Jazz, and Katrina

I heard Aaron Neville on NPR last weekend, speaking from his refuge in Austin, TX, about Hurricane Katrina. He sounded pretty bitter - New Orleans didn't die, it was "murdered," and he wants to be part of the process of figuring out who's to blame.

Meanwhile, Wynton Marsalis has a bit different take:

Swing is a philosophy of steadfastness. It instructs us to maintain an equilibrium when external forces are conspiring to tear it apart. At the heart of swing, two extremely different instruments--the drum and the bass--must be played with absolutely the same intentions. The cymbal that is struck on every beat by the drummer is in the high high register, and the bass notes, also articulated on every beat, are in the way way low. In order to swing, these extremes must get together, and then they must stay together. If you think getting together is hard, then you probably know that staying together is practically impossible. Anyone can swing for a few measures--but swinging is a matter of endurance. It tests the limits of your ability to work with another person to create a mutual feeling.

That is what is required of the citizens of this country now: sustained engagement with the issues that have been raised by this tragedy.....

Now, through the displacement of 300,000 families, we are forced as a nation literally to come closer and deal with one another in an unprecedented way. The development of jazz showed what Americans can do when we come together. There is no greatness without discomfort. Will we now recognize that we are on this land together? Have we given up on the proposition that every generation of Americans will improve on the glories of the one before? Why are systems now failing to help the people they should help? We must not acquiesce in incompetence or bigotry or greed. In New Orleans, we have real big roaches, and we have a saying: "When you turn the lights on, the roaches scatter." We must keep the lights on.