Wynton sounds frustrated

In his book, “Moving to Higher Ground: How Jazz Can Change Your Life”, Wynton Marsalis makes a case for jazz, a great case. He explains how jazz works. But he sounds very frustrated midway through the book. Wynton argues that African-Americans do not understand their music roots, criticizes rap and hip hop, and considers how many Americans waste time arguing over “who owns this music”. Today I listened to an interview with Wynton about his book. It was a call-in show. It sounds to me like Wynton wants to reach the African-American audience more. None of the callers were African-American. Perhaps along with Wynton’s bridge-building words, as he seeks to convince people that we all own the music, there is the rather blunt distinctive voice of Miles Davis echoing in the background, answering Wynton’s call with a response less comfortable. I wish Miles were here to debate with Wynton? I wish Miles were here to just play with Wynton. All this talk about jazz, a term Miles detested along with cool, in order to make it “approachable”, a life lesson, makes art less art and more artifact.