After reading Leroi Jones' "Blue's People," I have found a connection between the two when defining Blue's music in American Pop Culture. The term “Blue’s People” derives the concept of the history of the Blues music defines the identity of a Blue’s person. There is something singularly American about the Blue’s. The Blue’s are about facing the reality of never going back home, being a person that has lost their culture… not speaking the same, children who will have different societal views and realizing you are a new person in a new country as a outcast.
Blues music is about waking up to the realization of social distance between you and your people and the country you are in. During the time of slavery we see people as property rather than individuals conveying personal opinions. Leroy Jones' ideas remind us to remember slaves are not immigrants like European immigrants. The social interpretation between European immigrants and African immigrants is that one signifies the celebration of life and the other signifies the becoming of a commodity object. Blues music is about the slaves becoming a commodity object within a market of bodies. Additionally, Jones adds that this actually happened to the Africans who became slaves in the United States. These human beings were stripped of their identities, the very identities that forced them to think and be people different than who they really are. Blues music expresses the struggle and need for social change.
Then we observe paradox of the American dream and the influence this had on Africans who were then victims of patriotism and the historical concept of truth. Blues singers became empowered by liberal freedom and independence, however, the success of liberal freedom for few depended on the lack of freedom for others. The notion of freedom was based on slavery.
Jones asks his readers, "What happens to these people who have lost their "identities" so to speak?" (Jones, 41). This he says is the "beginning of cultural innovations and cultural freedoms that come out of blues music. (Jones, 43). Which leads to the ultimate theme of economics versus population to find an answer through cultural practice. Blues music is about the sub-culture of being black and singing emotion that resides from the soul.
"With the soothing sounds of the saxophone, guitar, and a soulful voice, blues music relives itself every time it is played."
-Catherine Keithley
Leroi, Jones. Blues People:Negro Music in White America. 1st ed. New York, NY: Harper Perennial, 1999. 40-56. Print.
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