Annotated Reading Two

Hughes, Langston. “The Blues I’m Playing.” The Ways of White Folks. New York:

Vintage Classic Books, 1990. 99-125.

One could very easily read all of the stories included in Langston Hughes’ 1933 collection The Ways of White Folks as an exploration of the relationship between jazz and the fictional narrative. From the tragic homecoming of ailing musician Roy Williams returning from Europe only to find brutal prejudice in “Home to the dissipated Mr. Lloyd, the wealthy white socialite in “A Good Job Gone” who goes slumming in Harlem for drink and women, Hughes writes movingly and convincingly of whites and blacks negotiating their place in a changing American culture. In “The Blues I’m Playing,” Hughes explores several issues central to the understanding of jazz in American life, namely the complexities inherent in a relationship between blacks artists and white audiences, the misreading of European classical traditions as a musical standard, and the unique conflicts that exist for female artists.

The story’s principal characters are Oceola Jones, a church choir director and music teacher from Harlem, and Mrs. Dora Ellsworth, an incredibly wealthy white woman whose only hobby seems to be acting as a generous benefactor to needy artistic protégées. Despite her passion for “beauty,” Mrs. Ellsworth had never acted as a patron for a black artist before, but Oceola’s piano playing—she had performed Rachmaninoff, Liszt, and “The St. Louis Blues” at their first meeting—had been so striking that the old woman took an immediate interest in her life. Very quickly, Mrs. Ellsworth takes inventory of Oceola’s whole life—from where works, where she lives, and with whom she associates—and begins to institute changes, all in the name of art’s sake. Things become even more conflicted when Pete, a prospective suitor of Oceola, makes his romantic intentions known.

One of the themes that readers may find most interesting is the exploring the underlying significance behind the obvious differences between the two women’s views on music. For Oceola, music demands “movement and expression, dancing and living to go with it” (114). In Harlem, she visits house parties and, later, in Paris she prefers West Indian ball rooms and Bricktop’s nightclub; she loves spirituals and blues and jazz. Mrs. Ellsworth, however, prefers symphonies and string quartets, Schubert and Beethoven; she “Still believed in the art of the old school, portraits that really looked liked people, poems about nature, music that had soul in it, not syncopation” (110). Here then we see an illustration of one of the first great truths concerning jazz: African-Americans are creating their own virtuosic compositions independent of the Western classical authority. One can examine this further be exploring notions of modernism vs. primitivism, experimentalism vs. traditionalism, popular music vs. high art, and seeking to identify the criteria that establish an artistic standard. Other areas worthy of discussion may include an examination of Mrs. Ellsworth’s aesthetic philosophy as opposed to Oceola’s more practical considerations, the romantic complications involved in the artist’s life (as seen with the conflict involving Pete), and finally the role of emotion and personal expression play in the performance of music.