The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
A story of Cold War warriors and legends of hot jazz
THE JAZZ AMBASSADORS:
Friday, BBC Four
CUNK ON BRITAIN:
Tuesday, BBC Two
In 1956, during the Cold War stalemate, Eisenhower’s government figured that their best chance of beating the Soviets would be to establish a positive consensus about America around the globe.
Via the newly established United States Information Agency, they set about selling the benefits of a prosperous capitalist society, while playing down inconvenient truths such as racial segregation in the south.
This was an era when even a widely beloved African-American star such as Louis Armstrong couldn’t perform in his home town of New Orleans, as racially integrated concerts were verboten and his band included two white musicians.
Nevertheless, the government decided to enlist the nation’s greatest jazz musicians as cultural envoys tasked
with putting an upbeat spin on the black experience by playing diplomatic concerts in the newly liberated nations of Asia and Africa. It was thought that a friendly dose of hot jazz would encourage them to embrace American ideals and abandon any pesky notions of turning Communist.
This was propaganda versus propaganda: during the Cold War, the Soviets repeatedly highlighted the injustice of racial segregation as a prime example of America’s hypocrisy and moral repugnancy. Without acknowledging their guilt outright, the American government knew their enemy had a point.
The story of how Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman and Dave Brubeck tried to rescue the world from the brink of Armageddon was told in the enlightening feature-length documentary The Jazz Ambassadors.
This collision of entertainment and foreign policy was instigated by AfricanAmerican congressman Adam Clayton Powell, an unsung hero who convinced Eisenhower that America’s global standing would be radically improved if they tackled racism head on.
Naturally, the musicians he enlisted, while happy to spread positive American vibes, weren’t prepared to ignore the rancid reality of Jim Crow. “I wasn’t going over there to apologise for America’s racist policies,” declared the politically active Dizzy Gillespie.
Armstrong renounced his role as an Uncle Sam ambassador after the Little Rock crisis, when nine black students were prevented from entering a racially segregated school. “The government can go to Hell!” he roared in the press. Duke Ellington later wrote an article proclaiming that racism in America meant it was losing the Cold War. This wasn’t the sort of PR Eisenhower expected when he greenlit the programme. However, Armstrong did manage to stop the Congolese civil war for 24 hours when he arrived to play a concert. You couldn’t ask for a more potent symbol of the miraculous power of music than that.
When Benny Goodman and his mixedrace band eventually toured Russia in 1961, they conducted illicit private jams with local musicians under the noses of an oblivious KGB. Jazz 1 – The Man 0. This fascinating saga of weaponised music expressing the complex spirit of America was elegantly told through talking heads and archive footage.
Funny in small doses as part of Charlie Brooker’s Screenwipe, gormless roving reporter Philomena Cunk wears out her one-dimensional welcome over the space of half an hour.
The spoof documentary series Cunk on Britain occasionally came up with some good gags (and some absolute clunkers) but they were overshadowed by the repetitive strain of a limited comic voice. Malapropisms and faux-dim misunderstandings only work within a more varied context.
Diane Morgan, who plays Cunk, is an inherently funny performer; her delivery and facial expressions are wonderful. She deserves better.