Music, Race, and Presidential Politics
January 9, 2008 by Gabriel
A friend just brought Maureen Dowd’s recent column on Barak Obama to my attention, for this:
“…Obama’s vague optimism and smooth-jazz modernity came together in a spectacular fusion with the deep yearning of Democrats who have suffered through heartbreaking losses in the last two elections with uninspiring candidates.”
It makes me wonder what she is accomplishing or attempting to accomplish with this off-hand reference. Am I making too much of the “smooth-jazz” toss-off? It is impressive as short-hand for so much, but with plausible deniability. What is “smooth-jazz modernity”? The article is hard to parse–she seems dismissive of Obama, but impressed with his ability to mobilize Iowans. The reference to smooth jazz is part of what gives me that feeling: by linking him to smooth jazz she may signal to some readers a placement within the black middle class (which is, of course, quite accurate), which has been denigrated and dismissed by commentators, black and white, for years. Think LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka’s harsh words in Blues People. One wants to hear from Charles Carson about this, whose paper on smooth jazz at this year’s AMS promised to unpack the making of a middle class music for the black middle class in the 80s and 90s.
The other funny thing about this smooth jazz reference is that Obama seems not to want to be heard as smooth jazz. Phil Ford’s post on the candidate’s song choices at Dial M for Musicology shows Obama to have avoided smooth jazz entirely, in favor of (primarily) soul and R&B that is much less explicitly middle class-identified. It’s a pretty good list, incidentally, if predictable; and mercifully free of Bachman Turner Overdrive.
UPDATE
Another friend points out that the reference allows Dowd to suggest (without quite having to say it) that Obama is “all hope and style (without substance).” That’s about right, I’d say–totally what people who love to hate smooth jazz hear it as representing.
…only because you mentioned me by name (shucks).
Fascinating reference to smooth jazz…good catch. I would agree that Dowd is a bit dodgy at times, but it seems to me this description does both–it signals both his “black-middle-class-ness” and the “all hope and style (without substance)” your friend astutely picked up on. That fact that–in either case–it seems to be used as a “dig” tells us a lot about what Dowd (and the readership she “represents”?) thinks of Obama, the black middle class, and smooth jazz. Presumably, because it worked in Iowa, it also tells us something about the dem party as a whole, I guess.
Perhaps most importantly, this connection to smooth jazz seems to tacitly point to something that (I am almost certain) is on everyone’s mind, but that most–if not all–people seem too afraid to voice: part of Obama’s appeal is that, as far as black candidates go, he is not “too black”. That is, like with smooth jazz, we can (attempt) to have it both ways. We can have a candidate that shows just how progressive and open-minded we are as a nation (”Look, we are seriously considering electing a black man!”), without putting our country in the hands of, say, Chris Rock’s “Nat X” character from SNL.
I have spoken elsewhere about how smooth jazz does just this — it enables the black middle class to draw on (either real or imagined) connections to black identity (often in the name of authenticity), while simultaneously letting them retain a certain distance from the “less-acceptable” qualities of these associations. I think that this (besides the $$) is one aspect that jazz “purists” find troubling about smooth jazz–not only is it “inauthentic”, but it seeks to appear authentic (at times, desperately so). Again, see Baraka’s “…Enter the Middle Class” in BP…
Now, I am not saying that there is something “inauthentic” about Obama. Rather, it seems that much of his success has rested on this both/either/neither(?) positioning, however silent everyone is about it. Dems love it because it can appeal to many demographics at once, and Republicans hate it because they can’t criticize him for it. (And trust me: I am living in TX right now, they do hate it. This post-Iowa idea that Reps are rallying behind Obama doesn’t hold water here–they just hate HRC more.)
However, we have to remember that to *some* people, smooth jazz IS just that–jazz. That is, when you mention jazz, they immediately think of Grover Washington Jr, Chris Botti (sorry Chris) or (gulp) Kenny G. I think this is ok; it makes us question the WHY of such definitions (although I would *strongly* encourage those people to take a jazz history course at some point!).
Turning back to the comparison with Obama, highlighting Obama’s unique position within the black community–middle-class, biracial, Ivey-educated* (full disclosure: I am also all of these, so I am not frontin’)–does similar work, IMHO. It helps us remember that there is not a single black community, identity, etc. A segment on NPR inadvertently did a great job of pointing this out yesterday: the host seemed suprised to learn that all blacks in South Carolina were not necessarily going to vote for the black candidate “de rigueur.”
I could go on; but I will stop there. Good post (as always).
[*In my experience, I have found that misspelling "Ivy" makes you appear less of a snob (or, less "Boojie" in my case)]
Follow-up:
If “smooth jazz modernity” is the ticket to the oval office, the Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter will never be pres:
http://willdo.philadelphiaweekly.com/archives/2008/01/michael_nutter_6.html
Yep, that’s ?uestlove on the 1s and 2s (well, two turntables and a MAC).
Ruminating on Charles’s comment that “we have to remember that to *some* people, smooth jazz IS just that–jazz.” It makes me think: and perhaps this is the most irritating thing about the Dowd piece; that the off-handed quality of her dismissive use of “smooth jazz modernity” signals not only who she is talking about but to whom. The taken-for-granted here is that smooth jazz people don’t read her column; or that people who read her column are too cultured/hip/in-the-know to take smooth jazz seriously or to mistake it for jazz, per se.
Nice, thanks.
“Smooth-Jazz Modernity???” I have know idea what this means. Her writing seems at times to be as vague as her assessment of Obama’s campaign. The reference is also hard to contextualize because, as Gabriel pointed out, it seems to come out of nowhere!
But…as I think about the reference, and the previous posts, it does seem to fit Obama very well. It interesting that smooth jazz developed as a style in the post Civil Rights/Black Power/rise of the Neo-Conservative era when, as social theorists have suggested, the United States entered a “Color-Blind” perspective on race. I don’t know much about smooth jazz but it seems to be one of the first jazz styles to displace the notion of an authenticity based on racial identity. I wonder if smooth jazz and its audiences can tell us much about race ( for instance can African Americans connect to black identity through listening to the smooth jazz stylings of Boney James…my mom loves that cat).
Smooth Jazz may be a great metaphor for Obama…A raceless music (that def. speaks to middle class values…safe and predictable)…to describe a raceless candidate. I think that folks on both sides of the isle would agree that one of the greatest strengths, assets even, of his campaign is its “racelessness.” I think that Dowd’s compounding “Modernity” with “smooth jazz” supports the raceless metaphor. To represent modernity in a post-modern era, where we acknowledge that perspectives are greatly influenced by subject positions, is to intentionally deny that subject positions exist at all, creating a candidate with a consensus mass appeal that transcends (or certainly hopes to) potential conflict rooted in race, class, gender, etc.
[...] 4, 2008 by Gabriel Did Will.I.Am read Maureen Dowd’s post (linked here)? Did Obama? Did Scarlett Johansson and Herbie Hancock and Kareem Abdul Jabbar and John Legend [...]
That is a great explication of just three words. In my blog post on the same column I noted that she also used “fusion” which is another jazz related term.
I think you pretty much nailed the image Dowd was trying to convey. I also picture a cool operator type with a certain style and suaveness that the bumpkin Clintons lack.