ABSTRACT
This chapter offers a detailed critique of aspects of the scholarly work of trombonist, composer, and academic George E. Lewis, focusing particularly on his problematic concepts of “Afrological” and “Eurological” musicality, and on his employment of stereotypes of white European jazz and improvised music in his analysis of trumpeter and composer Lester Bowie's transnational collaborative piece “Gittin' To Know Y'all.” In its recourse to a rhetoric of African American “authenticity” and exceptionalism, Lewis's own work has been less than successful in avoiding the essentialist implications inherent in his concepts, and the numerous arguments and counter-examples in this chapter – encompassing race, class, socioeconomic status, social history, artistic influence, cultural nationalism, humour, musical form and style, and improvisational and compositional practices – serve to repudiate the narrowness of Lewis's analytical approach. The chapter also examines and clarifies the wide range of music-making approaches evident in several European contemporary jazz and improvised music scenes, which Lewis's narrow conceptual categories have served both to obfuscate and undervalue. The chapter concludes with a call for a considerably more inclusive, nuanced, and rigorous approach to the discursive analysis and evaluation of contemporary jazz and improvised music, and for the recalibration of a series of crucial debates within the field of Jazz Studies.
