Do Black Lives Matter in Classical Music? The Radical Chic Activism of Maestro Gilbert, and the loud silence of classical musicians
On January 8, before beginning the New York Philharmonic’s first subscription series concert of the 2015 season, conductor Alan Gilbert turned to the audience and briefly spoke on the Charlie Hebdo murders, which had happened just days prior. He dedicated the concert to the victims of the “horrific massacre,” repeated the oft-quoted Leonard Bernstein aphorism of creating beauty in the face of violence, and concluded with “We are all Charlie,” referencing the hashtag intended to show solidarity with the French people.
Gilbert’s brief speech was received with much applause, and praised after the concert. I have no qualms with what Gilbert said, but I would like to point out what he, and others, haven't said.
The same morning of Gilbert’s statement, the BBC and NBC news released reports of an estimated 2,000 lives lost in Baga and surrounding villages. Repeatedly, the scene on the ground was described as “bodies lay strewn on the streets,” and eyewitnesses said the 16 villages were “burnt to the ground.” By sheer numbers, this was a "horrific massacre" of far greater proportions than France.
Which begs the question; why are 12 lives in France worth acknowledgment, but not 2,000 in Nigeria? Perhaps Mr. Gilbert was simply unaware; after all, the Boko Haram massacre has remained “un-hash-tagged” and didn’t explode onto social media as the Hebdo murders had. And, it being the first of the subscription series concerts, Mr. Gilbert could have been understandably busy on that particular day.
But, this excuse falls short: Gilbert has conducted the Philharmonic in concert three times since January 8, and while major news outlets have finally picked up the Boko Haram massacre, Gilbert has not.
I then wondered, “Where were you last year Mr. Gilbert?” The Black Lives Matter movement, which erupted last year with the reporting of at least 6 police-related deaths of unarmed black men and boys, ranging from ages 12 to 43 (with 4 happening within the same month), went unmentioned by the conductor. The July 17th homicide of Staten Island resident Eric Garner happened less than 20 miles away from Avery Fisher Hall, and it occurred in the middle of the New York Philharmonic’s summer concert series. These free outdoor concerts, lauded as events where the orchestra engages with communities of diverse backgrounds, would have been a truly appropriate venue for Gilbert to interact and acknowledge the communities of New York that are largely underrepresented in regular concert-goers, and which were beginning to simmer as the video footage of Garner’s chokehold death went viral.
Maybe you could excuse Maestro Gilbert again; the Hebdo murders have been derided as an attack against free speech, an issue close to the heart of many musicians and artists; perhaps that was why it merited acknowledgment. It could also be possible that Gilbert felt better qualified to speak on the Hebdo murders, as he most likely feels closer attuned to the victims of first world France than to the economically-distant income brackets of Ferguson or Staten Island, nevermind third world Nigeria. Or, with the likes of George Clooney sporting ‘Je Suis Charlie’ buttons at the Golden Globes, and footage from the widely attended unity march in Paris making its rounds (with the 50+ post-Hebdo Anti-Muslim hate crimes going largely unnoticed), it would certainly be safe for the New York Philharmonic to join in on the hash-tag activism. And if we are considering the Maestro’s risks, it could be against the best interests of the orchestra to make a statement on Black Lives Matter; activism against systemic racial discrimination has been a polarizing issue in even the liberal bastion of New York City, so the Philharmonic must consider the chances of alienating one of its many high profile sponsors.
Whatever the reasons may be, I’m not saying Gilbert should have spoken on the Black Lives Matter movement, or the Boko Haram massacre. If Gilbert, or any high profile musician, were to issue statements on international events before every concert, there would be no end of worthy causes to champion. Conductors and musicians are not required to make public their political stances on the issues of the day; that is simply not their job.
Yet, there is something undeniably conspicuous in Gilbert’s, and the rest of the classical music world’s, utter silence on issues of communities of color. In reference to the Black Lives Matter movement, with the Philharmonic touting its programming with schools that have Title 1 status and “over 60% of students enrolled in the Free Lunch Program," would it not have made sense to acknowledge these news headlines that were resonating with the very communities they claim to serve? With so much attention on the Hebdo murders, and the Boko Haram massacre remaining underreported and “un-hash-tagged,” it certainly would have done a greater public service to mention the killings in Nigeria. And unlike the aforementioned problematic concern of raising New York issues, and potentially New York ire, amongst funders, unless there’s some secret sponsor for the Philharmonic’s endowment that is a high-profile member of Boko Haram (which I am certain is unlikely), Gilbert had nothing to lose from acknowledging the massacre of Baga.
I’m not necessarily wagging my finger at Gilbert, but again I am asking: Why Paris? Why not Nigeria? Why not Ferguson or Staten Island? Whatever the answers may be, this silence implies that, in the classical music world, Black Lives Don’t Matter. At least, they don’t matter enough to mention them.
Well, they did, at one point. Ironically enough, to Leonard Bernstein, the very conductor that Gilbert chose to invoke in his mini-speech, and one of Gilbert’s predecessors as conductor of the New York Philharmonic. In 1947, Bernstein published an article in the New York Times, titled “The Negro in Music,” which contradicted the common belief that African Americans were absent from classical music because they were incapable of performing or appreciating the genre. At the time of the article’s publication, Bernstein pointed out, “There is not a single Negro musician employed in any of the major symphony orchestras, and that goes right down the list. There are no Negroes employed in the orchestras of the ballet or opera companies…” He asserted that the real reasons for this gross under-representation were systemic discrimination, economic oppression, and lack of access to educational resources, and emphasized that the absence of black classical musicians was a manifestation of bigger issues: "This is a social, not a musical problem. And that is why everything we can do to fight discrimination-in any form or field-will ultimately work toward ameliorating the musical situation.”
Throughout his career, Bernstein continued to show that Black Lives Mattered: he cast African-Americans in his Broadway musical On the Town, which memorably did not portray any characters in blackface, and modeled “an integrated citizenry.” He promoted the career of Andre Watts, giving the then- 16 year old his nationally televised debut in a New York Philharmonic Young People’s Concert, and having him substitute for an ailing Glenn Gould in a performance of the Liszt E-flat piano concerto that was received by a standing ovation from the audience AND the orchestra. Bernstein participated in the 1965 “Stars for Freedom” rally, which also included the likes of Sammy Davis Jr., Tony Bennett, Mahalia Jackson and Peter, Paul and Mary, in a concert organized by Harry Belafonte to lift the spirits of weary Civil Rights protesters as they finished marching the historic 54 highway miles from Selma to Montgomery. His numerous personal and private activities resulted in him being monitored by the McCarthy-era government for “supposed political subversion.”
Most controversially, in 1970 Bernstein and his wife hosted a private meeting to raise money and awareness in support of the “Black Panther 21,” a group of 21 Black Panther party members who had been held without trial for 9 months with bails set as high as $100,000 (which, accounting for inflation, would be well over $1 million in 2014 dollars). Though the event was lampooned by New York magazine writer Tom Wolfe as “elegant slumming,” and coined the term “radical chic” to describe what he deemed as Bernstein's superficial foray into fashionable activism, in hindsight, journalists like Alex Ross have made more sensitive reassessments of that now infamous evening.
Though Bernstein made some misinformed judgments in that particular instance, that does not discredit a career where he, repeatedly, made public his stance on discrimination and civil rights, among other issues. Thankfully, and perhaps in part due to some of Bernstein’s efforts, there is greater representation of musicians of color in the American classical music world today. Notably, Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic recently appointed as principal clarinetist Anthony McGill, who is one of the most prominent classical musicians, nevermind black classical musicians, living today.
But we still have a ways to go. There is currently at the Metropolitan Opera a laughable representation of race in their production of Aida, which takes places in Egypt, yet has one minor sung role for African-American bass Soloman Howard, and otherwise only includes black actors (and apparently one dread-locked white woman) as props in the scenery. Not to mention the blatant racism that the writer of the afore-linked article faced from a fellow concert-goer.
Or, when Black Lives Matter protesters staged a brief protest in the St. Louis Symphony’s performance of the Brahms Requiem, notably, none of their orchestra's musicians or administrators have commented on the disruption. Days following the protest, a conductor on a facebook page devoted to black composers commented that, ‘concert halls, and the great works performed in them, are sacred, providing a much-needed respite from the world outside. They are apolitical and should be indifferent to “reality.”’
Classical musicians cannot eschew what’s happening on the very streets outside of their concert halls, and then engage in “radical chic” rhetoric of whatever hashtag is trending. We cannot cry victim of being ostracized out of mainstream American culture if we are not willing to speak on the issues of the audiences we are trying to include. We cannot reference Leonard Bernstein and then neglect his legacy of activism with silent complacence.
We can speak out. We can use performance as a means of providing financial and social support to the ongoing efforts of activists. We can live Bernstein’s words, and issue our own reply to violence. 68 years ago, Bernstein urged us to do “everything we can do to fight discrimination-in any form or field” to improve race issues in classical music. We must now reverse his rhetoric, and use classical music to do “everything we can” for civil rights.
