R.I.P. Hip-Hop 1979-2007

Dearly Beloved,
We are gathered here today to pay our final respects to Hip-Hop Music.

Rap has always been around in African-American culture and in all musical genres. Hip-Hop was created by the street and club DJ's of New York. It was fun, infectious party music that quickly gained a following in the rest of the country thanks to the monster Sugarhill Gang hit 'Rapper's Delight'.

The Sugarhill Gang were quickly followed to hit status by other New York rap pioneers such as Kurtis Blow, Melle Mel, Afrika Bambaataa, Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, Big Daddy Kane and Kool Moe Dee. Hip-Hop began to address social issues in the early 80's as it struggled to gain more mainstream acceptance and airplay and break the pejorative label of radio programmers and music critics that it was 'just a fad'.

The pioneers were eclipsed by emerging talents such as LL Cool J and Run DMC as it continued to evolve and gain new fans. Hip-Hop began to grow from its New York birthplace and expand to Houston, LA, Atlanta, Miami and the rst of the country. Showmanship was added by MC Hammer as the ladies began to step up and rock the mics. The battle of the Roxanne's gave way to Salt and Pepa, Queen Latifah, MC Lyte, Monie Love and Queen Pen as the music began to appeal to groups outside of the African-American community.

The West Coast began to be heard with NWA, Ice Cube and Doctor Dre. Public Enemy not only gave us serious beats but biting social commentary infused with Black pride as they dropped science on us along with KRS One. Digital Underground and Will Smith (AKA the Fresh Prince) gave us humor. De La Soul and others continued to push the creative boundaries of Hip-Hop as West Coast based rappers Ice-T, Tupac Shakur and Snoop Dog became household names.

In ten years Hip-Hop achieved its Holy Grail of mainstream acceptance. Videos were being played on MTV and BET. Arsenio Hall opened the door for mainstream television show appearances by featuring rappers on his Emmy award winning late night talk show. Hip-Hop artists were soon making guest appearances on network TV shows or having shows and movie scripts written for them. Hip-Hop got its own category in the Grammys in the late 80's in addition to its own media magazines, TV shows, formatted radio stations, nationally televised awards shows and clothing lines.

Then the Hip-Hop up-from-the-hood American Dream turned nightmarish. The East Coast-West Coast Hip-Hop War with its focal point being the simmering hostility between Tupac Shakur and Notorious B.I.G. It boils over into violence that results in the senseless shooting deaths of both men. Rappers going to and spending more time in jail than they did on concert tours and bragging about it. The positivity of the female pioneer rappers being overshadowed by the antics and raunchiness of Foxy Brown and Lil' Kim just as Eve and Missy Elliott emerged as their creative heirs.

The large record companies bought out the Def Jam's and Sugarhill Records of the world as they sought to shoehorn their way into the music form they dissed earlier in the decade. Unfortunately the quality of Hip-Hop declined as the misogony, homophobia, glorification of criminal life and disrespect of women escalated under corporate ownership.

The late C. Delores Tucker tried to warn rappers in the mid-80's that they were treading on dangerous ground in terms of the content and direction of Hip-Hop. They dismissed her and others as 'haters' and 'sellouts' as they counted their cash and penned their expletive-drenched rhymes glorifying excessive materialism and hypermasculine sexuality liberally sprinkled with unfettered use of the n-word and b-word. The floods of megacash from record breaking sales numbers obscured what Hip-Hop started out to be and warped its base values.

Sadly, Hip-Hop lost its way and became all about the money instead of kicking positive lyrics and good times. Music executives with no emotional, historical and cultural investment in Hip-Hop continued to sign and promote more whacked rappers that deluged the airwaves with more negative rhymes and video imagery.

As Hip-Hop becomes less popular with African-American teens it is bought and listened to in increasing numbers by white teenagers. It has the effect of giving them an even more skewed impression of African-American life and culture than they already possess. Rappers morph into neo-minstrels and live action cartoon characters instead of eloquent street poets.

We increasingly lament the shift in some rap artists attitudes toward women from Sir Mix-A-Lot's ode to Black womanhood to increasingly negative ones. We also deplored the hypocrisy of dissing sistahs while using those same sistahs to pose half naked while shooting soft pornesque videos to promote their CD releases. The outbreaks of violence at Hip-Hop concerts and Hip-Hop awards shows disgusts more and more people.

Today, Hip-Hop is a shadow of its former self with sales down 21% in one year. While you have some artists that recognize what they need to do to resuscitate and restore Hip-Hop to its former glory, others such as 50 Cent refuse to see the light and tragically don't care as long as they 'get paid.'

Farewell, Hip-Hop. I've long since gone back to the music form that some of you boasted was dead in the early 90's. R&B and Soul still lives and is better than ever.

Ashes to ashes, mixers and turntables and dust to dust, we now commit our old friend Hip-Hop to the ground as we pour Cristal on your remains for all the dead homies.

It was an exhilarating ride while it lasted. May Hip-Hop rest in peace.

Thai Spice Girls Preach Transsexual Power

20th February 2007 17:04
Amy Bourke
From Pink News.co.uk




A girl band of transsexuals who model themselves on the Spice Girls are hoping to change social attitudes and achieve pop chart success in Thailand.

Venus Flytrap's five members were all born males and later underwent gender reassignment surgery.

Like the famous British group, they have onstage personas, namely Cool Venus, Naughty Venus, Posh Venus, Sweet Venus and Hot Venus.

They have achieved the dream of many a struggling artist and been snapped up by Sony BMG Music Entertainment, one of the world's biggest recording companies.

However, this is a purely commercial venture by a company looking to exploit a niche market in Thailand.

Sony auditioned 100 transsexual performers before selecting the final five, who later underwent a year of singing, dancing and acting lessons.

The band hope that their first single, 'Cause I'm Your Lady, will help to promote tolerance and inclusion of transsexuals in Thailand.

Their first album, Visa for Love, was released in December.

It has not had any chart success yet, but has earned the girls a lucrative concert deal, and has enjoyed repeat play on Bangkok's SkyTrain rail network

Sony's director for artists and repertoire Amonrat Homhoul told AFP: "It was not easy.

"Recording was time-consuming because the group members sing as women, but cannot keep their voices at a high pitch for more than a few hours.

"The response has been good, even if their songs aren't in the charts yet."

Thailand is believed to have the largest transsexual population in the world.

Experts estimate at least 10,000 trans people live in Thailand, though some put the figure at 10 times that.

Even the conservative number would mean that per capita, Thailand has many more transsexuals than most developed countries.

Although no-one is sure why Thailand attracts so many, part of the reason may be that medical treatments for sex change operations are extremely cheap.

They cost roughly 150,000 baht, (£2,000).

Some clinics in Pattaya will perform the surgery for as little as £500.

Thai people are often more tolerant of trangender people than other countries.

Transsexuals are known as "kathoey," and have special roles to play in village festivals, usually involving decorations or performances.
Transgender people are also often represented in the media and in public Thai life, but they can still draw negative attention.

More often than not their only option of work is dancing as exotic entertainers in cabaret revues.

Laws in Thailand are also heavily stacked against transgender people. They are not covered by rape laws, and are not allowed to marry.

The band's dream is that the music's appeal will extend to beyond the cabaret clubs tucked away in seedy red-light districts.

"I see being in Venus Flytrap as another chance for me, a ladyboy, to work in another field of entertainment other than cabarets and beauty pageants," Dhanade Ruangroongroj, or Cool Venus told AFP.

Krerkkong, who is studying for a masters in political science, said she hopes her experience with the band will help earn recognition for other transsexuals.

Ploypaitoon Moukprakaaiphed, or Hot Venus, lets us know why transsexuals do it better.

She told AFP she had the edge because, "I can sing both as a woman, and a man."


TransGriot Note: There's a glaring inaccuracy in this report. One of the paragraphs states that Thailand is believed to have the largest transgender population in the world. That's doubtful. The US alone has 300 million peeps and with a conservative estimate of one in 500 births being transgender that translates to roughly 2 million transpeeps in the US.

Why Y'all Hatin' On Beyonce?

I used to joke back when Destiny's Child was the hottest group going that they were the Supremes 2K version. Not long after that Beyonce released her solo album followed by Kelly Rowland's and Michelle Williams' solo releases.

I've noticed over the last year or so the increasing negativity from the Net and other quarters being directed at my Houston homegirl. I've heard people take perverse glee in the fact that Jennifer Hudson emerged as the breakout star of Dreamgirls and I'm a big Jennifer Hudson fan. I refuse to watch American Idol because she was screwed that year.

I'll be honest. If the technology were available for me to look like ANY woman past, present or future on the planet, she'd be in my top five. (hmm, there's an idea for a post. I'll get back to y'all on that later)

I had the pleasure of meeting Beyonce and her parents on an LAX flight I worked several years ago. I've had other peeps who spend extensive time around her report that she's a sweet kid. (I observed the same thing myself).

Frankly, I think a lot of the industrial sized Hateraid that's directed at Beyonce Giselle Knowles stems from jealousy. She's living what seems like a fairy-tale life. She's breathtakingly beautiful but down to earth. She's won Grammys. She sings the national anthem at the 2004 Super Bowl played in our hometown. She has a wealthy boyfriend in Jay-Z. She just became the first non-athlete, non-model and the second African-American woman to do the coveted Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue cover solo. If I'd come up with her story as the basis for a fiction novel people would roll their eyes and claim it's unrealistic.

It's real folks. Check out the videos and the Billboard Top 100 lists.

You have to admire someone whose father believed in his daughter's dream so much he quit his job at IBM to manage her career. Her mom Tina's shop is where during the 90's the power sisters in H-town got their hair done. The Knowleses were successful peeps and entrepreneurs before Beyonce blew up in the music biz. They have given money to their home church in Houston. The House of Dereon fashion design house they just started will drive that point home once again.

It's time for some of y'all to stop hatin' on the Knowles family, start appreciating and start taking notes.

Tres Chic

The dictionary definition of chic reads: smart elegance and sophistication especially of dress or manner. That's a dead-on target description of one of my favorite bands of the 70's.

Chic's music like most of the stuff I grew up listening to has proven to be timeless and ground breaking as well. I fell in love with their amalgamation of deep bass guitars, the lush strings courtesy of the Chic Strings (Cheryl Hong, Karen Milne and Marianne Carroll) and funky rhythms. Sometimes it was at a disco pace. Other times it was pure 70's funk with some cool soulful ballads and instrumentals thrown in just for good measure.

While Dad introduced me to Parliament-Funkadelic, I discovered Chic on my own. I opened the package of promo albums that got mailed to the house one day back in 1977 from Atlantic Records and noticed Chic's debut album. It was the self titled one that contained what would become their first hits 'Dance Dance Dance' (Yowsah Yowsah Yowsah) and 'Everybody Dance'.

Dad sometimes used me to screen albums because I tend to be analytical about the way I listen to music. The lyrics are extremely important for me. I'm into great guitar players, sax players who can blow and great producers. I got spoiled listening to peeps produced by Holland Dozier Holland, Gamble and Huff, Maurice White, Quincy Jones, et cetera. In Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards they already had the quality producers and musicians.

Norma Jean Wright started out as Chic's front singer. They decided after a year of touring to support the first album they needed another female singer to expand what they could do in the live show and musically. Norma Jean suggested her friend Luci Martin. When Norma Jean Wright was forced to leave the band because of her contractual solo career obligations. Alfa Anderson, who sang backup on the second album C'est Chic was moved up to replace her in 1978. Norma Jean did get to sing some vocals on the monster Sister Sledge 1979 We Are Family LP.

C'est Chic got released in late 1978 with 'Le Freak' as the lead single and sold six million copies. Risque was released the next year. It contained a a song that would help propel a new music genre to prominence. That song was 'Good Times' and it became the basis for the Sugarhill Gang's breakthrough hit 'Rapper's Delight' and a host of other rap records that sampled it throughout the 80's. The basslines were sampled by rock, rap and R&B producers as well.

C'est Chic was supposed to contain the song 'He's The Greatest Dancer'. While producing Sister Sledge's album they decided that this song was a better fit for them and swapped it with another song. The song they exchanged it for that ended up on the Risque album was 'I Want Your Love'. They also featured an up and coming commercial jingle and session singer by the name of Luther Vandross on several of their albums. Luther hit it big singing lead vocals on Change's 1979 album featuring the hit singles 'The Glow Of Love' and 'Searching' and set the stage for his debut Never Too Much LP in 1981.

Nile and 'Nard also produced Diana Ross' hit singles 'Upside Down' and 'I'm Coming Out' for her 1980 Diana LP.

They struggled to get airplay in the early 80's and disbanded. They did produce Madonna's 1984 breakthrough album Like A Virgin album and scored some successes producing other artists.

After a 1992 party in which Nile and 'Nard played old Chic tunes along with Paul Shaffer and Anton Fig to thunderous applause they organized a reunion of the band and produced CHIC-ism. It not only charted but received critical acclaim and airplay all over the world.

In 2005 they became three category inductees in the Dance Music Hall of Fame. They have received nominations for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2003, 2006 and 2007 but have yet to be elected.

Here's hoping that someday they'll be enshrined there as well.

The Man and the Story of The Black National Anthem

On February 12, 1900, “Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing,” also known as the Negro National Anthem and the Negro National Hymn was sung publicly for the first time at the Stanton School, a Jacksonville, FL school for African-Americans.

It was written by James Weldon Johnson with music composed by his brother J. Rosamond Johnson. The song was written for a celebration of Abraham Lincoln's birthday at the school.

He and his brother had forgotten it, but the students who heard it that day didn't. They taught it to their children and other children throughout the South. The song became so popular that the NAACP offically adopted it as the Negro National Anthem in 1920.


Lift every voice and sing
Till earth and heaven ring,
Ring with the harmonies of Liberty;
Let our rejoicing rise
High as the listening skies,
Let it resound loud as the rolling sea.
Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us,
Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought us,
Facing the rising sun of our new day begun
Let us march on till victory is won.

Stony the road we trod,
Bitter the chastening rod,
Felt in the days when hope unborn had died;
Yet with a steady beat,
Have not our weary feet
Come to the place for which our fathers sighed?
We have come over a way that with tears have been watered,
We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered,
Out from the gloomy past,
Till now we stand at last
Where the white gleam of our bright star is cast.

God of our weary years,
God of our silent tears,
Thou who has brought us thus far on the way;
Thou who has by Thy might
Led us into the light,
Keep us forever in the path, we pray.
Lest our feet stray from the places, Our God, where we met Thee;
Lest, our hearts drunk with the wine of the world, we forget Thee;
Shadowed beneath Thy hand,
May we forever stand.
True to our GOD,
True to our native land


The man who wrote it, James Weldon Johnson led quite an interesting life. Attorney, teacher, poet, diplomat, novelist, Broadway lyricist and civil-rights leader.

He was born in Jacksonville, FL in 1871 during the heady optimism of the Reconstruction period. His mother was a schoolteacher at the Stanton School, his father a head waiter at one of Jacksonville's numerous resort hotels and young James and his brother grew up with middle class backgrounds. After completing the eighth grade he was sent to Atlanta, GA to attend the college prep school and university divisions for Atlanta University since there were no high school at the time in Fhis hometown for African-Americans. After graduating from Atlanta University in 1894 he returned home and became the first African-American attorney in Florida since Reconstruction.

He soon tired of practicing law and became principal of his alma mater the Stanton School. Thanks to the influence of Booker T. Washington in 1906 he was appointed by President Theodore Roosevelt as consul to Puerto Cabello, Venezuela. In 1909 he moved to a more significant consular posting in Corinto, Nicaragua but left the consular service in 1913 after the election of Woodrow Wilson to the presidency.

He joined the NAACP in 1917 and as a field secretary established local chapters througout the South and increased overall membership from 10,000 to 44,000 by the end of 1918. In 1920 he became the first African-Ameerican secretary (CEO) of the multi-racial NAACP and held that post until 1931.

He was also continuing his literary efforts and was more renowned as an writer than a civil-rights warrior. During this time period he'd moved to New York, gotten married and played an active role in the Harlem Renaissance. He served as a mentor to writers Langston Hughes and Claude McKay and urged others to draw upon everyday African-American life as inspiration for their creative works.

He was deeply commmited to exposing the brutality and injustice heaped upon African-Americans and eliminating it. He pushed hard to get the Dyer Anti-Lynching bill passed that would have made lynching a federal crime. He not only worked successfully to get the NAACP on a firm financial footing but was responsible for the NAACP becoming a clearinghouse for civil-rights court cases. He worked with noted attorneys of that time in litigating a series of cases that attacked the legal pillars propping up segregation and worked closely with W.E.B. DuBois and Walter White (the man who succeeded him) to coordinate strategy.

He became a professor at Fisk University in 1931 and spent the remainder of his life teaching creative writing, American and African-American literature and writing. He was killed in an automobile accident near Wiscasset, Maine in 1938.

Johnson acknowledged in 1926 that he didn't originally set out to write a unifying national anthem when he penned the words to 'Lift Ev'ry Voice' and admitted that he'd let the song pass from his mind. But as songs sometimes do they take on a life and meaning of their own.

Thank you James Weldon Johnson, for all that you've done to uplift our people.

Vanessa L. Williams

Another installment in my ongoing series of articles on transgender and non-trans women who have qualities that I admire.

I remember that September 1983 morning that I woke up, opened up the Chronicle and read the story about Vanessa Lynn Willams becoming the first African-American to win the Miss America crown.

It along with the Miss Black America, Miss USA and Miss Universe pageants were my favorites to watch back in the day. I got more than a little fed up about the gorgeous sistahs who had graced the Miss USA, Miss America and Miss Universe pageant stages over the years who sometimes didn't even make it to the twelve semifinalist phase of the pageant. Janelle Commissiong of Trinidad and Tobago broke through in 1977 to becme the first woman of African descent to win Miss Universe, so I did hold out hope that a sistah would eventually do the same here in the States.

That year she and Suzette Charles made it to the five finalists but for some reason I turned the TV off and went to bed mumbling to myself, "They're gonna end up third and fourth runners-up." I was happy to see the picture of Vanessa eating breakfast in bed while I ate a Texas-sized portion of crow. (For the record, the first runner-up was Suzette Charles)

She goes from that lofty height of being Miss America 1984 to tragically having her crown stripped before her historic reign was about to end. After holding that press conference resigning the crown, many people wrote her off.

In 1988 I was driving home from work and was jamming to a brand new song being played on Majic 102 called 'The Right Stuff'. When the DJ annnounced that it was Vanessa Williams I was blown away.

Vanessa still has it going on. She oozes style and class. She's had the right stuff for years. She's done hit movies, Broadway, television and recorded hit albums. She's nominated for numerous awards, won a Grammy and NAACP Image Awards. Vanessa turned a moment that would have broken some people into a triumphant career that makes her arguably the most successful Miss America ever. I still laugh when I read the story about the prophetic birth announcement her parents issued when she was born March 18, 1963 that stated 'Here She Is, Miss America.'

As you can tell, I'm proud of her and I'm still a fan. She's on my short list of artists who if they release a CD I don't insist on listening to it before I buy it. I just simply snap it up and take it home. I have the same reaction to any movie or television show that she's involved in. I'd heard about 'Ugly Betty', but once I found out she was part of the show's cast it's Must See TV for moi.

One of the lessons I take from her life is never give up on your dreams no matter what obstacles are placed in your path. Keep fighting for them and they will happen.

P-Funk Forever

One of the things that I enjoyed about my dad's radio job in addition to the comp concert tickets was getting those promo albums. Thanks to those promo albums I was musically two months ahead of my peer group by the time they finally released it for sale to the general public.

I remember the day I got introduced to Parliament-Funkadelic and the whole P-Funk universe. I was in eighth grade at the time. Dad came home from work, tossed Parliament's Mothership Connection album in my room and said, "You need to listen to these guys."

I did and I've been a Funkateer ever since. A documentary was done that I gleefully watched on PBS late one night called Parliament-Funkadelic - One Nation Under A Groove. I even tested out to Doctor of Funkology level on the P-Funk quiz. If you want to take it, it's on the PBS Independent Lens website.

Besides learning about the various players in the P-Funk universe such as Starchild, Sir Nose D'voidoffunk and Dr. Funkenstein, I got to spend my high school years grooving to Bootsy's Rubber Band and the other components of the Funk Mob. The first concert I was allowed to attend without parental supervision was a Funkadelic one. I even learned how to spell psychoalphadiscobetabioaquadoloop correctly. My high school class jokingly calls 'Flash Light' our unofficial class song.

There are some fond memories of attending a Funkadelic concert that had a skull prop that smoked a giant joint. The lavish P-Funk Earth Tours that rivaled the ones that rock bands were doing. Pedro Bell's provocative cover art and the cartoons inside the liner notes and covers detailing the battles between Sir Nose and Starchild.

And the music. Funky, sometimes political and in many cases ahead of its time.
Flash Light is the most sampled song by rap artists. Dr. Dre used the music from 'Mothership Connection' for his song 'Let Me Ride'.

I couldn't even begin to list some of my favorite Parliament-Funkadelic songs...aaah why not? Flash Light, Knee Deep, Aqua Boogie, Tear the Roof of the Sucker, Up For the Down Stroke, One Nation Under A Groove, (not just) Knee Deep, Atomic Dog, Bullet Proof, Do Fries Go With That Shake...(and the list goes on)

The P-Funk Empire may be gone, and you have a few pretenders out there faking the funk, but George Clinton's legendary status as a music innovator and his music will be around forever.

To take the P-Funk quiz

Thank You, James Brown - For Your Genius, For Your Music and For Being Black and Proud

Wednesday, December 27, 2006
By: Tonyaa Weathersbee, BlackAmericaWeb.com

James Brown lived his life -- and departed it -- in a way that could have come straight out of a Toni Morrison novel.

The Godfather of Soul was born in a one-room shack in 1933 in Barnwell, S.C., during a time when if a black man was lucky enough to escape the racist terrorism that ruled those days, he invariably was victimized by its Jim Crow fallout. He was abandoned by his parents when he was four. Barred from school for having raggedy clothes. Sent to reform school as a teenager for breaking into cars.

But Brown was able to put all that angst and drama through one of the ultimate processors for positivism -- music. He transformed it into acrobatic moves, splits that any gymnast would envy, feet and hips genetically powered for non-stop swiveling, and hit songs punctuated with squealing horns, electrifying beats and phrases pulled out of a lyrical grab bag.

And there were the screams. Screams that he might have been belting out in a New Year's Eve performance, but which came out as three breaths before he died on Christmas Day.

Like I said, straight out of a Toni Morrison novel.

But the thing that I think I’ll remember most about James Brown, as his life and his influence is criticized and debated, is how his music mirrored the survivability of black folks like himself without, for the most part, glorifying the pathologies that seem to rule too much of our culture nowadays.

Not long after finding his musical soul after meeting Bobby Byrd while in reform school -- who took Brown into his home and into his group, the Gospel Starlighters -- Brown began putting the mournfulness inspired by his past life into music. “Please, Please, Please,” his first song with Byrd’s group, the Flames, became a million-selling single in 1956. It was followed by “Try Me,” which went to No. 1 on the rhythm and blues chart.

Later, though, Brown’s hits veered from ballads into songs that were more uninhibited and beat-driven. Songs like “Papa’s Got a Brand New Bag,” “Cold Sweat,” and “Mother Popcorn,” showed that sometimes, music is best for provoking dancing and physical release rather than reflection and reminiscence.

But in spite of his rough beginnings, Brown didn’t gain his fame by elevating his reform school experience as some sort of rite of passage, but through songs that encouraged black people to be their best. His 1966 song, “Don’t Be A Dropout,” encouraged black youths to not abandon an essential tool for their liberation -- education.

And his 1968 anthem, “Say It Loud, I’m Black and I’m Proud,” told the establishment that we “we won’t quit movin’ until we get what we deserve,’ and how “we’d rather die on our feet than be livin’ on our knees.”

That song proved to be a mantra for me, as it was released the year that I went to a predominantly-white elementary school here in Jacksonville, one in which the parents of many of my classmates sported bumper stickers supporting George Wallace, Alabama’s segregationist governor, for president.

It helps to have that kind of a song playing in your head when you’re in an environment in which people think they’re doing you some great favor by allowing you to be there.

Of course, Brown’s life wasn’t flawless. Like many other performers, he had his demons. In 1987, Brown, the man who made the 1970s anti-drug song, “King Heroin,” got hyped up on PCP and led police on a car chase across the South Carolina border. Charges stemming from that misadventure netted him more than two years in prison. He also struggled with legal problems with the Internal Revenue Service and domestic violence charges.

But even though people like me made light of his car chase episode in the late 1980s via the party chant, “Free James Brown,” he didn’t use his music to capitalize on his incarceration, as far too many popular black rap artists do these days. Instead, he continued to live up to his title as the hardest working man in show business by doing what he always did -- pouring his life into the perfection of his art.

Maybe that was a reflection of Brown’s genius and his talent; that in spite of all his troubles with the law and bouts with self-destructiveness, he could perform without having to glorify the most negative things about the black existence. His ingenuity is reflected in the fact that he was able to take the entrails of a life that was destined to be a throwaway one and transform it into something positive and priceless.

For that, as well as for so many other things, may he rest in peace.

Phyllis Hyman

Another installment in my ongoing series of articles on transgender and non-trans women who have qualities that I admire.

What can I say about the 'Sophisticated Lady'?

Before she tragically took her own life several hours before a show at New York's Apollo Theater in 1995, she was an Broadway actress, model and singer who I and many of her fans felt didn't really get recognized for her talents like her contemporary peers.

Unfortunately, while she was making that music I and many of her fans loved so much, she was dealing with personal issues. Just like her, I spent most of the 80's fighting a major personal issue and connected with her in that regard.

I'll never forget the first time I heard 'You Know How To Love Me' on the radio. I was in high school at the time and a big Mtume fan. I recognized his producing style and wanted to hear more of her music. When I finally got that album a few weeks later and saw that beautiful statuesque sistah in the high fashion clothes, I was hooked.

I loved Phyllis' voice and versatility. In addition to her R&B and jazz chops she even did some rapping on the song 'Don't Wanna Change The World'. I enjoyed seeing her cameo appearance in Spike's second movie School Daze.

I remember awaiting the release of what turned out to be her last CD, I Refuse To Be Lonely. I listened to the title song and I found it quite ironic that she was singing a song about her determination to defiantly move on with her life and it had so tragically ended.

Phyllis was another example to me that tall sistahs do exist and she was a beautiful one at that. It's just too bad that she didn't see the beauty inside her that me and legions of her fans did.

Happy Birthday to His Royal Badness

Break out that copy of 'Purple Rain' and toast it with some grape juice. Today is Prince Rogers Nelson's birthday. The rest of the world knows him as Prince. His fans call him 'His Royal Badness'.

Prince is one of my favorite artists. His first album 'For You' came out when I was a high school junior. I was amazed to find out that he played several instruments on the album in addition to producing it himself.

His sound continued to evolve during the 80's. It melded elements of rock, punk, and soul with sometimes controversial sexually-tinged lyrics like on 1980's 'Uptown' albumn. It was dubbed the 'Minneapolis Sound' and later groups such as The Time and Vanity 6 would form. Singers Alexander O'Neal, Cherrelle, Karyn White and the SOS Band would later ride the producing talents of Time members James 'Jimmy Jam' Harris and Terry Lewis to hit status. In Janet Jackson's case she became a superstar thanks to these gentlemen.

But back to the birthday boy. I still laugh about a 1981 Prince concert I attended in which he broke into a rousing encore version of 'Controversy' that was rocking The Summit (later Compaq Center). This particular concert was scheduled on a Sunday. When he got to the part of 'Controversy' that includes the Lord's Prayer and implored everyone to pray with him, the up until that point raucous crowd became quiet. The gentleman that had the seats next to mine and my date said to us, "Prince is my boy, but I ain't playing with God."

Turned out Prince's spiritual side wasn't an act. Songs such as 'I Would Die 4 U' and 'The Holy River' gave some insight into that side of his persona. He's also done some songs with political commentary such as 'Ronnie Talk To Russia', 'Sign O' The Times, and 'Cinnamon Girl'.

Speaking of acting, 1984 saw the release of the movie 'Purple Rain' which I and my brother attended the day it opened wearing a purple '1999' T-shirt along with the other faithful Prince fans that packed the theater. After that Prince wasn't an R&B fan's best kept secret. The movie became a big hit along with the movie soundtrack.

His battle with Warner Brothers over control of his master tapes and for increased artistic freedom led him to change his name to an unpronouncable symbol for a few years and perform concerts with the word SLAVE written on his face.

He has come back better than ever with 'Musicology' vaulting him back into musical prominence. In my eyes he never left that status.

Happy birthday, Prince.

Harmonizing Her Gender

It took Tona Brown years to develop her voice - and identity

By Chris King
of the St. Louis American

Tona Brown belongs to a sensitive, mysterious, misunderstood minority group.

She is an artist - more specifically, a musician, a classically
trained vocalist and violinist. Her repertoire favors art songs by
neglected African-American composers, Negro spirituals and the European classics. She recently performed at Washington University’s (St. Louis) Ursa Cafe as part of the Tranny Roadshow.

The Tranny Roadshow? Oh, yeah. Tona Brown is also transgendered - she
was born into the wrong gender. The Tranny Roadshow is a traveling
variety group with a rotating cast of artists who began their lives
in that troubling, at times horrifying predicament, then did
something to change it.

The Roadshow, Tona said, marks her first set of performances when she
comes advertised "as gay or trans." At age 26, she has lived as a
woman for three and a half years. "I don't broadcast it to the whole
world all the time," she said of her gender transition.

She pursued the opportunity to broadcast her identity, at this point,
with an activist's sense of mission.

"I think it's imperative for others to know we can do everything,"
she said. "Trans people fulfill every occupation. I want to let
people know, you can be who you are, no matter what it is."

It is a life or death issue. Suicide is relatively common in the
transgendered population, as are self-destructive life choices, such
as drug abuse and prostitution.

"People tend to learn very young, and they are very confused," she
said.

"Their family abandons them. They have no role models. You have to be
very careful."

Tona should be an enviable model to transgendered youth. Judging by
her publicity photos, her transition has been very successful, and
her family and peers were unusually understanding.

"I was extremely fortunate. God blessed me with a talent that
transcended the normal boundaries," she said.

"Those who know me and who have been interested in watching me
develop have supported me, with no qualms about it. They kind of knew
all along there was something different about me."

She grew up and still lives with her mother, Sharon, in Hampton
Roads, Virginia, having studied music in Northern Virginia and
Rochester, New York. She started in her field while identified as a
man, and she said her transition "hasn't hindered me at all."

"I'm a dramatic soprano and a high mezzo," she said of her vocal
range. "That's really awkward, for a male. I always wore long hair, I
was always androgynous. When I did decide to transition, it wasn't
that hard for everyone."

If anything, she said, the hard part came before she made the
switch. "I struggled before," she said.

"I was very, very feminine, and men always thought I was female
anyway. When I transitioned, it was just, `Oh, you're beautiful, and
we need a violinist.'"

Appropriately for a musician, her transition began, in a sense, with
one of her instruments - her voice.

"I used to sing Mariah Carey, a very, very high soprano. Then, at 16,
my voice dropped, and I had this huge, rich soprano," she said.

"I used to be very light and birdy. People didn't know how to address
me. They'd say, `Yes, ma'am,' and I'd have to correct them."

Like so many black children raised in the South, she came up in a
very religious family, singing in the choir.

"I was an alto," she said. "It was very awkward, at the time. People
didn't realize there is no gender stamp on your voice."

Her problems adjusting to expectations persisted, initially, when she
studied voice with Patricia Woolf at the Shenandoah Conservatory of
Music. "She would have me try to sing tenor, and my voice would
always crack - upwards," Tona said.

A breakthrough came when they were working together on Mozart's opera
The Marriage of Figaro. At one point, her teacher closed the book in
frustration and said, "I honestly don't know what you could do."

Tona remembered, "I was very androgynous. I wore heels (boots, then,
not pumps). Neither she nor I could deny there was something
different, not only with myself but with my voice."

Finally, her teacher handed Tona the role of Cherubino, a lyric mezzo
part that has (both ironically and appropriately, in this case) been
a "pants" role, performed by a female dressed in male clothes.

Asked to sing a high part typically taken by a woman (in costume as a
man), she found her natural voice. "It felt so good," she said. "All
this sound came out of me." From there, it was only a question of
time, courage and dedication.

"It takes a lot of courage to get up," she said, "and use your God-
given instrument, something as fragile as a voice, to continue to
train and take ridicule and to develop your voice." Or, for that
matter, your proper gender.