Steve Rowland “For 25 years I have been working in radio, video and now the Web, using the music and the arts as a window to explore issues in American History, society, race relations, human creativity, spirituality, aesthetic beauty, the nature of ‘change’ and human possibility.” Steve Rowland, MBA is an oral history practitioner who...
Author: Steve Rowland
oral historian and documentary producer
Miles Davis & John Coltrane — Celebrating Black Genius
I’m thinking quite a bit about Miles and Trane these days. Both on their own terms and in light of the horrific displays of racism we are experiencing. A news commentator last night suggested that the entire election is in some ways a referendum on race. I have also been looking back at my long...
Frederick Douglass and Photography
In yesterday’s New York Times, David Brooks wrote a fascinating column called “How Artists Change the World”. Brooks starts out by thinking about the role played by musicians at the DNC, but then settles into a thoughtful piece on Frederick Douglass and photography. He mentions a book called “Picturing Frederick Douglass” and tells us that...
Bob Marley, John Coltrane & William Shakespeare
Shakespeare, Coltrane, Bob Marley What is the connection? What do artists do? As apprentices, they develop several aspects of their thinking at once. They develop skills to master the basics of their crafts. They improve these skills to move them forward. They analyze what they experience in the art form and then...
Late Coltrane
Neither Elvin Jones or McCoy Tyner were happy about leaving the great John Coltrane Quartet in early 1965. Or about being replaced by Alice Coltrane and Rashied Ali – but Trane saw something very clear in what he wanted from the group, from Alice and from Rashied – that oddly he wasn’t getting from Elvin...
Miles Davis and John Coltrane
Miles Davis and John Coltrane. both born in 1926. Very different backgrounds. Miles came from a priviledged family — father was a dentist and landowner. Coltrane came from a working class family. His dad was a tailor and had a little dry cleaning and pressing shop. His two grandfathers were Methodist ministers in North Carolina....
Seattle Second Graders learn about John Coltrane’s childhood
The JackStraw Cultural Center, under the direction of Joan Rabinowitz, asked me and colleague Joan Hsiao to teach a jazz workshop for second graders. I suggested we learn about the childhood of John Coltrane. Educator Joan Hsiao and I spent 6 class sessions with each of two second-grade classes at McGilvra Public Elementary School. We...