#250 Will the Circle Be Unbroken- Henry Dumas
This is a story about the power of music. Probe is a
musician playing in a closed off all-black club in Harlem. No outsiders
allowed, the power of this music was known to do some serious damage to those
outside the circle.
Probe is prepared to play the Afro-horn, one of only three
in the world; It is his birthright. “Probe, since his return from exile had
chosen only special times to reveal the new sound. There were more rumors about
it than there were ears and souls that had heard the horn speak.”
Beyond the social commentary here of protecting culture,
keeping the richness of your artistic identity locked in a circle, are truly
amazing descriptions of live musical performances:
“The blanket of the bass rippled and the fierce wind in all
their minds blew the blanket back, and there sat the city if Samson.”
“Inside the center of the gyrations is an atom stripped of
time, black. The gathering of the hunters, deeper. Coming, laced in the energy
of the sun. He is blowing. Magwa’s hands. Reverence of skin. Under the single
voices is the child of a woman, black. They are building back the wall,
crumbling under the disturbance.”
It is a brilliant statement of cultural respect, trough a wonderful mithical-magic-realism surrealistic story "the Afro horn is the newest ax to cut the dead wood of the world"
ReplyDeleteI love this story
FMC