Jazz, a Being-in-the-World: Music and African American Theatre

Abstract

The acceptance of black music contributed to breaking down barriers between white and black culture. Despised and even rejected by the whites, the blues and jazz were eventually recognized as components of the Southern heritage of the African Americans. Jazz may be seen not only as a musical fact but also as a cultural fact, the artistic manifestation of a community linked to a set of uses, experience, beliefs, and conceptions forming a representation of the world. This essay follows the presence of different forms of music in theatrical representations of the African Americans, with examples from three playwrights: Lorraine Hansberry, Ntozake Shange, and August Wilson.