Freedom and the Arts.
Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness have long been cultural goals. They have found expression through the Arts, in literature, music, dance and the like. Yet freedom continues to elude humanity, as we grapple with the paradigms of choice, individuality and control. Where are the boundaries to freedom and what place does morality have in setting limits? As civilisations rise and fall, can we strike the balance between understanding and preserving our roots and not allowing them to dictate to us?
The universal language of music...
‘Music is the connective tissue among souls’, mused vocalist Barbra Streisand. An essential part of identity & culture, it expresses thoughts, feelings and themes, it captures beauty and is a medium for profound communication. Music is a force which affects all who hear it.
The price of freedom?
In 1863, President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation provided a legal framework for the eradication of slavery and for American civil rights to begin for more than 3.5 million citizens, hitherto in servitude. It was also the seedbed for a new musical movement destined to change the world. Slaves, liberated from the yoke, many unschooled and unable to read or write, had created their own idiom of song: the blues of the fields and plantations; the chants of the docks and warehouses, the chain-gang crews and railroad labourers; the hymns and spirituals of the churches; the hollers and group ‘singalongs’, all released to ease suffering. From the 1880s, this potent fusion of African American and European sources created a kaleidoscope of musical colours; Blues, Country, Jazz, Rock ‘n Roll, Soul, their antecedents and descendants, on which the world still feasts.