Simeon Solomon - Dignity Restored

At last Simeon Solomon receives the dignity of a proper grave stone. This afternoon, in an informal ceremony at Simeon’s graveside in Willesden Jewish Cemetery, a new headstone will be unveiled. Regular readers will know how I am a big fan of Simeon Solomon, a Victorian Jewish Pre-Raphaelite artist imprisoned for homosexuality. Unfortunately, I’m unable to attend the ceremony myself. Hopefully I will visit the cemetery on my planned trip down to London in August. 

 

I want to thank and congratulate Frank Vigon who has been putting so much time into giving Simeon the headstone he deserves. 

 

This is a short post today as I’m on holiday and trying to take it easy. So I’ll leave you with this photo of Simeon Solomon’s newly restored grave in all its glory (with permission of Frank Vigon). You can see the original damaged headstone has been reset, and a new memorial stone placed over the grave.

 

 

Flower Power : Sinful Stonewall

“The Seven Deadly Gay Sins” is the most popular lgbt history tour I am asked to conduct around Nottingham (people obviously like a bit of sin). Today the elegant surroundings of the annual Hampton Court Flower Show are filled with sin as the theme for the Conceptual Gardens category is the Seven Deadly Sins.

Pride is one of the oldest sins on the list. These days, of course, Pride has come to be closely associated with the lgbt community, as I related several days ago in my article about Brenda Howard. The Pride garden at Hampton Court has been sponsored by Stonewall, the lgbt charity, and it provides an eye-catching illustration into the question of equality. 

The designers of the garden, called “The Stonewall Garden: Breaking Down the Wall of Pride”, are Amanda Miller and Louisa Holecz. At the time of writing there are no photos of the garden available as it is to be revealed this morning. However, you can see an impression of the design here. 

So, what about the Deadly Sin of Pride? Why has its meaning changed over the centuries? 

Pride has always been considered to be the worst of the sins and the one from which the others derive. It appears on the various Deadly Sins lists more often than any other (yes, even more than lust and fornication). In the Book of Proverbs in the Old Testament “a proud look” appears at the head of a list of “things the Lord hateth” that were the origins of the Deadly Sins.

The traditional Seven Deadly Sins originate in the 4^th century in the writings of a monk called Evagrius. He listed 8 sins – gluttony, lust, greed, despair, wrath, pride, vainglory and acedie. This last sin has all but been forgotten, but can be best equated with neglect or apathy. The Deadly Sin of sloth on the traditional list is perhaps the nearest to acedie. 

Back to pride. The reason why it is believed to be the original sin is because it was the main trait of the angel who later came to be called Satan or Lucifer. He believed himself to be as great and as powerful as God. This trait can also be labelled as vainglory and hubris, two more sins that have been listed as early Deadly Sins in their own right. Vainglory is unjustifiable boasting, and hubris is arrogance. Vainglory is another example of how a sin came to change in meaning. In Latin “Gloria”, from which “glory” derives, meant “fame, or high renown”. Vainglory is, thus, the claim to false fame. Today, of course, glory has the meanings “praise and honour”, taking the act of claiming fame on yourself to claiming praise for others. 

In 590 Pope Gregory I, the person who decided on our traditional Seven Deadly Sins, merged vainglory, hubris and pride into one sin. All three can be said to display contempt for the views of others. The modern concept of pride turns this inside out. You can have pride in your achievements, pride in others, pride in your community, and pride in belonging. Pride is about recognising your own worth in relation to others. There is no place for contempt in pride any more. That’s what makes it more positive than vainglory or hubris. 

It is this belief in our own worth in society, and in what we can and have achieved in spite of opposition, that made the lgbt community take the word Pride to our heart. Even though no-one will ever claim that the lgbt community is wholly responsible for the shift of Pride away from its sinful origins, we can lay claim (thanks mainly to Brenda Howard) have established a new use of the word that is recognised in the world’s dictionaries. 

Which takes me back to Sinful Stonewall and the garden at the Hampton Court Flower Show. Amanda Miller’s design is based on her own experiences growing up as a lesbian in Australia. It represents the Pride I mentioned above, about how pride and belief in yourself in the face of homophobia can lead to a life of freedom. The title of the garden, “Breaking Down the Walls of Pride”, emphasises the double nature of the word, of how the sin of Pride in some can bring out the positive Pride in others.

And a bit of advance notice for 2015 - I’ll be doing a series of articles based on my tours, the Seven Deadly Gay Sins, featuring stories from lgbt heritage which relate to each one.

 

Rockin' the Jailhouse

Following on from my article on queer “baroque’n’roll” a couple of weeks ago let’s turn our attention to modern rock’n’roll and one of its most famous and iconic songs, “Jailhouse Rock” by Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller. The song was immortalised by Elvis Presley in 1957. 

What has become apparent in more recent years is that “Jailhouse Rock” may not be as innocent as it sounds. And it’s enough to leave Elvis “all shook up, uh-huh”. 

Elvis’s performance of this song, as seen in the eponymous film of 1957, clearly gives the impression that “Jailhouse Rock” is about having a party and a good time. But it’s the sort of good time to which the song may actually refer which would never have made it past the film censors. 

On analysis the lyrics of the song, when read on their own, can reveal a queer angle to life behind bars which, as we all know, are not mixed-sex establishments. If we take the lyrics one verse at a time we can see a very gay interpretation, even if its not there intentionally. 

Verse 1

The warden threw a party in the county jail.

The prison band was there and they began to wail.

The band was jumpin’ and the joint began to swing.

You should’ve heard those knocked out jailbirds sing.

 

Chorus

Let’s rock, everybody, let’s rock.

Everybody in the whole cell block

Was dancin’ to the Jailhouse Rock. 

It’s clear from line one that it’s the warden who is in charge of this party. I’m not sure what kind of party he was thinking of organising in an all-male prison. It’s not as if he’d be allowed to bring in a female stripper or anything. It sounds like it was just a gig by the prison band. 

Verse 2

Spider Murphy played the tenor saxophone.

Little Joe was blowin’ on the slide trombone.

The drummer boy from Illinois went crash, boom, bang,

The whole rhythm section was the Purple Gang. 

Whether Leiber and Stoller were aware of sexual slang to a great degree is unknown, but the actions of Little Joe have a sexual meaning. “Blowing” is a common term in sexual slang, but “trombone” is less well known. Basically, “blowing a trombone” (more specifically a “rusty trombone”) describes a particularly intimate sexual act between two men, about which I am too much of a gentleman to admit to knowing! Of course, not every reference to a trombone in song lyrics necessarily has any sexual connotation, but in this song it fits in. The Purple Gang mentioned was a real gang. They operated during the US prohibition era and were known for blackmail and extortion as well as providing illicit alcohol. Such a gang would be appropriate inhabitants of any jail, and perhaps “Jailhouse Rock” wasn’t an alcohol-free party at least. 

Verse 3

Number 47 said to number 3

“You’re the cutest jailbird I ever did see.

I sure would be delighted with your company.

Come on and do the Jailhouse Rock with me.” 

So Number 47 thinks Number 3 is cute! So cute, in fact, that he wants to do the Jailhouse Rock with him. Apparently (and I’ve tried to track down the origin of this use without success) the word “rock” was used in some US cities to describe sex itself. Interestingly, the word “roll” was also used as sexual slang for a man’s genitals, so “rock’n’roll” could have sounded overtly sexual in some cities. The two words, of course, don’t have to mean anything sexual in this respect, its just unfortunate that “rock’n’roll” can have two very different meanings. 

Verse 4

The sad sack was a sittin’ on a block of stone

Way over in the corner weepin’ all alone.

The warden said, “Hey, buddy, don’t you be no square.

If you can’t find a partner use a wooden chair.” 

Here we have the warden trying to cheer up one sorry soul in the corner by advising him to use a chair. For what? Sitting on instead of the stone? Dancing? Elvis dances with a chair in the film, but it looks rather ungainly and a potential hazard to those near by. Other analysts of the lyrics have suggested the warden is perhaps referring to a chair leg. Let’s hope the chairs in prison are well sanded and varnished, otherwise the “sad sack” will get splinters in a very embarrassing place! 

Verse 5

Shifty Henry said to Bugs, “For Heaven’s sake,

No-one’s lookin, now’s our chance to make a break.”

Bugsy turned to Shifty and he said, “Nix, nix,

I wanna stick around a while and get my kicks.” 

Shifty Henry, who was real jazz musician, urges Bugs to make his escape. Bugs obviously thinks that he’s having such a good time that he’d rather stay in jail and enjoy the fun. 

I have to admit that all these interpretations of the lyrics are loaded in favour of sexual meanings. I don’t think that Leiber and Stoller meant “Jailhouse Rock” to have such a queer interpretation, even if they knew some sexual slang, and even more sure that Elvis didn’t.

The Mother of Pride

We are now well into the Pride season. June is the month the USA celebrates Pride Month, their annual celebration of the lgbt community first established by President Clinton in 2000. June was chosen in commemoration of the events 45 years ago tonight on 28^th June 1969 – the Stonewall Riots – which are considered as a pivotal moment in the history of lgbt rights. 

Most lgbt people will have attended at least one Pride march or event. Some people, like myself, know from experience that a Pride event doesn’t organise itself, it needs a group of dedicated volunteers to plan ahead and co-ordinate. It was the same in 1969 just a month after the Stonewall Riots took place, and in the first recognised Pride March that took place on its first anniversary in 1970. 

One name which often leaps out as a major pioneer in the organisation of these two events, and in shaping the development of Pride today, is Brenda Howard (1946-2005). 

Brenda was present at the Stonewall Riots in 1969 and co-ordinated the rally one month later. At that time there was no thought of an annual event. That idea seems to have been first suggested by members of the Eastern Regional Conference of Homophile Organisations. It was they who formed the first organising committee of a march which they would hold annually in June as near as possible to the actual anniversary of the Stonewall Riots. 

But it wasn’t called Pride. That name didn’t start to be applied to the event until 1971. Brenda Howard is credited as being one of several people who first popularised the word in relation to the Stonewall march, which was called the Christopher Street Liberation Day March, named after the street on which the Stonewall Riots took place. 

One Pride element we can be sure was the brainchild of Brenda is Pride Week, a series of events that lasted several days around the Pride march. Brenda’s idea was the spark that ignited a chain of events which have travelled around the world. 

Think about it for a while. The first Pride Weeks were a way for the lgbt community to come together to discuss, socialise and, yes, celebrate their existence in the face of homophobia. Today these Pride weeks involve everything from lgbt rights conferences to pool parties, from marches to high-brow art installations. There doesn’t even have to be a Pride march to go with it, as can be seen in the creation of events such as the British Film Institute’s LGBT Film Festival. 

From Pride Week the lgbt community recognised a sense of togetherness which over the decades has also come to recognise its own diversity. So now we have Bi Pride, Bear Pride, Leather Pride, and many more. And not only that, but non-lgbt communities have started to use the format – Pagan Pride, Black Pride. Brenda, unintentionally, created a global phenomenon. 

From Pride Week the lgbt community also began to acknowledge the struggles and discrimination of their predecessors. That is the whole reason for the first marches – to remember the Stonewall Riots and the people who stood up for their rights. This developed into a need to protect and reveal the heritage of the lgbt community, to discover those struggles that have been forgotten yet can reveal so much about how the modern community evolved. From individual cities and regions the importance of these lgbt histories and heritage led to the creation of LGBT History Month. 

From Pride Week the lgbt community showed the world that there is nothing wrong in celebrating your identity or your diversity. The USA in particular has embraced the diversity of its nation – Asia-Pacific Heritage Month, Black History Month, Hispanic Heritage Month, Jewish Heritage Month, and others. 

While I have said very little about Brenda Howard’s life, I hope I have given you some idea of how great a legacy she left behind after her untimely death from cancer, also on this day, in 2005, the same day as the Stonewall Riots in 1969. 

In time I hope that the name of Brenda Howard will be used in the same breath as other pioneers of the modern lgbt community like Harvey Milk, Gilbert Baker (the designer of the Rainbow Pride flag) and Tom Waddell (founder of the Gay Games).

AMENDMENT : Further research has proved that the first use of the word "Pride" was by the Chicago lgbt community for their march to commemorate the first anniversary of the Stonewall Riots on 27th June 1970, the day before New York, San Francisco or Los Angeles held their own marches.

Pride in Toronto

This week WorldPride is taking place in Toronto, Canada. Oh, how I wish I could be there! I consider Toronto to be one of my “ancestral” homes. My grandfather and his brothers lived in and around Toronto at the start of the 20^th century. My grandfather returned to the UK in 1911 and had loved his life in Canada so much that he named his house after the village where he had lived – Newton Brook. It still has this name and my eldest brother still lives there. When my father got married in 1952 and my grandfather moved out and built a bungalow next door he named it after another Toronto village he knew – Willow Dale. It was in Willow Dale that my grandfather died in 1979 at the gage of 101. His brothers remained in Canada and their families, my cousins, still live in Toronto. 

The villages on Newton Brook and Willow Dale are now suburbs of the largest city in Canada (as Newtonbrook and Willowdale). The lgbt history of Toronto hasn’t touched either place very much over the past 100 years. Most of it has been based further south in the larger old settlement areas. Being largely residential areas there aren’t the usual gathering places associated with city centres though you can get occasional glimpses of lgbt heritage. 

Take, for instance, the United Church of Canada. The church in Newtonbrook was the place of worship of Ruth Bramham, the first transgender member of the United Church’s lgbt network Affirm United. She is also a director on its National Board. Another lgbt church member who lived in Toronto for a while is Rt. Rev. Gary Paterson who became the first gay leader of a Christian church in Canada when he was elected Moderator of the United Church in 2012 (he is married to Vancouver councillor Tim Stevenson who was part of the Canadian delegation to the Sochi Winter Olympics). 

The widely recognised Gay Village of Toronto is further south in the main metropolis. The area is called Church and Wellesley, after Church Street and Wellesley Street which cross in the heart of the district. This has long been the location of Toronto Pride and is where WorldPride is being held.

In one of those weird turns of historical events Church and Wellesley provides a direct link back to one of the earliest gay scandals in Toronto. Way back in 1820, less than a decade after the settlement was founded, a local magistrate called Alexander Wood owned an estate which covered part of the present Church and Wellesley area. The scandal arose when he was accused of misusing his powers as a magistrate by ordering local men to show him their private parts, ostensibly for inspection to identify a rapist. 

Since to 1970s Church and Wellesley has become the lgbt hub of Toronto. In 1991 the area elected the city’s first openly gay councillor, Kyle Rae, and after his retirement his successor was the fist openly lesbian councillor, Kristin Wong-Tam. Toronto provided the first openly lesbian provincial Premier in 2013. Kathleen Wynne replaced the then leader of her party and Premier of Ontario. She won the provincial election for the post in her own right just a few days ago. 

In the world of art and culture one of the most significant people to put Toronto onto the art map was Douglas Duncan. He was a wealthy heir who in 1936 opened an art gallery in which he showcased many up-and-coming Canadian artists. Like many he led a closeted gay life during this period when homosexuality was illegal. A hint to his sexuality was made at his memorial service when one artist remarked that Duncan had done a lot for female artists but didn’t actually love women. 

Toronto has provided several Olympians to Team Canada. Scott Cranham (diving), Norman Elder (equestrian), Mark Leduc (boxing) and Emanuel Sandhu (figure skating) all have sporting links with the city. 

Canada was one of the first countries to introduce same-sex marriages and Toronto was the location of the first. On 14^th January 2001 in the Metropolitan Community Church Kevin Bourassa and Joe Varnell, and Ann and Elaine Vantour, were married. Their fight to have their marriages legally recognised is told here. Just hours after the ruling in 2003 which recognised same-sex marriages another Toronto couple, Michael Stark and Michael Leshner, became the first same-sex couple to be married. 

The University of Toronto is home to the Mark S. Bonham Centre for Sexual Diversity Studies. As well as providing research courses for students and organising conferences the Bonham Centre also publishes the most comprehensive (and reliable!) online list of lgbt people on its website Queerbio.com.

I hope everyone has a good time at WorldPride and wish I could be there to visit my “ancestral” home.

Baroque'n'Roll

The term “classical” has been applied popularly to all post-medieval music, but there are several periods within “classical” music which relate to specific styles. One of these is baroque music which was written between about 1600 and 1750.

Baroque was an artistic style which also included art and literature and was originally created by the Vatican to attract people back to the Catholic Church after the rise of Protestantism. Baroque tried to be more popular and appeal to the ordinary person in the street and move away from the more formal, somewhat stuffy, music of the 17^th century. That’s not to say that music before baroque was always stuffy, but baroque tended to be more melodic and frequently more up-beat and livelier. In this respect it had the same impact as rock’n’roll in the 1950s when the music industry tried to appeal to a younger audience.

Many household names in music rose to fame in the baroque period – Bach, Handel and Vivaldi. All of them are familiar names and you probably know more of their music than you realise. With regards to attracting people back to the Catholic Church one of the most successful attempts was by Handel. His “Messiah” was hugely popular in his time, and still is today. 

There are several other queer composers who made a name for themselves and helped to give music its “baroque’n’roll” flavour to the 17^th century. 

Top of the list is Jean-Baptiste Lully (1632-1687). This Italian-born composer became one of the most important cultural figures at the court of King Louis XIV of France. As well as being a composer and talented musician Lully was a dancer, and most of his baroque work was for the theatre and dance hall more than for the church. 

As superintendent of music at the royal court Lully created many innovative ballets, operas and theatrical entertainments which can be compared to the modern stage musicals of recent years with their special mechanical effects. Working in collaboration with such famous French writers as Molière Lully transformed French theatrical music and opera and influenced the way stage productions are produced. 

Lully lost his royal position in 1685 after a scandal involving him and a boy in the royal music school, amongst other probable affairs. The alleged account of his death surely ranks amongst the most extraordinary. But we’ll leave that for later in the year! But until then I found this amusing little cartoon which features Lully and his part in the development of the orchestra.

In Lully’s native Italy another queer composer was rocking the baroque. Arcangelo Corelli (1653-1713) was a performer like Lully as well as a composer. He was regarded as one of the top violinists of his day and highly influential in the establishing of a distinct Italian baroque style. His music had fewer of the “fiddly” bits (pardon the violin pun) than most baroque composers, and he wrote music which people considered to be perfection. 

Having been born into an impoverished landed family Arcangelo’s rise to musical heights began after his talents were spotted by some of the most important patrons around at the time – Queen Kristina of Sweden, Cardinal Pamfili and, most importantly, Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni (the pope’s great-nephew). 

Arcangelo presided over the weekly concerts at Ottoboni’s palace in Rome. The Cardinal is regarded as one of the many closeted gay cardinals who gathered a group of talented, artistic young men around him, and Arcangelo, who lived in his palace for a while, probably came under the Cardinal’s patronage because of his looks as much as for his music. Arcangelo formed an attachment to another violinist in Rome called Matteo Fornari. Neither men married or are known to have had any female romantic interests and they were hardly ever separated. Another composer even dedicated a new sonata to the pair. 

Arcangelo’s music influenced many composers that followed, including Handel and Bach. The German baroque music scene was highly influenced by the Italians. One German queer baroque composed who was influenced by the Italians before Arcangelo was even born was Johann Rosenmüller (1619-1684). 

Johann studied at the University of Leipzig and lived in the city for many years. He became organist at one of the main cathedrals and was lined up to take over the post of Cantor, or director of music, after the current holder. This offer was swiftly dropped after Johann and several choirboys were arrested for sodomy. Johann was sentenced to jail, but he managed to escape and ended up in Venice. 

Venice helped to increase the Italian influence in Johann’s music and he wrote a lot while he was there, teaching at a girl’s school. Composers from Germany came to be trained by him and return home with the Italian influences. 

In 1682 Johann himself returned to Germany to become the choir master at the court of Anton-Ulric von Gelf, Duke of Brunswick-Wolfenbuttel. It was there that Johann died in 1684. 

There are many other composers who influenced the development of music and produce the “baroque’n’roll” of the 17^th century. The three queer composers mentioned today are just a few of those who passed on their influence all over continental Europe.

The Music of the Rainbow

Among the ever-growing number of classical composers whose sexuality has been discussed by biographers is one whose name is probably unfamiliar to you – Aleksandr Scriabin (1872-1915). 

Scriabin was a Russian composer, often called a pioneer of modern classical music. One of the elements in his extraordinary life was his belief in the influence colour has on music, which I’ll come to in a moment. Before that we’ll have a brief look at his life to understand why his sexuality has been discussed. 

On the face of it Scriabin was a regular straight guy. He married twice and had 7 children. It is biographers who interpret what little evidence there is to form an opinion. And opinion seems to be all we have with Scriabin. 

Outward appearances can be misinterpreted. Scriabin was quite short and considered effeminate. He was nicknamed “Pussy”, and I don’t need to explain that word’s use in sexual slang. Suffice it to say that during his lifetime Scriabin was never regarded as particularly masculine, even though he was a habitual womaniser and assaulter of young girls. During the turn of the century he had a very close relationship with his music publisher. But was it romantic or bromantic? Faubion Bowers, in the 1996 edition of his biography of Scriabin, wrote “to impute homosexuality – latent, passive or ultimately triumphed over, as it was in Scriabin’s case, in my opinion – still it would be recreant to shirk a rather homosexual interpretation of Scriabin’s life. Incontrovertible proof cannot now be dredged up from the past, but so many symptoms there seem to be”. Robert Craft (Stravinsky’s biographer) refers to Scriabin as “emotionally hermaphrodite”, and a handful of other historians openly label Scriabin as bisexual. The jury is still out as far as I’m concerned. 

So, back to the music. There are many instances in medical history where one sense is expressed by another. For example, seeing a shape and hearing a sound, or touching an object and smelling a fragrance. This very real phenomenon is called synesthesia. Although Aleksandr Scriabin was probably not a true synesthete he formulated a theory in which specific colour represent specific musical keys. He wasn’t the first or only composer who saw colour in music. Even Sir Isaac Newton came up with a similar theory way back in 1702 (I might say more about that later in the year). Here’s how his theory works, and I’m not particularly well versed in music theory so I hope I can explain this properly. 

Starting with the piano keyboard, there are 12 musical keys. Scriabin divided the rainbow colours into 12 hues which he placed in a circle, one colour representing one key, like a clock face. He placed them in a circle because they then coincided with what is called the Circle of Fifths (pictured below). We needn’t say more about it, except to say it’s all about how chords work together. 

Much of Scriabin’s reasoning for his application of colour to music was influenced by his own mystical beliefs and philosophy rather than true synesthesia. From about 1903 he began composing pieces based on his colour theory. The most significant of these was “Prometheus: Poem of Fire”. Scriabin invented a new “musical” instrument called a “clavier à lumières” (“keyboard with lights”) to be played during the piece. The keyboard was linked to projectors, so that whichever key or chord was played its corresponding colour in the Circle of Fifths was projected onto a screen or around the walls. 

The clavier à lumières was such a complex instrument to construct that it wasn’t actually used in the world premiere of “Prometheus: Poem of Fire”. One was built for a performance in 1915 in New York. Scriabin’s original clavier is preserved in his Moscow apartment which is now a museum. This video shows how a recent performance of “Prometheus”. 

The culmination of Scriabin’s colour music was to be extended to all the other senses in a monumental piece called “Mysterium”. This was to have been the salvation of mankind (he was a bit of an egotist and thought he was God!). “Mysterium” was to have been a week-long performance located in the foothills of the Himalayas and would have filled the air with music, light, colour and fragrance, with full orchestra, clavier and dancers. In Scriabin’s mind “Mysterium” was to have created such an aura of bliss on its audience that this bliss would spread around the world and rid mankind of its evils to create a new world of peace. 

Bearing in mind that “Mysterium” was being written in the years running up to 1914 it seems somewhat ironic that such a delusion of the power of his music would never be completed. As Scriabin saw the world descend into the war whose century is being marked this year he caught septicemia, and in April 1915 he died with “Mysterium” unfinished.

Several recreation and reconstructions of Scriabin’s colour/music have been performed in recent years.