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Collaboration vs. Independence
Themes and Colors
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Set in Chicago in the 1920s, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom unfolds during a period of significant cultural change. In particular, Levee’s attempt to push his bandmates toward new musical horizons reflects the transformations taking place in the music industry at the time—transformations that people like Ma Rainey and Cutler resist. For them, the blues is a rich musical tradition that doesn’t require embellishment or innovation. Levee, on the other hand, yearns to make music that is “fresh.” In fact, he’s so preoccupied with the idea of creating “exciting” new music that he shows outright contempt for more traditional approaches, acting like his fellow musicians are inferior because their playing isn’t innovative. He even turns his disparaging attitude on anything he sees as outdated or out of touch with the times. In contrast, Toledo has a deep appreciation for history and tradition, trying to get his bandmates to see that Black Americans have been cut off from their own cultural history. Because slavery took Black people out of Africa, Toledo argues, Black Americans are no longer in touch with the rich customs of their ancestors. Given that Levee’s fierce desire to move forward without looking to the past eventually leads to violent chaos, the play seems to endorse Toledo’s belief in the importance of history, implying that the best kind of change grows out of tradition—not in opposition to it.
The play focuses on the evolution of the blues as a way of exploring how certain Black cultural traditions have made their way into the present, and how the play’s characters either embrace or reject those traditions. Ma addresses this in a conversation with Cutler, in which she implies that white people often fail to consider the blues’ origins. “They hear it come out, but they don’t know how it got there,” she says. The idea here is that many white people hear the blues and take it at face value, simply listening to it without considering the cultural and historical context from which it emerged. That history is intertwined with Black culture, since the blues is believed to have been developed by formerly enslaved Black people who drew inspiration from hymns and field songs while working on plantations. The blues therefore encompasses the hardship and suffering that Black people have experienced in the United States—but Ma suggests that white people tend to overlook this, instead approaching the blues as if it’s any other kind of music.
Levee, however, is completely uninterested in the origins of the blues, which he thinks is—as a musical form—stagnant and tired. He doesn’t care about its historical or cultural roots, instead wanting to find new ways to build on it—or, more accurately, new ways to depart from it. In fact, he even goes out of his way to insult Ma’s traditional approach to music, disparagingly calling her style “tent-show nonsense.” The fact that Levee uses the term “tent-show” as an insult illustrates how uninterested he is in exploring the roots of blues music, which did gain some of its popularity through traveling vaudeville shows that took place under large tents and featured singers like Ma Rainey and Bessie Smith. Instead of rehashing this history, Levee wants to do something new, insisting that listeners want “something that’s gonna excite them”—a clear sign that he himself yearns for an exciting sense of change.
While Levee’s interest in exploring new horizons might seem like a good way to enrich and propel Black culture, though, the play hints that there’s value in paying attention to history and tradition. Toledo, for his part, urges his bandmates to think about their cultural history in order to better understand their present-day position as Black Americans. He reminds them that Black people were taken from Africa and brought to the United States, thus severing them from their customs and societal practices. And now, Toledo argues, Black Americans have forgotten about their roots and modeled themselves on white people. “We done sold ourselves to the white man in order to be like him,” he says. “Look at the way you dressed…That ain’t African. That’s the white man.” His main point is that, although dressing like distinguished white men seems like an improvement when compared to the life Black people led during slavery, it doesn’t necessarily count as true cultural progress; it’s just another sign of how much white culture has forced itself upon Black people. For Toledo, this lack of distinctly Black American traditions is exactly why things like the blues are so culturally important. After all, the blues is unique to the Black American experience.
Because Levee doesn’t appreciate the significance of his own cultural traditions, his attempt to forge an entirely new kind of music feels forced and unnatural. Obsessed with the idea of being innovative, he discounts the power of drawing from history, and it is perhaps because he tries to make such an abrupt artistic departure that nobody in the band is willing to work with him to reach new heights. Furthermore, he thought his ambitious ideas would impress white executives like Sturdyvant, but Sturdyvant ends up refusing to record his new songs. In response to this defeat, Levee careens into a violent rage, taking his anger out on Toledo by stabbing him. It’s especially significant that Toledo is the one to feel the brunt of Levee’s anger, since he has already tried to get Levee to see that old traditions have a lot to offer. Levee, however, has failed to internalize this idea, instead wanting to leave history behind. In a sense, then, the fact that he lashes out at Toledo emphasizes his rejection of cultural traditions that would help him make new art. As it stands, Levee fixates so intensely on the idea of progress that he overlooks the ways in which old traditions drive change. The play thus suggests that if change doesn’t evolve organically out of history, it doesn’t lead to real progress and is destined to fail.
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History, Tradition, and Change ThemeTracker
The ThemeTracker below shows where, and to what degree, the theme of History, Tradition, and Change appears in each act of Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom. Click or tap on any chapter to read its Summary & Analysis.
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History, Tradition, and Change Quotes in Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
Below you will find the important quotes in Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom related to the theme of History, Tradition, and Change.
Act 1
Quotes
STURDYVANT: Irv, that horn player...the one who gave me those songs...is he gonna be here today? Good. I want to hear more of that sound. Times are changing. This is a tricky business now. We’ve got to jazz it up...put in something different. You know, something wild...with a lot of rhythm.
(Pause.)
You know what we put out last time, Irv? We put out garbage last time. It was garbage. I don’t even know why I bother with this anymore.
IRVIN: You did all right last time, Mel. Not as good as you did before, but you did all right.
STURDYVANT: You know how many records we sold in New York? You wanna see the sheet? And you know what’s in New York, Irv? Harlem. Harlem’s in New York, Irv.
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SLOW DRAG: Come on, let’s rehearse the music.
LEVEE: You ain’t gotta rehearse that…ain’t nothing but old jug-band music. They need one of them jug bands for this.
SLOW DRAG: Don’t make me no difference. Long as we get paid.
LEVEE: That ain’t what I’m talking about, nigger. I’m talking about art!
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CUTLER: Slow Drag’s all right. It’s you talking all that weird shit about art. Just play the piece, nigger. You wanna be one of them...what you call...virtuoso or something, you in the wrong place. You ain’t no Buddy Bolden or King Oliver...you just an old trumpet player come a dime a dozen. Talking about art.
LEVEE: What is you? I don’t see your name in lights.
CUTLER: I just play the piece. Whatever they want. I don’t go talking about art and criticizing other people’s music.
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CUTLER: Well, until you get your own band where you can play what you want, you just play the piece and stop complaining. I told you when you came on here, this ain’t none of them hot bands. This is an accompaniment band. You play Ma’s music when you here.
LEVEE: I got sense enough to know that. Hell, I can look at you all and see what kind of band it is. I can look at Toledo and see what kind of band it is.
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TOLEDO: That’s African.
SLOW DRAG: What? What you talking about? What’s African?
LEVEE: I know he ain’t talking about me. You don’t see me running around in no jungle with no bone between my nose.
TOLEDO: Levee, you worse than ignorant. You ignorant without a premise.
(Pauses.)
Now, what I was saying is what Slow Drag was doing is African. That’s what you call an African conceptualization. That’s when you name the gods or call on the ancestors to achieve whatever your desires are.
SLOW DRAG: Nigger, I ain’t no African! I ain’t doing no African nothing!
TOLEDO: Naming all those things you and Cutler done together is like trying to solicit some reefer based on a bond of kinship. That’s African. An ancestral retention. Only you forgot the name of the gods.
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TOLEDO: See, now...I’ll tell you something. As long as the colored man look to white folks to put the crown on what he say...as long as he looks to white folks for approval...then he ain’t never gonna find out who he is and what he’s about. He’s just gonna be about what white folks want him to be about. That’s one sure thing.
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TOLEDO: Everybody worried about having a good time. Ain’t nobody thinking about what kind of world they gonna leave their youngens. “Just give me the good time, that’s all I want.” It just makes me sick.
SLOW DRAG: Well, the colored man’s gonna be all right. He got through slavery, and he’ll get through whatever else the white man put on him. I ain’t worried about that. Good times is what makes life worth living. Now, you take the white man...The white man don’t know how to have a good time. That’s why he’s troubled all the time. He don’t know how to have a good time. He don’t know how to laugh at life.
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TOLEDO: It ain’t just me, fool! It’s everybody! What you think…I’m gonna solve the colored man’s problems by myself. I said, we. You understand that? We. That’s every living colored man in the world got to do his share. Got to do his part. I ain’t talking about what I’m gonna do...or what you or Cutler or Slow Drag or anybody else. I’m talking about all of us together. What all of us is gonna do.
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The white man knows you just a leftover. ‘Cause he the one who done the eating and he know what he done ate. But we don’t know that we been took and made history out of. Done went and filled the white man’s belly and now he’s full and tired and wants you to get out the way and let him be by himself. Now, I know what I’m talking about. And if you wanna find out, you just ask Mr. Irvin what he had for supper yesterday. And if he’s an honest white man...which is asking for a whole heap of a lot...he’ll tell you he done ate your black ass and if you please I’m full up with you...so go on and get off the plate and let me eat something else.
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IRVIN: Ma, that’s what the people want now. They want something they can dance to. Times are changing. Levee’s arrangement gives the people what they want. It gets them excited…makes them forget about their troubles.
MA RAINEY: I don’t care what you say, Irvin. Levee ain’t messing up my song. If he got what the people want, let him take it somewhere else. I’m singing Ma Rainey’s song. I ain’t singing Levee’s song. Now that’s all there is to it.
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MA RAINEY: I’m gonna tell you something, Irvin...and you go on up there and tell Sturdyvant. What you all say don’t count with me. You understand? Ma listens to her heart. Ma listens to the voice inside her. That’s what counts with Ma. Now, you carry my nephew on down there...tell Cutler he’s gonna do the voice intro on that “Black Bottom” song and that Levee ain’t messing up my song with none of his music shit. Now, if that don’t set right with you and Sturdyvant...then I can carry my black bottom on back down South to my tour, ‘cause I don’t like it up here no ways.
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Act 2
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MA RAINEY: White folks don’t understand about the blues. They hear it come out, but they don’t know how it got there. They don’t understand that’s life’s way of talking. You don’t sing to feel better. You sing ‘cause that’s a way of understanding life.
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LEVEE: […] That’s what’s the matter with you all. You satisfied sitting in one place. You got to move on down the road from where you sitting...and all the time you got to keep an eye out for that devil who’s looking to buy up souls. And hope you get lucky and find him!
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CUTLER: I done told you about that blasphemy. Taking about selling your soul to the devil.
TOLEDO: We done the same thing, Cutler. There ain’t no difference. We done sold Africa for the price of tomatoes. We done sold ourselves to the white man in order to be like him. Look at the way you dressed...That ain’t African. That’s the white man. We trying to be just like him. We done sold who we are in order to become someone else. We’s imitation white men.
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LEVEE: […] Come on and save him like you did my mama! Save him like you did my mama! I heard her when she called you! I heard her when she said, “Lord, have mercy! Jesus, help me! Please, God, have mercy on me, Lord Jesus, help me!” And did you turn your back? Did you turn your back, motherfucker? Did you turn your back?
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