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Documents Relating to the Black Music Division
(Bennington College, 1981-09) Williams II, John H.; Atkins, Carl J.; Dixon, Bill
In short, instead of being accepted and esteemed for its contribution to the arts and its message for society, the Bennington College Community has in part isolated Black Music. Camille Paglia of the Literature Division, and one of the few champions of Black Music, explained this phenomenon at the dedication of VAPA in 1976 in a speech of tribute to Bill Dixon: "There is no consolation here: those who seek assurance of the principle of benevolence pervading the universe will not find it in Bill Dixon's music. For the tradition of black music of which he is an advanced exponent, the reality of experience is suffering, pain, sacrifice, bitterness, anger. In the urgency of this black music at its most intense we find untamed energy, a violence of emotion and expression...the Black music that is practiced at Bennington is still unabsorbed by the bourgeoisie, for it is too raw, savage, unnerving; it possesses too much enriching estrangement, too much 'metaphysical uneasiness'"