Elmo Hope

I wanted to talk about, as a contrast, urban policing and the development of jazz.

If we skip ahead to the Jazz Age, another artist you profile, Elmo Hope, had a very different experience.

absolutely during the development of modern jazz there was i argue a very rational desire to escape the sort of image that had attached itself to blues musicians and to lead belly right the idea was modern jazz is an intellectual endeavor which it is it is genius it is one of the great gifts america has given to the world And the effort to separate modern jazz from earlier forms of black music involved hiding any criminal records, involved never sort of pandering to that outlaw image.

I think that this was a very rational thing to do, and I think that...

And while I had known something of Tupac Shakur, I don't know a lot about his music.

And I knew nothing of Elmo Hope and Ike White.

But getting rowdy, getting reckless, playing music, getting arrested, they've gone together in this culture for a long time, right?

You know, getting rowdy, getting wild, and that sort of being part of American musical culture.

So, Besides the damaged relationships with his family and friends, he doesn't really pay a price for any of that rough and rowdy stuff that you're talking about.

Contrast him with some of the other musicians.

In my mind, Johnny and Elmo Hope sort of live in the same space because Elmo Hope is an interesting counterpoint to Johnny.

He's a young man who started training in classical music when he was very young, very serious musician, wants to get into jazz, drops out of high school to pursue a jazz career.