Afas 200 topic discussion
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Transcript of Afas 200 topic discussion
The Arts at Home and AbroadBy Dovile KlisauskaiteAFAS 200 Topic Discussion Dr. Carter
Recorded Music & Radio• Mamie Smith sparked a
momentous trend in 1920
• Recorded Perry Bradford’s “Crazy Blues”
• First black women to release a blues record for a major company
• Companies judged women’s voices and diction unsuitable
• Sold 75,000 copies in Harlem alone
• Opened many doors
• Black Swan Records was created for the production of a broad range of black musical forms
• Harry Pace didn’t want it to be just a business, but also a vehicle for racial advancement
• Brought capital & middle-class respectability to the black community
• Controversy between popular or cultural pieces
• Sold records at multiple locations to ensure business with African American clientele
• Rival companies & radio put Black Swan out of business after two years in operation
The only “genuine” black business
Jazz Roots & Routes
• “Roaring Twenties” = “Jazz Age”• Middle-class blacks believed it to be a hindrance to racial
progress• Ferdinand “Jelly Roll” Morton
• Composer, pianist, and raconteur• First jazz composer by World War I
• Jazz evolved from regional differences in black music shaped by:• Migration routes of
southern musicians and their blues tradition
• Rise of northern record industry that encouraged jazz bands & blacksingers
Black Theater• African American theater flourished in Harlem• Performed in a range of roles• The Lafayette Players (1915)
• First African American stock company• Included white playwrights• Emerged many respected dramatic actors
• Abbie Mitchell• Laura Bowman• Frank Wilson etc.
• Began to appear beginning in the war years especially with their employment in plays written by white authors
• Popular musical appeared on Broadway• Longest Running being Shuffle Along by Eubie Blake
Visual Arts• African art forms are sources of inspiration to “culturally
awaken” blacks• Emboldened to develop a variety of different styles
• James Van Der Zee (1886-1983)• Conveyed black middle-
class life and Harlem’s leaders and institutions realistically through photographs
• Shaped how the Harlem Renaissance is remembered
• The Great Depression ended his work
Painters• Archibald Motley was
known for his paintings of the city’s black nightlife and for portraits of his family and friends
• “Scientific” study of race• First African American
artists of 1920’s & 1930’s• First black artist to mount
a one-man show in a major New York gallery
• First to win a Guggenheim fellowship