New Day Jazz
Justin Desmangles
Art vs. Trade By James Weldon Johnson
Trade, Trade versus Art,
Brain, Brain versus Heart;
Oh, the earthiness of these hard-hearted times,
When clinking dollars, and jingling dimes,
Drown all the finer music of the soul.
Life as an Octopus with but this creed,
That all the world was made to serve his greed;
Trade has spread out his mighty myriad claw,
And drawn into his foul polluted maw,
The brightest and the best,
Well nigh,
Has he drained dry,
The sacred fount of Truth;
And if, forsooth,
He has left yet some struggling streams from it to go,
He has contaminated so their flow,
That Truth, scarce is it true.
Poor Art with struggling gasp,
Lies strangled, dying in his mighty grasp;
He locks his grimy fingers ’bout her snowy throat so tender.
Is there no power to rescue her, protect, defend her?
Shall Art be left to perish?
Shall all the images her shrines cherish
Be left to this iconoclast, to vulgar Trade?
Oh, that mankind had less of Brain and more of Heart,
Oh, that the world had less of Trade and more of Art;
Then would there be less grinding down the poor,
Then would men learn to love each other more;
For Trade stalks like a giant through the land,
Bearing aloft the rich in his high hand,
While down beneath his mighty ponderous tread,
He crushes those who cry for daily bread.
at right, Jacob Lawrence's 1985 lithograph, Man on a Scaffold
Genre
Blues & Classical & Experimental & Jazz & Poetry & Literature
Missed the Show?
Sunday 9/15/2013 @ 3:00PM - 6:00PM
Artist | Song | Album | Label | Comments |
---|---|---|---|---|
Betty Carter | 30 Years | Droppin' Things | Verve | |
Carmen McRae | As Time Goes By | Carmen McRae: Alone | Amigo | |
Karin Krog featuring Dexter Gordon | Everybody's Somebody's Fool | Ballads & Blues | Storyville | |
Ntozake Shange (Laurie Carlos) | Sorry | For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When The Rainbow Is Enuf | Buddha | |
Phineas Newborn, Jr. | Oleo | A World Of Piano | Contemporary | |
Howard McGhee & Teddy Edwards | You Stepped Put Of A Dream | Together Again! | Contemporary | |
Langston Hughes | Gospel Cha-Cha | Ask Your Mama: 12 Moods For Jazz | Buddha | |
Steve Lacy | Bye-Ya | Reflections | New Jazz | |
Airbreak | ||||
Phineas Newborn, Jr. | Well You Needn't | The Newborn Touch | Contemporary | |
Joe Turner | Shake Rattle & Roll | Shake Rattle & Roll | Atlantic | |
Ray Charles | Movin' On | Movin' On | Atlantic | |
Sterling Brown | Long Gone | Anthology Of Negro Poetry | Folkways | |
Muddy Waters | Hoochie Coochie Man | Hoochie Coochie Man | Chess | |
Oscar Brown, Jr. | Man, Earnest Boy | Tell It Like It Is | Columbia | |
Etta Jones | Yessir, That's My Baby | Don't Go To Strangers | Prestige | |
Ruth Brown | Mama, He Treats Your Daughter Mean | Mama, He Treats Your Daughter Mean | Atlantic | |
The Clovers | One Mint Julep | One Mint Julep | Atlantic | |
John Kirby Sextet | Bugler's Dilemma | The Biggest Little Band In The Land | New World | |
Dizzy Gilliespie Orchestra | Things To Come | Groovin' High | Savoy | |
Charlie Parker | Ko-Ko | Charlie Parker Memorial | Savoy | |
Airbreak | ||||
Etta Jones | Don't Go To Strangers | Don't Go To Strangers | Prestige | |
Philly Joe Jones | I'll Never Be The Same | Showcase | Riverside | |
Carl Sandburg | White Ash | Carl Sandburg Reads His Poems | Caedmon | |
Carl Sandburg | Four Preludes On Playthings Of The Wind | Carl Sandburg Reads His Poems | Caedmon | |
Billie Holiday | God Bless The Child | Lady Sings The Blues | Verve | |
Sonny Rollins | God Bless The Child | The Bridge | RCA | |
Margaret Walker (Gloria Foster) | We Have Been Believers | A Hand Is On The Gate | Folkways | |
Max Roach & Abbey Lincoln | Prayer / Protest / Peace | We Insist! : The Freedom Now Suite | Candid | |
Amiri Baraka | Dope | Before Columbus Foundation Poets Read | Folkways | |
Airbreak | ||||
Steve Lacy Quartet | Louise | The Straight Horn Of Steve Lacy | Candid | |
Steve Lacy Quartet | Introspection | The Straight Horn Of Steve Lacy | Candid | |
Booker Little | We Speak | Out Front | Candid | |
Booker Little | Strength & Sanity | Out Front | Candid | |
Charles Mingus | East Coasting | East Coasting | Bethlehem | |
Lennie Tristano | All The Things You Are | Lennie Tristano | Atlantic | |
Airbreak | ||||
Ella Fitzgerald | I Could Write A Book | Ella Fitzgerald Sings The Rodgers & Hart Song Book | Verve |