Micky Hart

Planet Drum is an older CD now, but Micky Hart has been continuing his fascinating explorations into world music and rhythm since then. I've never been a Grateful Dead follower, but I admire what they were doing and am really excited by Micky Hart's work. World music is nothing new nor is the idea of fusing foreign cultural elements together with familiar styles. Something new always comes out, not "pure" (not that this is possible) but interesting. Western music was built on the combination of different styles and aesthetics. Otherwise we would still be singing Gregorian Chant, itself the result of stylistic combination and revision. The music of medieval villages eventually made it  into early instrumental and orchestral music and continued its development from there with 18th and 19th century music in Europe. In addition to what became known as tonal harmony, it was rhythm that really transformed music from the otherworldly quality of chant and vocal polyphony to more earthy and dance-related styles. It was a re-discovery of the body, distrusted by a neo-Platonic church culture where spirit trumped flesh as an ultimate value. That, at least, is the broad narrative. There is a deeper narrative in the details.

When jazz first came on the scene in the south it was distrusted by hegemonic white, Christian culture still stuck in the idea of disembodied spirit moving towards heaven (away from the body and earth). The problem of acceptance was two-fold: the music used drums and powerful rhythms; and it was performed and composed by people of color. American and European pop music and certainly religious music was not subtle rhythmically. It was 2/4, 4/4 and 3/4 time-two beats, four beats or three beats to a measure of musical time, predictable and lacking in serious counter-rhythms or rhythmic layering. This lack of rhythmic subtlety was eventually called "square." The shapes seemed simple and even a bit boring compared to the interesting cross-rhythms in jazz or blues. Drums were the driving force articulating the interesting dynamics of rhythm in this music, carried forward in the solo and rhythm instruments on top (the harmonies/changes, melodies and solos that developed the melodic material). All of this came from Africa, Cuba, Latin America, the Caribbean-all places where the underside of American culture had come from during that era's practice of cheap labor known as slavery. White Christian culture was embedded in another worldview and economic reality and wasn't initially able to absorb or understand this other way of seeing the world. It looked uneducated, unsophisticated, dirty, poor, and unsavory. It was corrupting for anyone from a more genteel background. Keep your daughters away!

Of course, it was racist to the core. It was tied to economic elitism and colonialism, to the superiority of white culture and values, to a deep fear of the savage world ("deepest darkest Africa" sort of thing) and to a deep distrust of the body and human sexuality, which had to be controlled within rigid social expectations. White preachers felt compelled to condemn it for its corrupting influence.

Young people, at least a good number of them, saw it differently. It was liberating. It embraced what the churches rejected in strong moral terms. It felt good. It was fun. And for many the music was profound, a new way of human expression. White players joined the music, performing scandalously with black and brown musicians in public and eventually on recordings. And it wasn't European! It was American with roots in the rhythms and aesthetics of  Latin America and Africa, an explosion and fusing of cultures and styles and sounds. It changed the sound and face of American pop music. "Daisy, Daisy give me your answer, do" gave way to "I Got Rhythm," "St. Louis Blues," "Kansas City," and a host of classic American tunes. Kids danced to them, played them, listened to them. They became the new cultural soundtrack. It hasn't stopped since.

By the time we reach Micky Hart there is a long history of musicians studying, performing and integrating musics from Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa, not to mention other cultures from around the world. What even three decades ago was called "Latin" rhythm has become Brazilian, Afro-Cuban, and other sub-headings with specific characteristics. The knowledge base of a musician like Hart is vast, global and detailed. It is as specific and "learned" as any classical musician, say a specialist in Romantic piano literature or French Baroque music. It was always so, but it was unrecognized for decades by the majority of people, certainly by the classical and European-trained musicians of the first half of the twentieth century.

Sometimes, as I seek out what to listen to from the digital library I've accumulated, I like to hear music by Bruckner or Bach. But then I put on Planet Drum and find it equally if not even more compelling. It is different, to be sure. But it is also equally "good." The old pyramid with the German Three (Bach, Beethoven and Brahms) on the top has been flattened for good. They are no less wonderful, no less important, but they have been joined by the rest of the world.