Post tag: Mao
See the Award-Winning Documentary “Jazz In China” at the Brooklyn Heights Library April 6th

“Jazz In China: The Documentary,” chronicles the 100-year story of how jazz—a democratic form of music through improvisation—exists and thrives in China—a country with a long tradition of adherence to central authority.

“Jazz In China” is a documentary produced, directed, and written by Eugene Marlow, Ph.D. based on his 2018 book Jazz in China: From Dance Hall Music to Individual Freedom of Expression (University Press of Mississippi).

The 60-minute award-winning documentary reveals the significant influence of African-American jazz musicians with leading indigenous jazz musicians, sinologists, historians, and jazz club patrons in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou, and archival and contemporary performance footage.

“Jazz In China” was the winner of the 2022 American Insight “Free Speech Film Festival,” and received the “Award of Excellence” from the Depth of Field International Film Festival.

“Jazz In China” will  be an “official event” of the UNESCO-sponsored International Jazz Day, on April 30, 2023.


Many thanks to those who made this event possible:
Curator Leslie Arlette Boyce
Brooklyn Heights Branch of the Brooklyn Public Library
NYFA  “Jazz In China” is a sponsored project of the New York Foundation for the Arts

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Four Generations of Chinese Jazz Musicians

The renovated Paramount dance hall in Shanghai, China is the only remaining dance hall where jazz was perfromed in the 1930’s-1940’sMarlowsphere Blog (#129)

Western perceptions to the contrary, jazz in mainland China has survived through four generations.  Starting in the 1920s when jazz first came to China, specifically Shanghai, till now there have been several generations of indigenous jazz musicians.

The first generation responded to the demand for jazz at the time—dance hall music. While there were a plentitude of non-Chinese jazz musicians performing in Shanghai—such as drummer Whitey Smith, pianist Teddy Weatherford, trumpeter Valaida Snow, and trumpeter Buck Clayton, and a host of bands from the Philippines and Russia—Chinese jazz musicians eager to perform for their own also formed their own ensembles to perform in Shanghai’s many dance halls.

A ccording to an account by bassist Da Ren Zheng (who also contributed charts to the Peace Hotel Jazz Band profiled later), these early Chinese jazz bands included: Yu Yuezhang (who organized the first all-Chinese jazz band), several so-called Cantonese jazz bands, Chen’s “New Band,” Jin Huaizu’s (a.k.a. Jimmy King) famous Paramount Dance Hall band, the Huang Feiran Band, and the Kaixuan Band. Fan Shengqi (dubbed “The King of the Saxophone”) was a member of this generation; he survived Mao’s tenure, and began performing jazz again in Beijing after his demise.

Following Mao’s takeover of China in 1949 through his death in 1976 all performances of jazz in dance halls were forbidden. But by 1980 China was opening up economically to the west.
At that time the Chinese government requested that a group of former dance hall jazz musicians—who survived in the intervening years by playing Chinese classical music—create a sextet and perform at the Peace Hotel on the Bund in Downtown Shanghai. The motivation was economic: entertainment for western visitors. This group—holdovers from the 1930s-1940s—has performed there (with some changes in personnel) every night for the last 35 years. They are the subject of a German produced film entitled “As Time Goes By in Shanghai.”

Liu Yuan "Father" of Jazz in ChinaSince the mid-1980s a second generation of jazz musicians—partly influenced in Beijing by  German diplomat (and bass player) Martin Fleischer, now an ambassador in Brussels—began to emerge. Among this small group is tenor saxophonist Liu Yuan considered the “father” of jazz in China (Martin Fleischer can be called the “godfather of jazz in China”). Liu Yuan gained initial fame by performing with trumpeter/songwriter/protester Cui Jian, China’s so-called “father of rock” in the 1980s. Liu Yuan now owns a club in Beijing called the East Shore Café. Liu Yuan and others of his generation have performed and are performing jazz as a means of individual freedom of expression, much like Cui Jian on the rock side of the musical ledger.

A third generation of jazz musicians—definitely in the mode of individual freedom of expression—include (in Shanghai): Third Generation of Chinese Jazz Musiciansguitarist Lawrence Ku, singer/songwriter Coco Zhao, saxophonist and professor Zhang Xiaolu, and singer/pianist Joey Lu. In Beijing this third generation includes: virtuoso bassist and jazz festival promoter “Adam,” “cool” pianist Xia Jia, pianist Kong Hong Wei (a.k.a. Golden Buddah), Mongolian-born alto saxophonist Liu “Kenny” Xiaoguang, drummer Xiao Dou, singer Yao Yi Xin, bassist Zou Tong, bassist Zhang Ling, saxophonist Yinjiao Du, and saxophonist Wu Yun Nan (formerly with the Chinese Navy Band). Several of these musicians received training in jazz in the United States.

The youngest and fourth generation of Chinese jazz musicians is now coming to the fore. With the Chinese government’s apparent blessing, 20-year-old saxophonist virtuoso Li Gaoyang attended International Jazz Day, April 30, 2013 in Istanbul, Turkey. Heading up the delegation was saxophonist Liu Yuan, profiled briefly above.

Li Gaoyang(李高阳) started learning music at the age of 4. By the tender age of 8 he had already been playing and studying the saxophone. Basically he’s self-taught on the instrument and has become the most famous jazz saxophone player, educator and composer of his generation in China.

Li has embraced East coast jazz and has considerable experience in this style of performance. With his unique style, Li considered tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone and EWI (i.e., Electric Wind Instrument), in descending order, his main instruments. Through the years, Li has composed a considerable amount of originals covering different style/spectrum of music and has been lauded as the top jazz Li Gaoyang is among the latest (4th) generation of Chinese jazz musicians saxophone player by audience and critics alike.

Since the age of 14, Li Gaoyang has founded the Li Gaoyang Trio and Li Gaoyang Quartet with drummer Shao Ha Ha, bassists Hu Hao, Bi Zi Gang, keyboardists Jin Ye and Han Yun, all recognized jazz players in China. Li has brought his groups to many large scale events and jazz festivals. Li Gao Yang Quartet has been recognized as one of the top jazz bands in China.

Next to leading his own group, Li Gaoyang has also performed in the following established jazz formations: Beijing Jazz Orchestra, Du Yinjiao Jazz Big Band, CD Swing Band, Big John (Zhang Ling) Blues band, Blue Head Sextet, among others.

In 2012, Li Gaoyang was invited to join the famous Golden Buddha Jazz band, headed by virtuoso jazz pianist Kong Hong Wei, also profiled above. Li has also been featured on some performances of American jazz instrumentalist Antonio Hart during Hart’s tour in China. Through his acquaintance with the legendary Sonny Rollins, who is his biggest influence on saxophone so far, Li has received valuable teaching from the maestro. Li has also received had lessons with masters such as Bob Cranshaw, Sammy Figueroa, and Peter Erskine among others.

The Chinese jazz musicians notwithstanding, performing spaces for these musicians appear to be expanding. Jazz @ Lincoln Center has announced plans to open a jazz club in Shanghai in 2016, and Blue Note Entertainment (owner of the famous Blue Note jazz club in New York City) has announced plans to open a jazz club in Beijing in 2017.

Eugene Marlow, Ph.D.
September 21, 2015

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© Eugene Marlow 2015

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The Stagnation of Human Rights Freedoms, Media Ownership, and Concentration of Wealth

Marlowsphere Blog (#117)

Freedom House—an organization founded in 1941 by former first lady Eleanor Roosevelt and attorney Wendell Willkie—has published its latest report on “Freedom in the World 2015.”  It is not a pretty picture.

Freedom House's "Freedom in World 2015" map

While the second half of the 20th century witnessed the growth of freedom in the world, in the late 20th century (starting in 1995) until now, human rights freedoms, country by country, has declined on a global basis. The kind view is that the growth of freedom has at least stagnated. To quote from the report:

More aggressive tactics by authoritarian regimes and an upsurge in terrorist attacks contributed to a disturbing decline in global freedom in 2014. Freedom in the World 2015 found an overall drop in freedom for the ninth consecutive year.

Nearly twice as many countries suffered declines as registered gains—61 to 33—and the number of countries with improvements hit its lowest point since the nine-year erosion began. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a rollback of democratic gains by Egyptian president Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s intensified campaign against press freedom and civil society, and further centralization of authority in China were evidence of a growing disdain for democratic standards that was found in nearly all regions of the world.

The worst regions of the world with respect to lack of freedom are Northern Africa and the Middle East.

The decline (or stagnation) in human rights freedoms reported by Freedom House parallels the ranking of world countries with respect to journalistic freedom of the press. According to Reporters Without Borders (RSF) “World Press Freedom Index 2015″:

Two-thirds of the 180 countries surveyed for the 2015 World Press Freedom Index performed less well than in the previous year,” the France-based watchdog said. RSF attributed the decline largely to attacks on media as global conflicts proliferated throughout 2014. This includes not only repressive regimes, but also non-state groups such as Boko Haram and Islamic State, which “used fear and reprisals to silence journalists”.

Iran, China, Syria and North Korea were among the places ranked as having the worst levels of press freedom. China came in 176th, one step down from last year.

. . . .Around the world, France ranked 38th (up one place) the U.S. 49th (down three places) and Russia 152nd (down four).

Freedom of the Press World Wide 2014

This blog has already pointed to the issue of the relationship between lack of literacy (or to put it another way, levels of illiteracy) and violence. The general conclusion is that where there’s significant levels of illiteracy (such as in Pakistan), there’s significant levels of violence, especially against girls and women. Further, where’s there’s significant levels of illiteracy (such as in Egypt), there’s significant lack of human rights freedoms.

But there’s another relationship that bears mentioning, and that is the relationship among levels of human rights freedoms (or the lack thereof), media ownership, and distribution of wealth.

What is the relationship between Human Rights Freedoms, Media Consolidation & Wealth Concentration on a global basis?The question is this: is there a relationship—that has evolved over the last 30-35 years—among the very real stagnation of growth of human rights freedoms in the world, the very real consolidation of media ownership on a global basis, and the very real high levels of wealth concentration on a global basis?

To provide some detail, in the last 30-35 years corporate ownership of media assets—print and electronic—has shrunk from about 80 companies to a mere handful. Depending on one’s definition, the major players in the media ownership industry range from a mere six to (perhaps) 12. The major players are such companies as: Disney, Bertelsman, Sony, COMCAST, News Corp., Time-Warner, CBS, et al.

During this same time period, the rich have gotten richer, the poor have gotten poorer, and the middle class has stagnated. A recent report pointed out that 80 people in the world had as much combined wealth as 3 ½ billion people on the planet. With respect to the latter group, the reference is to the poorest people on planet Earth.

Granted, the 20th century has seen staggering rates of transportation, information, and communications technological innovation, literacy rates globally have risen significantly (according to UNESCO), healthcare has improved for more and more people globally, and in some parts of the world (China, for example, which is an irony), the middle class has grown dramatically, i.e., since Mao’s demise in 1976 several hundred million people have been brought out of poverty into the middle class.

Yet, in the same time period, the level of terrorism on a global scale has increased, fewer and fewer companies own more and more media assets, fewer and fewer people own more and more real and financial assets, and the growth of human rights freedoms has stagnated.

There was a time when the Internet was viewed as the technology that “would level the playing field for small vs. large companies.” To a degree this is true, but the fact of the matter is that large companies still own major portions of the playing field. The financial crisis of 2008-2009 in the United States—that had global repercussions—shuttered one major financial institution, Lehman Brothers, and a host of much smaller firms, not to mention the thousands of individuals who lost their homes; but the rest—those that were too big to fail—were saved by the tax payer!

It would be naïve to conclude that only financial institutions are the ones to point to for our current spate of global financial and geo-political problems. There are other reasons. One is the deeply imbedded clinging to outmoded beliefs and extreme religious concepts in certain parts of the world among certain communities. These communities are angered by the accelerating cultural changes brought on by technology and are reacting violently.

The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas S.KhunAnother reason is the disruption of technology to cultural mores and norms in certain parts of the world. In general, people don’t like change. They want stability. Regardless, technological innovation brings about disruption to cultural mores and norms. In turn, external change challenges a culture’s world perspective. It’s hard to make the adjustment or give up perceptions that don’t work anymore. A good read on this subject is The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Khun.   The concepts in this book can be applied to the individual, the family, the larger community, and the country.

The question then becomes: does the inexorable march of technological innovation create  opportunities for a few to grab wealth and political power to the detriment of the rest of the populace? Is there, indeed, a close (perhaps, inevitable) relationship among the stagnation of growth of human rights freedoms, media consolidation, and wealth concentration among a few in the last 30-35 years?

It cannot be mere coincidence.

If you have any questions or comments about this or any other of my blogs, please write to me at meiienterprises@aol.com.

Eugene Marlow, Ph.D.
February 16, 2015

© Eugene Marlow 2015

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The Global Village At War

The Global VillageThe Marlowsphere Blog (#106)

My last blog posited that we are moving in the direction of humanizing technology. That is, increasingly our communications systems in particular—the Internet, World Wide Web, telecommunications—are morphing into very human-like sensory characteristics, for example, increasing voice characteristics, increasing use of motion video on the Internet. In homes, businesses, and public spaces video screens have become flat (some are curved), and large.

I also posited that our communications systems have created a global marketplace for information and communications. We have inexorably become what Dr. Marshall McLuhan   described in1964 as a “global village.” His use of those two words is correct. The planet has become global with respect to all manner of human activities. In one sense we have moved from villages, to city-states, to countries, and in the last century to regional economic entities, e.g., the Pacific Rim, the European Union, OPEC, the Organization of American States, the BRICS, and so on.

But the phrase also reflects the characteristics of a village of the past: people in the village are an entity unto themselves, sometimes dealing with outsiders, sometimes not, where men are dominant, and women are secondary. In today’s world the concept of a “village” is reflected in the fact that most if not all the new countries that have been admitted to the United Nations are based on “ethnic centers,” never mind geographic considerations. Further, current conflicts in the world are ethnically-based—that is, there are groups at war with each other based on perceived cultural differences. It is not about territory, especially, or even economic gain. It’s an extremist view—“we perceive who we are and if you’re not one of us, you must be killed.”

Technology used for good or evilIt is ironic that for all the technological advances in communications and the collaboration it fosters, there seems to be more groups coming into existence who are insular, exclusive and extremist.

Examples abound. The current Israel-Palestinian conflict in Gaza is about Hamas wanting to destroy Israel; it refuses to recognize Israel as a legitimate state.  On the other hand, Israel exacerbates the perceptions by continuing to build settlements on land the Palestinians regard as theirs. They also perceive that the entire region is theirs, but the United Nations   in 1948 voted otherwise. There has been conflict ever since. The conflict is exacerbated by Iran that is apparently supplying rockets to Hamas. Iran seems also bent on finding a way to destroy Israel.

In Iraq ISIS believes its Sharia interpretation of Islam is the only interpretation of the Koran and in that context feels no constraint in executing people who do not believe as they do and blowing things up—such as the resting place of the biblical Joseph.

In Syria newly elected (for the third time) President Assad thinks nothing of killing his own people who disagree with his self-centered, elitist policies. In Egypt the former, now deposed President Morsi thought nothing of inculcating his Brotherhood of Islam’s narrow-focused perception of the world. An ex-military general is now the new president. We’ll see how that works out.

Abubakar Shekau Boko HaramIn Africa, the Boko Haram, led by a man who was once interred in a mental institution, believe that everything in the west is bad. It thinks nothing of killing and kidnapping in the name of Islam.

In eastern Ukraine recently, Russian President Putin thought nothing of seizing the Crimean Peninsula and annexing it to Russia. He also supports the “Ukrainian militants” who similar to the abovementioned extremists think nothing of seizing buildings and killing those who do not feel the way they do about Russia.

In Chechnya rebels there continue to blow things up—including people—because they want a separate state based on their cultural heritage. The war in Bosnia at the end of the last century was also ethnically-based. Many died because each side saw their cultural heritage as the culture to follow. Ethnic cleansing followed.

Adolf Hitler used his Nazi propaganda machine to manipulate much of the German populace into perceiving that the Jews were at the root of their problems and that Jews were less than human. Starting with Kristallnacht (The Night of Broken Glass) in November 1938, the Third Reich succeeded in exterminating six million Jews.

In China towards the end of Mao Zedong’s rule, the Cultural Revolution purged a generation of intellectuals and artists who were perceived as out of step with Mao’s dictates. Millions perished.

The CrusadesIn the 16th century the Spanish Armada attacked England. Why? Because Spain was Catholic and Elizabeth I wasn’t.  The Armada famously perished in the English Channel from a storm that came up just at the right moment.

Go back a millennia and you have the Crusades that pitted the righteousness of Christians against the righteousness of Muslim-based cultures. Go back another thousand years and you have the righteousness of the Roman Empire against the emergent righteous Christians, and so on.

Conclusion: toleration of other people’s cultural values and views is not a prominent human characteristic. To bring us back to the present, former Secretary of State Madelaine Albright recently said: “In a sentence, the world is a mess.” The problem in the early part of the 21st century is that the world means the world. Two thousand years ago the world was much smaller, but larger than the world of early agricultural communities of 10-12,000 years ago, and certainly much larger than the villages of pre-literate tribes before that.

The problem is conflicting cultural ethnic values and views are now supported and accelerated by contemporary transportation, information, and communications technologies. Information (whether factual or not) moves at the speed of light and this only expands its impact.

So, why hasn’t contemporary transportation, information, and communication technologies made the world a better place for all of us to enjoy? Why haven’t these technologies made us different? Why are human beings bent on pursuing conflict rather than peaceful co-existence?

Perhaps part of the answer is that human evolution takes a lot longer than technological development. After all, it took a couple of million years for homo sapiens to develop the Living on Mars by 2033capacity for language, but only a few thousand years to move from an agricultural world, to a world with accounting, then writing, then printing, then electronics, and now photonic and nano technologies.

We’ll probably have men and women living on planet Mars sooner than men and women will learn that cooperation and collaboration is more fruitful than armed conflict.

Please write to me at meiienterprises@aol.com if you have any comments on this or any other of my blogs.

Eugene Marlow, Ph.D.
September 1, 2014

© Eugene Marlow 2014

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When Musical Cultures Clash

When musical cultures clashThe Marlowsphere Blog (#100)

Sometimes when two unlike musical cultures clash or at least come together something wonderful happens, as in the evolution of Afro-Cuban Jazz in mid-20th century in New York City. Sometimes, though, the opposite happens, especially if the prevailing political and cultural environment is unwelcoming.

An example of this is evidenced by the influence of European and, thereafter, American music, i.e., jazz, on traditional Chinese music. The description of this is provided by Dennis Rea—in his 2006 book Live at the Forbidden City–in a chapter devoted to his travels outside Chengdu a few months immediately following the trauma of Tiananman Square of June 1989.

He and his fiancée traveled to parts of northeast China where they encountered the music of the Uighurs. His commentary, though, also centers on the decline of traditional Chinese music beginning over 100 years ago in favor of European music (that still exists today). Later, in the 1920s, jazz becomes all the rage in China, particularly in Shanghai, then a blossoming economic center (that still is today). And in the 1990s American style pop/rock music becomes all the rage in China, especially in the larger Live at the Forbidden City by Dennis Reacities, such as Shanghai and Beijing.

The Chinese traditionalists of the 1920s and 1930s railed against this continued western influence. I say “continued” because the reactionary attitude of these Chinese traditionalists to “outside influences” is rooted in similar attitudes that reach back many centuries, of which the Chinese response to Britain’s advances in 1793 and again in mid-19th century, i.e., the Opium Wars, are the most obvious examples. The Communists continued this attitude following their takeover on October 1, 1949. In this period, the eradication of outside western influences until Mao’s death on September 9, 1976 is extreme.

This raises the question of the relationship between the fine and performing arts on political and economic systems. A knife, sword, or bullet can kill, but can a line of poetry, a dance, or song have the same power? Is the pen mightier than the sword? How can a picture, movement, or sound elicit so much fear in a political system that that political system feels the need to squash the life out of its aesthetic existence?

Rea commented on these issues:

“The traditional music of China’s Han majority hasn’t fared much better than that of the Uighurs under communist rule. Like the nation itself, Chinese music for centuries successfully assimilated elements of other Asian cultures while retaining its own distinct identity. In contrast, China’s encounter with European classical music had a devastating effect, as the alien science of functional harmony clashed with the essentially non-harmonic methodology of Chinese musical practice. When confronted with the imposing edifice of European music theory, many Chinese musicians denigrated their own music as unsophisticated by comparison. By the late 1890s, China’s national instruments were falling out of favor with the musical elite, victims of the country’s love affair with that embodiment of Western musical hegemony, the piano, and to a slightly lesser degree the violin. Despite the best efforts of propagandists to outlaw Western art forms during the Cultural Revolution, this obsession with European music continues to this day and remains the focus of formal music education in China.”

Field of PianosWhat Rea says is true, not just of formal music education in the conservatories, but outside the conservatories. Both in Beijing and Shanghai, one only has to go to one of the modern Macy’s Department Store-like multi-story department stores and on one floor you are bound to come across a whole section devoted to all kinds of pianos. Not Steinways or Yamahas, mind you, but there’ll be plenty of styles to choose from. During one visit to just this kind of store in Beijing, I observed these demonstration pianos being put to very good use: a mother was giving her young daughter a lesson, or perhaps she was taking the opportunity for the young, budding pianist to practice her lesson before a lesson with a real teacher. Either way, the mother was relentless, a counterpoint to the daughter’s glaring lack of real talent.

Rea also comments on the inevitable fusion of traditional Chinese folk melodies with Western musical approaches:

“While China has produced an impressive number of virtuoso performers in the European tradition, the national infatuation with European music has also spawned an unfortunate forced fusion of Chinese folk melodies with Western orchestration. Though a source of great pride to ardent nationalists, such lightweight, European-influenced works as the “Yellow River Concerto” and “The Butterfly Lovers” with their puerile patriotic melodies and cloying “101 Strings” romanticism, combine the worst of both worlds. Not until the emergence in the 1980s of fiercely imaginative “New Tide” composers such as Tan Dun [of “Crouching Tiger” fame] and Guo Wenjing did East meets West musical clashChina’s embrace of Western musical values produce a mutually enriching synthesis of the two traditions, rather than mere pastiche.”

Rea continues:

“Another factor in the decline of traditional music was the official cultural policy of the Chinese Communist party. For decades after the 1949 communist revolution, music’s sole purpose was to be a transmitter of political and moral propaganda. Party idealogues condemned China’s rich classical and folk music heritage as representative of feudalist “old thinking” and individual initiative was subsumed in the long march toward a utopian socialist society. The only officially sanctioned musical genres the post-Liberation period were politically correct socialist anthems, Madame Mao’s dour revolutionary operas, and feel-good ditties extolling the praises of the Motherland. Not surprisingly, the public never really warmed to utilitarian music that dull as day-old bread. Only after Deng Xiaoping relaxed constraints on popular music in the late 1970s did Chinese music begin to wiggle out of its idealogical straitjacket. Traditional music performance and research resumed, romantic love songs were again tolerated, and foreign styles such as rock and disco first appeared in China, engendering new East-West fusions. Among the more bizarre hybrids was a series of recordings of Cultural Revolution songs set to a thumping disco beat, with singers belting out incongruous lyrics.”

In a way the importation of European classical music and American jazz has created a cultural dichotomy in China. Some have embraced the non-traditional music, others are holding on to the “traditional” melodies for dear life.

Nothing stays the same forever. Resistance to outside influences only serves to weaken the cultural gene-pool, so to speak. On the other hand, there is something to be said for preserving and honoring past cultural traditions. Both have value.

Please write to me at meiienterprises@aol.com if you have any comments on this or any other of my blogs.

Eugene Marlow, Ph.D.
June 2, 2014

© Eugene Marlow 2014

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