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It’s not jazz. At least not as I would usually define it. It’s all in one key. There are no chord changes, no sliding away into dissonance and distraction. It is improvised, but the composer’s original theme, his “prime” motive, is ever-present.
As we celebrate Juneteenth for the second year as a national federal holiday — now on Sunday AND Monday—amidst the block parties, barbecues, festivals, concerts, and civic events, I continue to ponder the meaning and implications of this day. My ambivalence about commemorating the occasion of the constitutional right to freedom for African-Americans being reluctantly accepted by the last holdouts is balanced by what I imagine were the jubilant hopes and dreams embodied by those first celebrations, as our people claimed their birthright as free human beings at long last.
I dusted off my narrating chops with another episode of OPB’s “Oregon Experience.”
Listen to the full interview with Dr. S. Renee Mitchell and me.
The truth is I generally like to feel like I know what I’m doing. As much as I teach about growth mindset, and the importance of failure on our path of learning, in all honesty, my greatest fear is being caught unprepared. That, and the feeling of incompetence that often accompanies my first forays into unknown territory.
