Hale Woodruff’s “Afro Emblems” and Ashanti Gold Weights

Afro Emblems by Hale Woodruff_1950_oil on linen_18 X 22 inches

Hale Aspacio Woodruff (Cairo, Illinois, USA, 1900-1980) first grew interested in African art in the 1920s, when an art dealer gave him a German book on the subject. He couldn’t read the text but appreciated studying the pictures; on a trip to Europe some years later he bought African sculpture for his own personal inspiration. For “Afro Emblems”, Woodruff divided his canvas into rough rectangles, filling each shape with an emblem inspired by Ashanti or Akan gold weights. [ See paragraph below. ]  Woodruff’s bold black outlines and dashes of colour stand out from the blue background, creating an abstract African-influenced pattern.

Ashanti gold-dust weights made of brass_19th century

Ashanti or Akan Gold Weights

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Natural gold resources in the dense forests of southern Ghana brought wealth and influence to the Ashanti (Asante) people. Wealth increased by transporting gold to North Africa via trade routes across the Sahara Desert. In the 15th and 16th centuries this gold attracted other traders, from the great Songhay Empire (in today’s Republic of Mali), from the Hausa cities of northern Nigeria and from Europe. European interest in the region, initially in gold and then in enslaved Africans, brought about great changes, not least the creation of the British Gold Coast Colony in the 19^th century. (In 1959, this “Colony” de-Colonized, becoming the modern West-African nation of Ghana.)

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Asante State had grown out of a group of smaller states to become a centralized hierarchical kingdom. By the early 1700s the Asante State’s increased power meant it was able to displace the former dominant state, Denkyira, which had, through conquest, controlled major trade routes to the Atlantic coast as well as some of the richest gold mines. Once the Asante became dominant in this region, both gold and slaves passed through its state capital, Kumasi.

Gold was central to Asante art and belief. Gold entered the Asante court via tribute or war and was fashioned into jewellery and ceremonial objects there by artisans from conquered territories. The court’s power was further demonstrated through its regulation of the regional gold trade. Everyone involved in trade and commerce owned, or had access to, a set of weights and scales. The weights, produced in brass, bronze or copper (usually by the ‘lost wax’ process), corresponded to a standardized weight system derived from North African / Islamic, Dutch and Portuguese precedents. Since each weight had a known measurement, merchants too employed them for secure, fair-trade arrangements with one another. Other gold-trade equipment included shovels for scooping up gold dust, spoons for lifting gold dust from the shovel and putting it on the scales and boxes for storing gold dust.

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Wilson Pickett: Engine Number 9

Wilson Pickett (1941-2006) was born in Alabama into a family of many kids, and a father who was working up in Detroit, Michigan. In an interview in later years Pickett described his mother during his childhood: “She was the baddest woman – in my book. I get scared of her even now. She used to hit me with anything, skillets, stove wood… One time I ran away and cried for a week. Stayed in the woods, me and my little dog.” When he was fourteen he headed up to Detroit and lived with his father. It was then that he seriously began to sing in church ensembles that toured around; one of them, The Violinaires, helped him to really hone his singing skills. Gospel singers were beginning to “cross over” into the secular music market and this transition led the way to what would come to be known as Soul music. The Falcons, with Eddie Floyd, were at the forefront of this evolution, and Pickett joined the group at the age of 18 in 1959. His first songwriting began, with “I Found a Love”. “If You Need Me” and “It’s Too Late” would follow – but the latter two he recorded solo – commencing a career under his own name.  James Brown is undisputably Soul’s Number 1 Man, but if you listen to Pickett and Brown, Pickett’s voice is undeniably more interesting:  complex; capable of bird-like shrieks and astonishing wails;  hoarse from crying? shouting? at Love gone wrong or Love going oh so good.   James Brown had the crazy looks and stage personality, but Pickett’s voice is richer, takes more chances, and makes the weirdest deep-from-within sounds.

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Listen to Wilson Pickett in this 1970 recording of Leon Gamble and Kenny Huff’s “Engine Number 9”. The instrumental sound is a hybrid of Blues and Rock.  And Pickett’s voice is all Soul:

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“Engine, Engine number 9”

(words and music by Leon Gamble and Kenny Huff / Owws and Uhs by The Wicked Pickett!)

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Engine, engine, number 9:
Can you get me back on time?
Move on, move on down the track,
Keep that steam comin´ out your stack.
Huh! Keep on movin´,
Keep on movin´, keep on movin´…
Oww! Uh!
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Engine, engine, number 9:
Keep on movin´ down the line.
Seems like I been gone for days,
I can´t wait to see my baby´s face.
Look-a-here:  Been so long since I held her,
Been so long since I held her…
Oww!
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Been so long since I held her,
Been so long since I kissed her…
Owwww!

Engine, engine, number 9:
Move on, move on down the line.
Seems like I been gone for days,
I can´t wait to see my baby´s face.
Move on, move on, woaaah, move on!
Owwwww! Gotta git there…
[ Oh, this is soundin’ alright…

I think I’m gonna hold it a little bit longer,

I’m gonna let the boys “cook” this a little bit… ]

Etcetera…

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Johnny Hartman: the great yet little known song stylist

Johnny Hartman (born John Maurice Hartman), 1923-1983, was from Louisiana but grew up in Chicago. Imagine the best qualities of Frank Sinatra’s voice from the 1940s and 1950s – tender and thoughtful, or manly with confidence – and you’ll have an idea of Hartman’s voice.  Now: lower that voice to a baritone-bass – and you’ve got Hartman.  Like Sinatra, he had a homely face and a great voice – but Hartman’s interpretive skills with a ballad were more sensitive – were finer – than Sinatra’s.

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Contemporary singer Gregory Generet has written of Hartman: “ [He] was a master of emotional expression, putting everything he had into every word he sang. His rich, masculine baritone voice never wavered in its sincerity. The only vocalist ever to record with John Coltrane, he was mostly known only to true jazz lovers during his glorious career.” Generet’s correct when he writes “glorious”; he’s also correct when he writes “mostly known only to true jazz lovers.” Hartman’s performances on record are “glorious” and he was always too little known by the general public, and is by now all but eclipsed in the Internet-era that is the 21^st century, where History is 10 years ago.

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Cole Porter (1891-1964)

“Down in the Depths on the 90^th floor” (1936)

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Manhattan, I’m up a tree,
The one I’ve most adored
Is bored
With me.
Manhattan, I’m awfully nice,
Nice people dine with me,
And sometimes twice.
Yet the only one in the world I’m mad about
Talks of somebody else

– And walks out.
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With a million neon rainbows burning below me
And a million noisy taxis raising a roar,
Here I stand above the town
Drinking champagne with a frown,
Down in the depths on the ninetieth floor.

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And the crowds in all the nightclubs punish the parquet
And the couples at the bar clamour for more.
I’m deserted and depressed
In my regal eagle’s nest,
Down in the depths on the ninetieth floor.

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When the only one you want wants another,
What’s the good of swank and cash in the bank galore?
Why, my janitor and his wife,
They have a perfectly good love life;
And here am I,
Facing tomorrow,
Alone in my sorrow

– Down in the depths on the ninetieth floor!

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Listen to this 1955 recording of Johnny Hartman singing “Down in the Depths (on the 90^th floor)”:

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