Raymond Miles, “Heaven is the Place” 

A Gospel for Now on BOL

"I know what it means to miss New Orleans"

Let me be the first to say I like gospel. I was raised on gospel music. It is just as much a part of me as the rhythm of my heart. It is not something that I can get away from. Mahalia's voice/passion is my mother’s breast, my living in the world. You see in a southern Virginia black church that was the music—and Mahalia was the queen. So New Orleans gospel is all mixed up with the blues and the people and the freedoms of jazz. So New Orleans ain’t just in New Orleans. It became an American music.

Now, let me say, I do not listen to a lot of gospel these days. I don't care that much about the sophistication and the jazz arrangements of popular gospel. Well I still listen to James Brown. But he knows that the music—the drum got to be true, how it really be.

When I saw him in B'more on Pennsylvania Avenue at the Royal Theater, two times in one day – a matinee and the following 8 o'clock show, it was then I understood what the black preacher in that black church with a choir behind him, what he was doing, in backwoods VA. I saw perfection in "Please, Please, Please." A spirit man, an artist, an actor, man of the people.

But that was the surface reality of the black church. The real black church occurred during summer revival, which lasted five nights, beginning Sunday with homecoming, when your folk come from scattered places. They come home to thank the Lord for his blessings, with their love ones, with their peoples.

Well, that's the way it was done at the country Baptist churches—the most independent of black churches. These churches emphasized community. These are a new people, a constantly renewing kind of people. Their faith is caught up in their faith in the Lord.

Now when I was growing up there was no hanging image of Christ. Of course, the fans and some of the Sunday school material came from outside of the community with the "classic" image of Christ made commercially popular in the 50s. The true Christ came alive in the pulpit—in the person of the preacher. Ours was Reverend General Ruffin. black and stocky like he from Ghana, a shiny chocolate, a beautiful set of teeth and about as serious a being as a black boy ever feels from afar.

He commanded the elements. He had powers to evoke the spirit and make it manifest itself in his person—and in you, in the people, he could create, find oneness. That power New Orleans music retains, been renewing for a century or more. Let us say it's that African thing, that ancient man thing of possession by the Spirit, by Being itself. Well, pop gospel gets fancy, cute, sophisticated. And so the gospel this brother does is different than all that. This gospel makes us special.

What is that us? Maybe it’s tribal. It sure ain't upward mobile, trying to fit in where you can get in by any deceptive means at hand. That ain't what New Orleans is all about. That's why as a place, as a living thing, a little experiment, it reminds us about who we are and what we be. What is our promise and what is our gift to America.

Now, I ain't talking about these million-dollar preachers we got now. Country Baptists are famous for keeping preachers on the move. Because back then churches were communities, families of achievement and all kinds and levels, and we are all together, as one, worlds with their own beginnings, ties, memories, working together, dying together. And if a preacher couldn't truly bring the Spirit to sustain that community then he got the boot. He is not the One. And black folks are always on the outlook for the One.

During revival, before there was any preaching, the congregation itself takes over the service, the ceremony. Anyone can raise a song, and the congregation would urge them on, responding, chanting his words out and if it’s one of those spirited surging songs, they be moving their feet, and they be swinging it, as natural and as steady as a day’s work. Anyone can get up and speak, either to praise God or mock bad behavior, and there would be amens, and clapping, too.

This vigorous congregation style is the true black church. It is the black church at its most democratic, at its most tribal, that is, with its emphasis on community and compassion and responsibility.

In so much as the preacher, or a singer and a choir, can evoke that and make it manifest itself in our hearts and souls, he/she is one of us. New Orleans has this effect on me, it refreshes, renews. That's what this brother's singing and choir do, especially in the I'm Gonna Shout About It and the one about Job and his faith.

He reminds me also of C.L. Franklin, who had much more going on. Still I like what Miles does. It’s good listening. . . . I know what it is to miss New Orleans.

*   *   *   *   *

Forgetting Isn’t the Problem

Americans have a way of forgetting.  -- Miriam

I have been thinking about that. Well, whether there are any historical parallels, semblances to the losing of, destroying, of an American city, and dispersing a million people from their homes, there's something unique about this time, even as our country preacher speaks of slave ships. People speak also of the Oakies, as the closest that is similar to this forced migration of people. I suppose blacks would think of 1910-20 and 1940s.

But never, even if we take the Oakie example, never have there been such a dispersion in a short period of time, the only semblance is Reconstruction, maybe as confused, which shows you how clumsy American governments are. But not even Jubilee-Reconstruction has been so photographed and images dispersed so thoroughly as the destruction of New Orleans, my sweet woman abused and raped.

We were spectators—the whole global network of cyber technology users. We too must conclude, even if I exaggerate about the amount of paper spent on images and ink, paper rots, and cyberspace is almost like a living thing that goes on and on, like that bunny. There's no way this event can be swept under the carpet. There are too many witnesses. So I don't think "forgetting" is gonna be the problem. This one we can win.

I think America is special. Maybe it's my early training in a backwoods one-room framed school in southern Virginia, home of Presidents and other great men, and greater women. Maybe it’s that one teacher (pretty, beautiful hand, Miss Trisvan), her seven grades, fifty or so students, a pot belly stove in a sandbox. The American flag with the 48 stars. Our pledge of allegiance. The nation's songs that spoke of we the American people.

They say the earliest teachings one recalls even in senility. So I admit I have been trained. But even the poet Langston Hughes believes in America, in his poems. Black folk have always believed in America. I can't recall a historical time, now you may correct me if I'm wrong, that black folk as black folk didn't believe in America.

So I'm gonna believe that the comfortable middle-class of whatever complexion, believe that they are Americans and Americans deep down believe in the we. Now they may indeed forget or behave as if they don't know the we. That's self-blindness. That's cynicism. That's loving comfort over principle. That's deviltry. I think, nay, I believe, I don't know it as hard evidence (because I been disappointed a many a time), I have faith that Americans are greater than their colors. America has a soul, an enduring soul. It has grown, learned from its people and its others.

Now I ain't gonna say that many won't drag their feet. And they got all kind of weights to hold a thing in place. Not least among these are the corporate media and academia. One thing we have learned in the last two weeks, most people have concluded that one cannot depend on the corporate media for all of the story, or to report the story with objectivity, or photo or caption things as they really are, were. 

Reporters are moved too often by sensationalism. The circus. That is what gets the public attention. And, man, the ratings pay the bills. And you can become a star if you got the appeal "right."

But as the politicos discovered in the last presidential election the cyber-networks are powerful. We in a new place. Many come to the table without being rich, without being the Alpha male, and influence the course of American, or channel of American, thinking and feeling -- partly because with these cyber-networks we can bring the people of the world in as our audience. Let them too have a voice, encourage them to speak. What should America be doing in this particular situation. If She can't deal with her most intimate problems of social justice, who're they to be so self-righteous with us, so Christian.

So no not again, there won't be any forgetting. It's the doing that's the problem. Can we use these cyber-networks to force people to do what they should do? That's up for grabs now. How many can we bring into our world, feel with us, work with us?

As ever and always, Rudy  (12 September 2005)

*   *   *  *  *

burning all four wheels.

It's the truest poetry, we need singers in these times of the movement of people, these sojourners. The Uptown Rulers don't want to be nowhere else. They want to go home. And that's the way it ought to be. So we should make it be. You telling me with all our technology we can't make it be in the 21st century.

This is the time, my brother, this is, the time of the separation. America's gonna be obliged to change her way. America is before the court of world opinion. Which road will she take? These questions are on the dock. How's America gonna confront this first great crisis of the 21st century.

How shall she in we come to terms with the visual relation of race and poverty, and the aural and visual class racism as a sophisticated sport. Which way America -- What road will you take -- Can you heal yourself America -- Fulfill your promise?

It won't be easy. But I believe we can talk her into it. If we make the right appeal. White people are 70% of the population and let's say the overwhelming majority of them are middle-class or working class with money and want to hold onto as much as possible. We need them, they need us. It is a creative and dynamic combination.

I think that we as we can speak to these people as we speak to ourselves in a language that they can understand. Like they understand our dance, our music, our songs. Maybe now is the time they can understand our words, our reason, our hearts, and souls, and have pride in us, as we have desired. A gift, a revelation. Maybe this is the now time for America, the real America to be.

I we the wordmasters we say we with powers from the Most High. This is not too great then a task for us to bring forth when there are ears to listen, and a people open for understanding. I say let it be and it be. Now all together. Say amen.

posted 13 September 2005