| ONE VOICE CAN’T SPEAK FOR MILLIONS (CONTINUED) |
| Similarly, I’m also amazed that whenever I hear a discussion on Black pride, someone always seems to brings up the issue of Egypt, and whether or not Cleopatra was Black. All that's academic. We don't have to go back to antiquity to find a source of pride. All we have to do is study the life and times of our parents, our grandparents, and that generation of Black people born between the turn of the century and WWII. In less than a hundred years our people have gone from being the defenseless and nameless victims of public lynchings, to becoming people like Colon Powell, who was responsible for the defense of all of America and the entire western world. In less than a hundred years, the Black people of that generation went from housekeepers and flunkies, to the boardrooms of multinational corporations. And in less than a hundred years, we’ve gone from playing washboards and tin cans on the side of the road, to becoming the greatest musicians the world has ever known. As a musician, I think about that time a lot—when White folks use to laugh and simply tolerated as “quaint” those “simple” brothers with their washboards and tin cans on the side of the road. They weren’t seen as a threat, because they were deprived of going to the prestigious music conservatories that White musicians had access to. But today, America is defined by the legacy of those very same musicians. Every time anyone turns on a radio anywhere in the world, they should have to pay royalties to Bird, Miles, Coltrane, Quincy Jones, Marvin Gaye, and the myriad of other Black musicians that have carried on our legacy. Yeah, they laughed at us in the beginning, just like they’re laughing at us now; but now, you can get a Ph.D. in just about any university in the world for just trying to figure out what Bird was doing—and fifty years after his death, they still can’t get it right. That is the power of creativity, and that is our legacy as a people. So, we’ve got to start taking ourselves much more seriously—because we are a powerful people, with an exceptional intellect. But we’ve got to develop it, and refine it, and extend it to the whole of human knowledge. And we’ve got to stop taking ourselves for granted, and expecting one voice to speak for millions. We must seek to educate ourselves, so that millions can speak with one voice: Neither scholar nor the head of state, The most common of men seems to be my fate; A life blistered with struggle and constant need, But as my legacy to man I bequeath my seed. More fertile, more sturdy, these ones than I, This withered old vine left fallow and dry; The nectar of their roots lie dormant still, But through their fruit I'll be revealed. Eric L. Wattree, Sr. eric@wattree.com |