Gary:

The lute came along before the banjo and I don't think many European court musicians were black. The longest running trend is "classical" music and not much, if any, of that genre was written by blacks.

Musical expression, however, is not a function of race and never has been. Culture, maybe, but not race.

Still, there are a differences between black and white music even if those differences are very subtle and often can only be measured in the timbre of the singer's voice. Some songs sound better to me with a black vocalist and others sound better with a white vocalist. Imagine Elton John singing "Old Man River?" YUK! Or Johnny Mathis singing "Folsom Prison Blues." another YUK!

If 9 out of 10 or 10 out of 10 billboard hits were by black artists, as DukeWill stated, it may make perfect business sense for a white artist to gravitate to country. That's not racism, just good business.

In terms of playing, I've never noticed that musicians of any given race have an edge on any other race. However, I can tell you this, when I was a dancer in my youth, there was no way in hell I was going to compete with the black dudes in boogie dance contests. I could buy the same oversized raincoat, and match them move for move, but they looked "cool" and I looked rediculous by comparison. They definately had the edge. That applied to tap dance contests as well. So I focused on ballroom dance contests where the cool black dudes didn't have the advantage, if and when they even entered those contests.

Sometimes what some would label as racial stereotyping is a reality that should be acknowledged and accepted, not condemned.

I know if I were raising a young white boy in America today, I would encourage him to become an olympic swimmer, not a 100 meter sprinter. That would not be based on racial stereotyping either, but rather based who's been getting the medals and who hasn't.

P.E. Knudsen





[This message has been edited by Knute (edited 02-06-2004).]

P.E. Knudsen