History Lab in Action: Latin Jazz Reveals African Diaspora in the West
Just as science labs make real a textbook's theorems and formulae, a history lab on campus brought to life the African influences in Latin American history and music. The Latin Jazz Youth Ensemble of San Francisco was invited...
...by CSUS history department head Kent Holubar to campus for a day of classroom and musical exchanges. In Mr. Holubar’s words:
The day culminated in a concert with the CSUS jazz ensemble students performing with Dr. Calloway and alums of the Latin Jazz Youth Ensemble (see video).
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“It seemed a natural two-fer: having the distinguished music educator, Dr. John Calloway, music director of the Latin Jazz Youth Ensemble of San Francisco, speak to the European history students on the impact of the African Diaspora on the culture of the Americas AND having him and his musicians work with our jazz/pop ensemble.
“The sophomores' European history class has a fairly involved unit on the trans-Atlantic slave trade, and this event was meant to illustrate my assertion that there is hardly any culture in the Americas that is not, in some part, inflected by African culture. The new concept I acquired today was that of ‘African retentions’--American and Caribbean cultures have retained a greater or lesser part of their African admixture. Dr. Calloway particularly cited Cuba and Brazil as having greater African retentions than, say Peru or Mexico—and then illustrated this in music.”
The day culminated in a concert with the CSUS jazz ensemble students performing with Dr. Calloway and alums of the Latin Jazz Youth Ensemble (see video).