Performers stand onstage in Spaulding Auditorium after the Fourth Cycle, as a part of the John Coltrane Memorial World Music Series. 24 September 1978.

Performers stand onstage in Spaulding Auditorium after the Fourth Cycle, as a part of the John Coltrane Memorial World Music Series. 24 September 1978. From left to right: James "Blood" Ulmer (cut off), Ellie Taylor, Abraham Adzinyah, Roberta Kirn, Bill Cole, Warren Smith, Joseph Daley.

About the Collection

Black Creative Music carries a rich history at Dartmouth, with records of a thriving music scene in this tradition as early as 1915. Although Dartmouth is not known today as a "jazz" school, practitioners of this music at Dartmouth have pushed and expanded the boundaries of what can be considered “jazz,” with pedagogies from the likes of Don Cherry, Robert Northern (known as Brother Ahh), Hafiz Shabazz, and Bill Cole. They believed in the power of this music to elicit greater attunement to the natural world and to humanity.

The Black Creative Music at Dartmouth digital collection contains digital recordings and photographs of magnetic reel to reel tapes, cassette tapes, VHS tapes, DAT tapes, CDs, DVDs, and associated boxes, paper labels, and paper programs from concerts, workshops, and rehearsals, of jazz and Black Creative Music throughout Dartmouth’s history. The digital collection is comprised of objects from various source collections. Some materials are from the private collection of Don Glasgo, the former director of the Coast Jazz Orchestra at Dartmouth (1974–2017), and some materials are housed in the Hopkins Center records, DA-115, at Rauner Special Collections Library. The materials largely document performances and workshops by the Coast Jazz Orchestra (formerly the Barbary Coast Jazz Ensemble), Dartmouth College’s jazz orchestra led by various students (informally from 1915-1974), Don Glasgo (1974-2017), and Taylor Ho Bynum (2017-present). Notable facets of this collection lie in concert recordings of the John Coltrane Memorial World Music Series, started by Professor Cole (1974-1990) while he still taught at Amherst College in 1972. Interestingly, in a series that carried Coltrane’s name, Bill organized programming that featured Indian Classical Music alongside Cameroonian guitar and free jazz. Cole believed that John Coltrane, through his identification of his music as a form of folk music from the African diaspora, “paid tribute to that universal essence” found in other folk musics around the world, like in Asia and Africa. With this collection and associated digital exhibit, the Dartmouth Libraries hopes to bring to light this rich, yet often overlooked, history of Black Creative Music at Dartmouth.

The accomplished artists, who participated in the residencies and performances documented in this collection, include Toshiko Akiyoshi, Marshall Allen, Ray Anderson, Peter Apfelbaum, Francis Bebey, Karl Berger, Byron Bowie, Joseph Bowie, Lester Bowie, Don Cherry, Bill Cole, Ornette Coleman, Jayne Cortez, Joseph Daley, Anthony Davis, Andy Gonzalez, Jerry Gonzalez, Dexter Gordon, Fred Haas, Slide Hampton, Julius Hemphill, Dave Holland, Oliver Lake, Frank Morgan, James Newton, Arturo O’Farrill, Alanis Obomsawin, Sun Ra and his Arkestra, Michael Ray, Sam Rivers, Max Roach, T.V. Sankaranarayanan, Ray Santos, Maria Schneider, Jim Seeley, Woody Shaw, Warren Smith, Lew Tabackin, Cecil Taylor, Clark Terry, James "Blood" Ulmer, Abdul Wadud, James Williams, and more.

A Note about Naming Conventions: Why "Black Creative Music"?

A Note about Naming Conventions: Why "Black Creative Music"?

Today "jazz" music is known as one of the most revolutionary artistic movements of the twentieth century, but the naming of the genre has a complex history. Key innovators of the form have referred to it variously as "American Music" (Duke Ellington), "Black Classical Music" (Nina Simone), "autophysiopsychic music" (Yusuf Lateef) and, simply, "music" (Max Roach; Charlie Parker). Former Dartmouth Professor Bill Cole recounts how he purposely left the word "jazz" out of his first book, Miles Davis: A Musical Biography, because of what seemed to be instances of “misuse” of the word throughout its history. However, in his second book, John Coltrane, Cole adopted the term once again, to describe Coltrane’s relationship to the music as a series of codes, symbols rooted in inquiry, scrutiny, and ascertainment. In other words, Cole used the word to refer to “a people’s art form,” a series of developments of the music stemming from the African-American people which ultimately investigates the nature and spirit of the times, of humanity, and of existence itself.

The digital collection opts for the term “Black Creative Music.” The use of this term stems from traditions borne from organizations like the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, as well as the art form’s roots in Black history and culture. 

Front of a reel to reel tape. October 16, 1976. The Barbary Coast Orchestra.

Copyright

Dartmouth Libraries assigns a Creative Commons BY-NC license to the digital work and associated web site.

The copyright and related rights status of individual materials have not been evaluated. For more information please see our Guidelines for Use, Rights, and Permissions. You are free to use this material in any way that is permitted by copyright law that applies to your use. Due to the copyright status of this collection, the recordings in this collection are only available to those in the Dartmouth community with Dartmouth sign-ins. If you do not have a Dartmouth sign-in, please email Rauner Reference with specific item requests for access as an outside researcher.

Project Credits

  • “Black Creative Music at Dartmouth” came out of Daniel Lin ‘23’s Digital Library fellowship. The project was proposed and managed by Daniel Lin, with support from Laura Braunstein, Jennifer Mullins, and Elizabeth Shand.
  • Materials were selected by Daniel Lin with input and contributions from Memory Apata, Peter Carini, Don Glasgo, Taylor Ho Bynum, Kent Randell, Jay Satterfield, Elizabeth Shand, and Noah Skogerboe.
  • Materials were cataloged by Daniel Lin.
  • The time-based materials in this project were digitized by Preserve South in Atlanta, GA, and Noah Skogerboe.
  • Time-based media conservation was done by Preserve South.
  • The still images were digitized by Ryland Ianelli.
  • Metadata development was overseen by Shaun Akhtar, Emily Baumgart, and Daniel Lin.
  • The collection materials are delivered via the DEBII and Panopto platforms, developed and maintained by Paul Merchant, Jr., Joshua Shaw, and Noah Skogerboe.
  • The collection homepages were built in Drupal by Daniel Lin, Elizabeth Shand, and Joshua Shaw.
  • The associated digital exhibit was curated by Daniel Lin. Exhibit text was researched and written by Tamonie Brown, Taylor Ho Bynum, Colin Hancock, Daniel Lin, and Connor Quigley.
  • Additional thanks goes to Bill Cole, Leonee Derr, Phil Garran, Linda Glasgo, Adam O’Farrill, Zack O’Farrill, Sarah Sully, Bruce Wiedrick, and the Rauner Special Collections staff.