A Short Diversion

I'm writing this from the Deutsche Sommer Schule Atlantic, in Kingston RI. We've been visited and spent time with two German rappers from Berlin, Pyrana and Chefket. I'm grateful for the experience, and they love rap, but it felt familiar, in a not good way, when they talked about the beginnings of rap in the South Bronx and, it felt to me, glossed over the pain and crime and suffering there. And out of all that came the media making money off the music. There's a straight line from the Blues to Rap, I think, and the suffering that created them is forgotten in the rush of the powerful to make money.