October 13, 2022 • 23 mins
The former New York Times critic, and author of the recent memoir Constructing a Nervous System, talks about the genius of the First Lady of Song, Ella Fitzgerald, and how Fitzgerald helped shape Jefferson's own perspective.
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
With everything she does, there's a kind of generosity. She
gives herself to it fully. She's always finding new ways
to change alter. We do a song that her fans
may have heard for years. She gives pleasure so acutely.
(00:26):
That is Pulitzer Prize winning critic Margot Jefferson talking about
jazz singer Ella Fitzgerald, the Immortal first Lady of Song.
Fitzgerald is one of Jefferson's idols. We're going to hear
how Fitzgerald inspired Jefferson and helped make her the woman
she is today. I'm a land Revere and this is
(00:48):
Seneca's one Women to Hear. We are bringing you one
hundred of the world's most inspiring and history making women
you need to hear. If Margot Jefferson's voice sounds familiar,
it's because she frequently appears in documentaries about the history
of music, among them Ken Burns Mini series Jazz and
(01:12):
the documentary Ella Fitzgerald just one of those things. She's
probably best known for her career with The New York Times,
where she was a book reviewer, theater critic, and critic
at large. Jefferson's second memoir, Constructing a Nervous System recently
came out. In it, she traces the cultural forces that
(01:36):
shaped her, including, of course, the artistry of Ella Fitzgerald.
Listen and learn why Ella Fitzgerald and Margot Jefferson are
amongst Seneca's One Women to Hear. I'm speaking today with
Margo Jefferson, Award winning author, professor, and jazz enthusiast. Welcome, Margot.
(02:01):
It's a pleasure to have you with us. Oh, it's
a pleasure and an honor to be here. Well, Margot,
I know that you're also an extraordinary authority. And Ella Fitzgerald,
whom you greatly admire, that first lady of song about
whom you've written. Could we talk some about her because
she's such an iconic figure in American music? Yes, first,
(02:23):
the first lady of almost any kind of song. Yes, Well,
what made her so legendary and why should she be remembered? Well,
you know, with a musical artist, first of all, there's
you know, there, there's the instrument. There is that lovely, um, clean, clear,
beautifully pitched voice. There is a combination of virtuosity um.
(02:49):
She can give you long lines, she can scatch, she
can you know, jump and give you lots of percussive.
So you've got the virtuosity, but there with everything she is,
there's a kind of generosity she gives herself to it fully.
She she thinks of new ways. I I set in
(03:10):
my piece on her that her mind is her music laboratory,
her mind in her ear. She's always finding new ways
to change alter redo a song that her fans may
have heard for years. So there's also that kind of
kind of constant curiosity within herself, but a kind of
(03:31):
respect for the audience too. She gives pleasure so acutely,
and she doesn't intimidate when she gives pleasure. Does she
just fascinating to hear you talk about her already? I
wonder is there an aspect of her life or career
that more people should know about? I think so. And
(03:53):
I discovered this after she died in I think it
was and I was asked uh the New York Times
to write a piece about her, and I started thinking
more and researching more. How we we, meaning her fans
and listeners, have taken that what appears to be this
kind of even temperament um and this lack of telling
(04:18):
stories and ten stories about her life that's made us
take her a little bit. For granted, she's often been
compared to Billy Holliday, who was also a great artist,
but to Ella's detriment, it was often all you know,
lady Lady Dave puts everything into her songs, her heart,
her suffering, and and Ella she just doesn't have that
(04:39):
emotional reach. And maybe she didn't have that experience. While
she had a very hard early life. She was orphaned,
she was abused by a stepfather. She ran away from home.
She got sent to UM a facility let us call
it for girls in upstate New York, where she was
again um abused. She ran away. She was a professional,
(05:03):
and she was determined to be a singer. She ran away.
She came back to New York. She you know, stood
outside of you know, every ballroom and jazz club around.
She listened to record successively, She trained her voice, and
she was a working musician by the precocious age of sixteen.
She chose never to to talk, to make these painful
(05:28):
experiences into a kind of legend or a tragedy, which
I think took a certain amount of pride um and
and that kind of self respect. But I think I
think we need to remember that and we need to
remember that every human being, particularly every artist UM. They
they used their own particular style and temperament to UM
(05:53):
to convey what went on in their life. Ella could
be very melancholy, she could do it UM very sweetly,
sad versions of songs, but she wasn't going to give
you intense confessions. And there's always a little bit of
reserve there, not coldness, I would say, but reserves well.
(06:15):
In your latest memoir, Creating a Nervous System, you tell
your story through the musicians and creators who shaped you.
How did Ella Fitzgerald help shape the person you are, Margo? Well,
you know, first in my early years when I was
listening to her as a pre ADOLESCENTUM she brought out
(06:39):
and that did shape me certain insecurities, and it had
very much to do with being a young girl in
the nineties fifties with all these rigid constructs and rules
and definitions of what made women interesting and Worthwhile I
knew she was wonderfully talented, the record were in my house,
(07:01):
but I was, like so many young girls, I was
obsessed with um, with clamor with desirability. And Ella she
was It's nice looking, she dressed nicely. But she was
sport ly. Um. She was yes, yes, yes, yes, yes
um and in that way not glamorous. And she never
(07:24):
exuded um sexuality. That's you know again, if you were
listening to a record, to a recording of a song,
you could hear it, but never in her performances. So
I was torn between feeling um, oh my goodness, it's
like you know, the librarian um and being embarrassed up.
(07:45):
And I think that really was intensified by my being
a young black woman at a time that there were
you you know, um images, desirable, exciting, um compelling in
ages up. So her weight there was, you know, think
of Aunt Jemima, the stereotype of the large, large black woman.
(08:07):
So her weight embarrassed me, even though she couldn't have
been less like Aunt Jemima in the manner. Also, and
this had to do with her the work she put
into her artistry. Whenever she was really singing hard let's
you know, say, like a swinging jazz song and improvising
(08:28):
and scatting on television, she would use a white hand
fishes because she was sweating. Now they're women were not
supposed to sweat on television. Lewis armstrong sweated um men
could but this was, if you may remember this very
distasteful word on lady light. Yes. Uh, and that rattled
(08:52):
me too because I also, being black, associated a black
woman sweating with a stereotypes of your on your knees,
scrubbing your you know, you're somebody's made or domestic. And
what's interesting to me is she when you look at
her now and think about her, you know, nothing about
(09:14):
her was close to those stereotypes, really, but they were
so alive in the culture and they, you know, we
girls were so profoundly shaped by all these you know,
forbidden ways to look or or act. So it I
it took me, being an adult and being a feminist,
(09:38):
to integrate all of these parts of her, her extraordinary
talent and her resolute um refusal to um, you know,
to play at being wildly glamorous. That was not what
she was about. She was about being um, a serious
(09:59):
and winning in her manner, but never ingratiating um and
never you know, kind of aggressively flirtatious. She was about
being a musician. You know, there's a lesson and all
of that, isn't there about judgmental and appearances and and
the reality that you came to know so deeply, Yes, exactly,
(10:21):
and also how susceptible, Um, we are too to the stereotypes,
um that surround us, and the and the verbotens and
the and the injunctions. Um, this is what this is
what you know an attractive interesting woman is. We also
we knew she was major, as we knew Billie Holiday,
(10:45):
Sarah Vaughan, um, other singers were major. But you know
they as singers, as women singers, they weren't always treated
as seriously for their musicianship as male and a mentalists.
So you know, I had I had to, and I
chose to really as I again got older and realized this,
(11:07):
this legacy in all forms of popular music of pioneering
and great um women singers, this has to be explored
and given its full do well. And women in various
professions still are on the receiving end of some of that,
aren't they absolutely, um take being taken for granted, being
(11:31):
somewhat condescended to. It's been decades and every woman I
know who's ever been in a in a formal business meeting,
you know whatever the profession um can tell a story
about making a perfectly intelligent point and either having it
taken over and co opted by another man in the meeting,
(11:54):
or having it ignored exactly exactly, yes, yes, yes, yes,
Senecas one hundred women to hear, will be back after
the short break. So she was just that great first
(12:21):
lady of songs, or was she say, first lady of everything?
In some ways? You know, even at her very in
her very last years, she was joking. But you know
she wore were the thiet glasses. She had great a
lot of trouble seeing her voice was wavering a bit,
but she was still performing. But she said in one interview,
(12:41):
well she said, you know, um, what I may next
do is see what I can make of this um
rapping and this hip hop. And I thought, and then
she just laughed. You know, she wasn't even trying to
be ingratiating. She was actually saying, very sweetly, don't think
there's anything I can't do. I will, I will find
my way to this. So she was a gutsy lady too,
(13:04):
she absolutely was. She made her way really alone for
many years. So do you have favorite Ella Fitzgerald performance?
That's it's difficult, um that I have many loved ones,
but One of the great ones is a nineteen sixty
(13:26):
live in Berlin performance she does of a song called Hi,
How High the Moon that was first written you know
as a as a sweet, more valid sort of song.
That Ella has her jazz musicians behind her, and she
not only no swings into it, you know, so it's
(13:48):
it's as if you know, it's with the vigor of
of an astronaut. How High the Moon? She quotes from
forty four according to One Yes critic Um, dis pouncing
us to be right by by according to my County.
She quotes, in the process of singing various verses of
this song from forty four other songs Um, including the
(14:09):
Flight of the Bumblebee Night in Tunisia, thirty Growth, a
old old blues and ragtime songs. Up, she scats, she
stretches out her lines. She can. She keeps inventing new
songs with each chorus. And at the very end, and
that's remember just keep in mind how we were talking
(14:30):
about her sweating. At the very end, she borrows um
from Jerome current song Smoke gets in your eyes, and
she says, you know, they asked me how I knew that,
I of course replied, then Her last line is sweat
gets in my eyes. But okay try triumph and and
(14:54):
and witty as well. Well, that's your sounds like one
amazing performance. All of things that she introduced into it
exactly exactly. She could also you know, sing a song.
There are other versions of it that are just you know,
gentle and lilting. There was never any one way that
(15:16):
she felt she had to do. Yeah, she's really some
shots and languorous with the Duke Ellington Zong book, every
every songbook, every composer, every song gets its own considered,
get gets taken into the Elephants Gerald Laboratory, musical laboratory. Well,
I know that jazz has been such an important part
(15:39):
of your life. What is it about the genre that
speaks to you so personally? Ah, Well, it's it's the
range of music of songs that it can draw on.
It draws on blues, it draws on classical um, it
(16:01):
draws on you know, very intense um acute, flashy material,
It draws on ballads, and it constantly encourages and emphasizes
and flourishes by individuality. Every musician. You know, Yes, you've
(16:21):
got your technique, You've got a repertory of of material.
You've got your style, but you're always being encouraged to
at your best, to take it further, to try something new.
And that is very moving to me at that sense
of of tex, of minds and hearts and imaginations, you know,
(16:47):
in inaction, you know, UM, just listening to you, and
how much you know about Ella jazz in general, so
much of that world. But what we also know of
you that others may not is that you're one of
the most famous critics to emerge from the New York Times. Yeah,
I don't know it. Well, well, let's let's bear with
(17:10):
me on this, because I've heard others say that you
were one of the most extraordinary critics. So what is it?
What is it about writing criticism? You know, we all
read it. I think we read these reviews. What sets
a good critic apart? What when you threw yourself into that?
What were you aiming to do? I was aiming to
(17:33):
combine the materials of that my intellect you now produced
that my senses very acutely produced. And so it's analysis.
It's it's a kind of description that we captures that
that renews, that gives the audience. Um, the the on
(17:55):
site UM sensual description, and I died to UM keep
questioning myself to to walk an interesting line between you know,
having a certain authority you have to otherwise why would
you be a critic and why would you put the
work at UM having a kind of authority but also
(18:18):
being open to UM to two new questions being using
UM maybe ambiguity uncertainty UM too to to help the
reader UM think about the the range the possibilities of
(18:38):
art and entertainment, you know, to to to to give
coherence both to certainties and uncertainties. I also really wanted
to keep UM testing my knowledge, you know, not to
only stay and I think that's important when you're a
bit with the material, with the beat that you know best,
(19:00):
but to bring your skills and tools UM, you know,
to new territories. Did you hear a lot from readers
when you were doing your criticism, either agreeing with you
or disagreeing with you? Believe me both very much. Not
to mention you you get letters, but also you know
(19:20):
there would be people who would use who would leave
long phone messages, so probably still a little more controllable
than you know critics getting responses immediately online now but
but absolutely, Yeah, And you know I was I was
a black woman critic, so you know, in in some
(19:41):
borders that was considered exciting and groundbreaking, and in others
it was considered a little disreputable. So so that affected
who I heard from and in what way? Yeah, I'm sure,
but you've certainly established yourself as one of the more
famous critics to emerge from the times. Well, you know,
(20:01):
we've reached that point in our conversation that I always
hate to reach, and that's we've just about run out
of time. But let me ask you. You know, there's
so much in your writings, uh that explores racial and
socioeconomic identity. With these themes in mind, what makes you
optimistic about the future, because clearly we have so many
(20:24):
challenges in these categories. Oh UM, with this in mind, UM, race, gender, UM, staft,
social economic justice and injustice, and knowing that we are
all in many ways often very frightened and angry right
now because there's so much ugliness about I think what
(20:48):
helps me, UM, gives me some hope is the intensity
of for example, in UM the abortion crisis, the range
and the intensity of UM of women being involved. I
would say the same thing about the attacks on voting rights. UM.
(21:09):
You know, there's so much imagination as well as passion,
UM going into ways, finding ways to protest to you know,
literally actively change the laws. UM. And Also there are
more and this this is heartening. There are more alliances
(21:30):
being made across UM, across race and ethnicity, across gender divides,
across class barriers. There are more political um alliances being made.
And and that is hardening to me because that means, um,
you know, people are curious about each other and there
(21:51):
and each other's sufferings and struggles as well as their own.
Well said, Thank you so much, Margot Jefferson. Thank you
for sharing your insights with us, for making us so
much smarter about Ella Fitzgerald and jazz and so much more.
Thank you all the mess to you. This was a
(22:12):
pleasure two amazing women, Ella Fitzgerald and Margot Jefferson. Here
are three things I took from that delightful conversation. First,
Margo reminds us that great dignity is sometimes the perfect
antidote to the harsh realities of life. Ella Fitzgerald had
(22:35):
a rough upbringing, but her singing was smooth, seamless, elegant,
she never displayed her suffering, and that says Margot took
pride and self respect. Second Ella shows how the true
artist is always growing and trying new things. Towards the
(22:56):
end of her life, she talked about experimenting with rap
hip hop. Her real message was, I don't think there's
anything I can't do. Finally, Margot gives us cause for
hope amid today's challenges. She takes heart when she sees
people acting on behalf of their beliefs, when she sees
(23:17):
alliance as being made across barriers of race, ethnicity, gender,
and class. As she says, those alliances mean that people
are curious about each other and each other's struggles as
well as their own. Tune in next time to hear
about our next featured woman and discover why she's one
(23:40):
of Seneca's Women to Hear. Seneca's one hundred Women To
Hear is a collaboration between the Seneca Women Podcast Network
and I Heart Radio, with support from founding partner PNG.
Have a Great Day,
With everything she does, there's a kind of generosity. She
gives herself to it fully. She's always finding new ways
to change alter. We do a song that her fans
may have heard for years. She gives pleasure so acutely.
(00:26):
That is Pulitzer Prize winning critic Margot Jefferson talking about
jazz singer Ella Fitzgerald, the Immortal first Lady of Song.
Fitzgerald is one of Jefferson's idols. We're going to hear
how Fitzgerald inspired Jefferson and helped make her the woman
she is today. I'm a land Revere and this is
(00:48):
Seneca's one Women to Hear. We are bringing you one
hundred of the world's most inspiring and history making women
you need to hear. If Margot Jefferson's voice sounds familiar,
it's because she frequently appears in documentaries about the history
of music, among them Ken Burns Mini series Jazz and
(01:12):
the documentary Ella Fitzgerald just one of those things. She's
probably best known for her career with The New York Times,
where she was a book reviewer, theater critic, and critic
at large. Jefferson's second memoir, Constructing a Nervous System recently
came out. In it, she traces the cultural forces that
(01:36):
shaped her, including, of course, the artistry of Ella Fitzgerald.
Listen and learn why Ella Fitzgerald and Margot Jefferson are
amongst Seneca's One Women to Hear. I'm speaking today with
Margo Jefferson, Award winning author, professor, and jazz enthusiast. Welcome, Margot.
(02:01):
It's a pleasure to have you with us. Oh, it's
a pleasure and an honor to be here. Well, Margot,
I know that you're also an extraordinary authority. And Ella Fitzgerald,
whom you greatly admire, that first lady of song about
whom you've written. Could we talk some about her because
she's such an iconic figure in American music? Yes, first,
(02:23):
the first lady of almost any kind of song. Yes, Well,
what made her so legendary and why should she be remembered? Well,
you know, with a musical artist, first of all, there's
you know, there, there's the instrument. There is that lovely, um, clean, clear,
beautifully pitched voice. There is a combination of virtuosity um.
(02:49):
She can give you long lines, she can scatch, she
can you know, jump and give you lots of percussive.
So you've got the virtuosity, but there with everything she is,
there's a kind of generosity she gives herself to it fully.
She she thinks of new ways. I I set in
(03:10):
my piece on her that her mind is her music laboratory,
her mind in her ear. She's always finding new ways
to change alter redo a song that her fans may
have heard for years. So there's also that kind of
kind of constant curiosity within herself, but a kind of
(03:31):
respect for the audience too. She gives pleasure so acutely,
and she doesn't intimidate when she gives pleasure. Does she
just fascinating to hear you talk about her already? I
wonder is there an aspect of her life or career
that more people should know about? I think so. And
(03:53):
I discovered this after she died in I think it
was and I was asked uh the New York Times
to write a piece about her, and I started thinking
more and researching more. How we we, meaning her fans
and listeners, have taken that what appears to be this
kind of even temperament um and this lack of telling
(04:18):
stories and ten stories about her life that's made us
take her a little bit. For granted, she's often been
compared to Billy Holliday, who was also a great artist,
but to Ella's detriment, it was often all you know,
lady Lady Dave puts everything into her songs, her heart,
her suffering, and and Ella she just doesn't have that
(04:39):
emotional reach. And maybe she didn't have that experience. While
she had a very hard early life. She was orphaned,
she was abused by a stepfather. She ran away from home.
She got sent to UM a facility let us call
it for girls in upstate New York, where she was
again um abused. She ran away. She was a professional,
(05:03):
and she was determined to be a singer. She ran away.
She came back to New York. She you know, stood
outside of you know, every ballroom and jazz club around.
She listened to record successively, She trained her voice, and
she was a working musician by the precocious age of sixteen.
She chose never to to talk, to make these painful
(05:28):
experiences into a kind of legend or a tragedy, which
I think took a certain amount of pride um and
and that kind of self respect. But I think I
think we need to remember that and we need to
remember that every human being, particularly every artist UM. They
they used their own particular style and temperament to UM
(05:53):
to convey what went on in their life. Ella could
be very melancholy, she could do it UM very sweetly,
sad versions of songs, but she wasn't going to give
you intense confessions. And there's always a little bit of
reserve there, not coldness, I would say, but reserves well.
(06:15):
In your latest memoir, Creating a Nervous System, you tell
your story through the musicians and creators who shaped you.
How did Ella Fitzgerald help shape the person you are, Margo? Well,
you know, first in my early years when I was
listening to her as a pre ADOLESCENTUM she brought out
(06:39):
and that did shape me certain insecurities, and it had
very much to do with being a young girl in
the nineties fifties with all these rigid constructs and rules
and definitions of what made women interesting and Worthwhile I
knew she was wonderfully talented, the record were in my house,
(07:01):
but I was, like so many young girls, I was
obsessed with um, with clamor with desirability. And Ella she
was It's nice looking, she dressed nicely. But she was
sport ly. Um. She was yes, yes, yes, yes, yes
um and in that way not glamorous. And she never
(07:24):
exuded um sexuality. That's you know again, if you were
listening to a record, to a recording of a song,
you could hear it, but never in her performances. So
I was torn between feeling um, oh my goodness, it's
like you know, the librarian um and being embarrassed up.
(07:45):
And I think that really was intensified by my being
a young black woman at a time that there were
you you know, um images, desirable, exciting, um compelling in
ages up. So her weight there was, you know, think
of Aunt Jemima, the stereotype of the large, large black woman.
(08:07):
So her weight embarrassed me, even though she couldn't have
been less like Aunt Jemima in the manner. Also, and
this had to do with her the work she put
into her artistry. Whenever she was really singing hard let's
you know, say, like a swinging jazz song and improvising
(08:28):
and scatting on television, she would use a white hand
fishes because she was sweating. Now they're women were not
supposed to sweat on television. Lewis armstrong sweated um men
could but this was, if you may remember this very
distasteful word on lady light. Yes. Uh, and that rattled
(08:52):
me too because I also, being black, associated a black
woman sweating with a stereotypes of your on your knees,
scrubbing your you know, you're somebody's made or domestic. And
what's interesting to me is she when you look at
her now and think about her, you know, nothing about
(09:14):
her was close to those stereotypes, really, but they were
so alive in the culture and they, you know, we
girls were so profoundly shaped by all these you know,
forbidden ways to look or or act. So it I
it took me, being an adult and being a feminist,
(09:38):
to integrate all of these parts of her, her extraordinary
talent and her resolute um refusal to um, you know,
to play at being wildly glamorous. That was not what
she was about. She was about being um, a serious
(09:59):
and winning in her manner, but never ingratiating um and
never you know, kind of aggressively flirtatious. She was about
being a musician. You know, there's a lesson and all
of that, isn't there about judgmental and appearances and and
the reality that you came to know so deeply, Yes, exactly,
(10:21):
and also how susceptible, Um, we are too to the stereotypes,
um that surround us, and the and the verbotens and
the and the injunctions. Um, this is what this is
what you know an attractive interesting woman is. We also
we knew she was major, as we knew Billie Holiday,
(10:45):
Sarah Vaughan, um, other singers were major. But you know
they as singers, as women singers, they weren't always treated
as seriously for their musicianship as male and a mentalists.
So you know, I had I had to, and I
chose to really as I again got older and realized this,
(11:07):
this legacy in all forms of popular music of pioneering
and great um women singers, this has to be explored
and given its full do well. And women in various
professions still are on the receiving end of some of that,
aren't they absolutely, um take being taken for granted, being
(11:31):
somewhat condescended to. It's been decades and every woman I
know who's ever been in a in a formal business meeting,
you know whatever the profession um can tell a story
about making a perfectly intelligent point and either having it
taken over and co opted by another man in the meeting,
(11:54):
or having it ignored exactly exactly, yes, yes, yes, yes,
Senecas one hundred women to hear, will be back after
the short break. So she was just that great first
(12:21):
lady of songs, or was she say, first lady of everything?
In some ways? You know, even at her very in
her very last years, she was joking. But you know
she wore were the thiet glasses. She had great a
lot of trouble seeing her voice was wavering a bit,
but she was still performing. But she said in one interview,
(12:41):
well she said, you know, um, what I may next
do is see what I can make of this um
rapping and this hip hop. And I thought, and then
she just laughed. You know, she wasn't even trying to
be ingratiating. She was actually saying, very sweetly, don't think
there's anything I can't do. I will, I will find
my way to this. So she was a gutsy lady too,
(13:04):
she absolutely was. She made her way really alone for
many years. So do you have favorite Ella Fitzgerald performance?
That's it's difficult, um that I have many loved ones,
but One of the great ones is a nineteen sixty
(13:26):
live in Berlin performance she does of a song called Hi,
How High the Moon that was first written you know
as a as a sweet, more valid sort of song.
That Ella has her jazz musicians behind her, and she
not only no swings into it, you know, so it's
(13:48):
it's as if you know, it's with the vigor of
of an astronaut. How High the Moon? She quotes from
forty four according to One Yes critic Um, dis pouncing
us to be right by by according to my County.
She quotes, in the process of singing various verses of
this song from forty four other songs Um, including the
(14:09):
Flight of the Bumblebee Night in Tunisia, thirty Growth, a
old old blues and ragtime songs. Up, she scats, she
stretches out her lines. She can. She keeps inventing new
songs with each chorus. And at the very end, and
that's remember just keep in mind how we were talking
(14:30):
about her sweating. At the very end, she borrows um
from Jerome current song Smoke gets in your eyes, and
she says, you know, they asked me how I knew that,
I of course replied, then Her last line is sweat
gets in my eyes. But okay try triumph and and
(14:54):
and witty as well. Well, that's your sounds like one
amazing performance. All of things that she introduced into it
exactly exactly. She could also you know, sing a song.
There are other versions of it that are just you know,
gentle and lilting. There was never any one way that
(15:16):
she felt she had to do. Yeah, she's really some
shots and languorous with the Duke Ellington Zong book, every
every songbook, every composer, every song gets its own considered,
get gets taken into the Elephants Gerald Laboratory, musical laboratory. Well,
I know that jazz has been such an important part
(15:39):
of your life. What is it about the genre that
speaks to you so personally? Ah, Well, it's it's the
range of music of songs that it can draw on.
It draws on blues, it draws on classical um, it
(16:01):
draws on you know, very intense um acute, flashy material,
It draws on ballads, and it constantly encourages and emphasizes
and flourishes by individuality. Every musician. You know, Yes, you've
(16:21):
got your technique, You've got a repertory of of material.
You've got your style, but you're always being encouraged to
at your best, to take it further, to try something new.
And that is very moving to me at that sense
of of tex, of minds and hearts and imaginations, you know,
(16:47):
in inaction, you know, UM, just listening to you, and
how much you know about Ella jazz in general, so
much of that world. But what we also know of
you that others may not is that you're one of
the most famous critics to emerge from the New York Times. Yeah,
I don't know it. Well, well, let's let's bear with
(17:10):
me on this, because I've heard others say that you
were one of the most extraordinary critics. So what is it?
What is it about writing criticism? You know, we all
read it. I think we read these reviews. What sets
a good critic apart? What when you threw yourself into that?
What were you aiming to do? I was aiming to
(17:33):
combine the materials of that my intellect you now produced
that my senses very acutely produced. And so it's analysis.
It's it's a kind of description that we captures that
that renews, that gives the audience. Um, the the on
(17:55):
site UM sensual description, and I died to UM keep
questioning myself to to walk an interesting line between you know,
having a certain authority you have to otherwise why would
you be a critic and why would you put the
work at UM having a kind of authority but also
(18:18):
being open to UM to two new questions being using
UM maybe ambiguity uncertainty UM too to to help the
reader UM think about the the range the possibilities of
(18:38):
art and entertainment, you know, to to to to give
coherence both to certainties and uncertainties. I also really wanted
to keep UM testing my knowledge, you know, not to
only stay and I think that's important when you're a
bit with the material, with the beat that you know best,
(19:00):
but to bring your skills and tools UM, you know,
to new territories. Did you hear a lot from readers
when you were doing your criticism, either agreeing with you
or disagreeing with you? Believe me both very much. Not
to mention you you get letters, but also you know
(19:20):
there would be people who would use who would leave
long phone messages, so probably still a little more controllable
than you know critics getting responses immediately online now but
but absolutely, Yeah, And you know I was I was
a black woman critic, so you know, in in some
(19:41):
borders that was considered exciting and groundbreaking, and in others
it was considered a little disreputable. So so that affected
who I heard from and in what way? Yeah, I'm sure,
but you've certainly established yourself as one of the more
famous critics to emerge from the times. Well, you know,
(20:01):
we've reached that point in our conversation that I always
hate to reach, and that's we've just about run out
of time. But let me ask you. You know, there's
so much in your writings, uh that explores racial and
socioeconomic identity. With these themes in mind, what makes you
optimistic about the future, because clearly we have so many
(20:24):
challenges in these categories. Oh UM, with this in mind, UM, race, gender, UM, staft,
social economic justice and injustice, and knowing that we are
all in many ways often very frightened and angry right
now because there's so much ugliness about I think what
(20:48):
helps me, UM, gives me some hope is the intensity
of for example, in UM the abortion crisis, the range
and the intensity of UM of women being involved. I
would say the same thing about the attacks on voting rights. UM.
(21:09):
You know, there's so much imagination as well as passion,
UM going into ways, finding ways to protest to you know,
literally actively change the laws. UM. And Also there are
more and this this is heartening. There are more alliances
(21:30):
being made across UM, across race and ethnicity, across gender divides,
across class barriers. There are more political um alliances being made.
And and that is hardening to me because that means, um,
you know, people are curious about each other and there
(21:51):
and each other's sufferings and struggles as well as their own.
Well said, Thank you so much, Margot Jefferson. Thank you
for sharing your insights with us, for making us so
much smarter about Ella Fitzgerald and jazz and so much more.
Thank you all the mess to you. This was a
(22:12):
pleasure two amazing women, Ella Fitzgerald and Margot Jefferson. Here
are three things I took from that delightful conversation. First,
Margo reminds us that great dignity is sometimes the perfect
antidote to the harsh realities of life. Ella Fitzgerald had
(22:35):
a rough upbringing, but her singing was smooth, seamless, elegant,
she never displayed her suffering, and that says Margot took
pride and self respect. Second Ella shows how the true
artist is always growing and trying new things. Towards the
(22:56):
end of her life, she talked about experimenting with rap
hip hop. Her real message was, I don't think there's
anything I can't do. Finally, Margot gives us cause for
hope amid today's challenges. She takes heart when she sees
people acting on behalf of their beliefs, when she sees
(23:17):
alliance as being made across barriers of race, ethnicity, gender,
and class. As she says, those alliances mean that people
are curious about each other and each other's struggles as
well as their own. Tune in next time to hear
about our next featured woman and discover why she's one
(23:40):
of Seneca's Women to Hear. Seneca's one hundred Women To
Hear is a collaboration between the Seneca Women Podcast Network
and I Heart Radio, with support from founding partner PNG.
Have a Great Day,
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