Miles Davis hat einmal gesagt „Die weißen Kritiker meiner Musik beachte ich nicht. Es ist, als wollten Europäer chinesische Musik kritisieren. Sie haben davon keine Ahnung. Ich habe gelebt, was ich spiele“. Ich verehre den Mann wie nur wenig andere Jazz-Musiker. Mit der gleichen Achtung lese ich auch das folgende Gedicht aus dem Jahr 1961 von Langston Hughes, einem – natürlich – afroamerikanischen Dichter und Schriftsteller aus Harlem.

Trumpet Player

The Negro
With the trumpet at his lips
Has dark moons of weariness
Beneath his eyes where the smoldering memory of slave ships
Blazed to the crack of whips about thighs

The negro
with the trumpet at his lips
has a head of vibrant hair
tamed down,
patent-leathered now  until it gleams
like jet were jet a crown the music

from the trumpet at his lips
is honey mixed with liquid fire
the rhythm from the trumpet at his lips
is ecstasy  distilled from old desire
Desire that is longing for the moon
where the moonlight’s but a spotlight in his eyes,
desire that is longing for the sea
where the sea’s a bar-glass sucker size

The Negro
with the trumpet at his lips
whose jacket
Has a fine one-button roll, does not know
upon what riff the music slips
It’s hypodermic needle to his soul
but softly as the tune comes from his throat
trouble  mellows to a golden note

(Langston Hughes)