Kwame Copeland

The Afro-blues Tradition: Glorious Child of the Africans Kwame Copeland

The Blues was born from praise songs, poetry, metaphorical tales, and folk traditions of the Africans, as they became Americana's. The Afro-Blues sprouted up wherever the African landed in this hemisphere. The tradition mixed with existing cultures but retained its uniqueness. Part of its uniqueness was its use of percussive tones and its use of mythological references in its idiom and artistic rituals. As a historical tradition, it was so receptive and creative, that its classical roots evolved into the 21st Century. At this time of moral and spiritual crises, I fall back on my inheritance, where meditative prose and poetry, are used to reflect the moment from emotive reasoning. John Coltrane and Mongo Santamaria both claimed the song Afro-Blue. Yet! This song reflects where the tradition had traveled, since Coltrane was an African American and Santamaria was an African Cuban. This great stream of maternal traditions has given much to the world, and in these times of great transition; its glorious well should be dipped in more often. If just to argument this present debate-What is Human!