music can be heard among friends. What I hope to lift from this art form is the fact that we all improvise each minute (those of us who don't arise each morning with a complete script prepared for each of our interactions, that is!).
We respond to what is said to us, in what we seek to know, and what we need others to know. The richness of our communication parallels the richness of our experience and influences the extent of our options. Improvisation, like learning, is a two way affair, with each phrase exchanged setting the stage for the next. I bet more of us would confess to improvising if I asked the question again...
If we are to move from consumers (audience) to producers (soloists), it helps to have something to say in your solo. Studying, even mastering, chords, scales, technique do not assure a valid, satisfying expression for player, partners or listeners. That demands sincerity, two way listening, sensitivity and committment. Just like real life. The content is up to what's in your life.
It helps to reflect on the concept of "voice" to take my meaning here.
Finding Your Voice
After a short time on the net, you begin to realize the paradoxical nature of this democratic medium. Each person is a single voice, with equal claim to bandwidth, regardless of experience, status, position, age, sex, and a host of other descriptors which serve to filter the heirarchical contexts characterizing much of our routine "offline" exchanges. Yet, some of these voices belong to the latter day masters of the medium. Pioneers and experts arrive in your mailbox mixed in with "clueless newbies" and yet pearls of insight are exchanged due to the content of ideas, rather than simply their source. In this aspect, there is a meritocracy based on contributions, perhaps, but the possibilities of person to person, or person to many persons, makes this a means of sharing what we know, care about or wonder about that has no precedent in human history.
When a person starts down the road of understanding more about Jazz, it changes from a "music" to a family of voices. Names evoke sounds that happen in your head when they are spoken. For a musician, saying "Duke" or "Trane" or "Bird" or "Miles" or "Birks" calls up their music, life history, societal influence and more into a rich tapestry of association. Even more amazing is that players can hear only a few tones of any of "family" member and instantly identify who's playing, the same way you can hear the voice of one of your family members on the phone and not have to ask "who is it?"
Achieving such mastery require practice, dedication and talent that take years to mature. We can easily miss the point if we take the fork of this analogy that sees the computer as the instrument, and arrive at Julliard as the model for where we want teachers or citizen learners to end up, with Carnegie Hall as the goal.
Instead, consider the fork which sees life as the instrument, one to be played with the passion artists bring to creation, with whatever discipline is being pursued as simply the melody - this model sees the computer or even the internet as simply the mechanical means of transmission, like the air on which sound travels. It is the potential for having one's "voice" heard by so many people, no longer constrained by place or time, gathering around interests, that makes it possible for the entire range of personal knowledge and vision to find a place and medium for exchange.
All the things You Are...
In other musics, the composer is celebrated (although usually not in their lifetimes!), and the musician in the orchestra is relegated the role of a necessary technician. Most people belong in the audience, due to the talent, practice and dedication required to succeed at music as a livelihood. In jazz, it is the individual people who matter. Oh, to be sure, their compositions and stylistic discoveries outlive them, but their voice is silenced at their passing, never to be duplicated again.
The internet offers everyone the opportunity to find their "voice", and a way to be heard! As I discovered this week, finally meeting many of the visionaries who are responsible for the current progress we all enjoy, I didn't just "feel like" I knew these folks: at a deep level, I did. I only lacked the picture, the gesture, the subtle non-verbal clues we walk around with, but at the deepest level I realized this: On the internet, the Who in You shines through. Your words, how you choose to respond, the hopes, dreams and outlets you seek define a larger part of your personality for your audience than you might imagine.
The Dues of our Blues
Remember, this is only an analogy. You don't need to become a virtual virtuoso, you just need to explore and share all of who you are. One of the objections to arts residencies was: we don't need more artists - we can't feed the ones we have today! The bandied figure for creative people is 3% of the population. I get angry around *that* one. Who's been given the chance? Who's been encouraged and supported, who's experienced the idea that their life provides a daily dose of experience others can benefit from?
I think the number is *far* higher, just based on the people who soloed on my instruments. The biggest step is from "I can't" to "I haven't yet, but I'll try". Turning the corner on that idea may spark confidence that results in someone who brings poetry to their "normal" job, who seeks new ways of doing things because they've encountered their own creativity, and realize it can be channeled in practically any direction.
What amazed me in my residencies was how I was welcomed by almost everyone, except the music teachers! It's a good thing that I believe in interdisciplinary education, and found ways to connect jazz to every class in the curriculum, from cooking soul food to physics, from history to calculus to chinese philosophy. Most of the music teachers didn't want to come near Jazz, or let me into "their" program. In a way, it didn't matter, because the kids still learned to blow convincing, original solos, improvising and tapping into their creative core, but it was disconcerting.
Sound like how some teachers feel about letting the internet into "their" classrooms? I think we need to rethink how we approach the subject, in at least two ways, because as long as this stays a computer issue, it stays a "foreign" subject.
First of all, it is about people. On each end of any network wire, there is a person, and that's the only reason for having any of the hardware and software in between. Let's focus on the people, and how these resouces can lead to exciting learning in our classrooms. The fact that networks make this possible should be as transparent as possible.
From the mountains to the valleys...
Coming to this conference has been a profound experience. In my home town, like it or not I'm increasingly being seen as the person with all the answers, and while I do find giving service to be gratifying, the pressure to provide every answer is relentless. Within hours of arriving here, I met and experienced the skill level of many people who are so far beyond my present level of knowledge, that I found it to be amazing, and actually a complete relief! As a drummer, my mentors have names like Max, Tony, Jack, Elvin and Diz ; on the net they sound like Odd, Connie, Bob, Prescott, Frank, Yvonne, Lara and Larry! When this relief had resulted in sufficient relaxation, an important realization followed.
The beauty of the internet is this: no matter how specialized an area of interest, there is someone who can point the way, who has developed their skills and knowledge to serve as a guiding light, who knows and will share what I need to know. At the same moment, there are elements of my experience which enable me to serve this same role for someone else. The internet creates the possibility for the first time in human history for connections to be made in both directions, from any point of the compass to any other.
By focusing on the computer, interfaces, types of connection et al, we obscure the fact that each of us is an "expert" in *something*, and that at one time or another, what we have to share will be vital to someone. People coming to the internet who feel intimidated, insecure, "without a clue" are only so with respect to the mechanics of the technology. Once they learn how to come online and share what they have to contribute,and find their "voice", they are also "instant experts".
We need these people, every one of them. The problems we confront today won't wait for the learned to deliver a packaged prescription for our world. If the challenges we must solve were as simple or stupid as they seem in their brief turn in the media spotlight, they'd be easy to solve. Instead, it will take a sustained effort by the unfettered creativity of as many people on this planet as we can muster to save the day.
So, our colleagues must be invited into a caring community which values what they have to say about learning, which is committed to providing support to their initial "growing pains" and which is determined to discover new ways for us to collaborate, to jump levels beyond the constraints of time, space and energy to which our isolation has accustomed us.
How does Jazz (Blues) relate to these dues? The obstacles are enormous, our history has its own forms of professional oppression, and so the call to "feel good *in spite of* ..." rings true. We need to dig deep into our collective "trick bag" and find creative ways to improvise within our respective invisible structures to provide coherent, convincing expressions of welcoming, with which to bring each teacher and student, parent and child, employer and employee in to a community of learning. We need to woodshed our parts, perfect our skills and trade ideas in all styles, at all tempos, with any available instrumentation. As Charlie Parker said, "Now's the Time"
I leave you with the lyrics to the non-textual part of the presentation, which closed my portion at Tel*Ed. You need to say these words to the melody of Billie Holliday's "God Bless the Child"
Peace,
Ferdi
(verse) Them that's got shall get Them that's not shall lose So the Bible says And it still is news... College may have and Business may have But God bless the child that's got his node, that's got his node. (verse) Online services may give you gateway mail and such You can help yourself just don't download too much College may have and Business may have But God bless the child that's got her node, that's got her node. (bridge) IP address, you've got friends crowding 'round your mailbox door Lose your access, in a flash you ain't nobody no more... (verse) Dialup access may give you Usenet, mail and such You can help yourself, just don't post too much College may have and Business may have But God bless the child that's got her node, that's got her node. (tag) She just don't worry 'bout nothin, cause her domain's known.
Ferdi Serim (609) 897-7300
November 15, 1993
ferdi@tigger.jvnc.net (Global Enterprise Services)
ferdi@digital.cosn.org (Consortium for School Networking)
"Waltzes with Gophers"
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