The Harlem Renaissance came to East Liberty last Friday, and not a moment too soon. For the hundreds who turned out for the "Discovery" showcase at the Kelly-Strayhorn Theater that evening, echoes of the town's once-influential jazz scene were felt in performances several genres removed from it in time and space.
Despite the presence of some audience members old enough to remember when Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn treated Pittsburgh's club scene as if it were their own personal fiefdom, there was little appetite for nostalgia.
The evening had its own vibe, with a contemporary twist as intellectually stimulating as anything East Liberty has seen in years. Young black men in tailored suits, their ties loose from long hours of toiling in knowledge factories and financial institutions Downtown, mingled unselfconsciously with FUBU-wearing "B-boys" and white bohemians at the refreshment table during intermission.
I was struck by the casual elegance of the young women who turned up by the dozens to support the arts that night. There were also plenty of adolescent girls on hand imitating their sisters and mothers. Only the coldest heart wouldn't have been charmed by their youthful, but stylish, vanity.
To my relief, no one chanted "Pass the Courvoisier" or any of the other urban music video cliches making the rounds. Fortunately, the only cheese on the premises that evening was sliced into cubes and sitting on serving trays.
If you squinted, it would've been easy to imagine a similar Friday night at the Crawford Grill in the late '40s or the Granada Club in the '50s. The only thing missing was the effervescence that comes with copious consumption of alcohol.
Despite the sobriety, there was plenty of joy on hand at the Kelly-Strayhorn Theater, both on and off the stage. The family-oriented audience was pleased to be part of an event guaranteed not to degenerate into violence in two hours.
The artists at the center of the whirling poetic and musical firmament that evening call themselves the BridgeSpotters Collective. They've been around since 1996, building community and corporate support while marching inexorably toward a critical mass of enlightened urban expression in Pittsburgh.
In a series of poetic monologues that followed performances by the Solomon Steelpan Company, Nego Gato Inc. and members of the Urban League Charter School, the BridgeSpotters waded into the heart of contemporary black life with refreshing philosophical finesse. Imagine a version of the Wu Tang Clan in which every member performs intricate poetry while staying out of jail as a matter of course.
Kamau Ware, the collective's founder and visionary director, has avoided the artistic pitfalls that sidelined the Scratch Poets, an innovative Pittsburgh group with similar ambitions that fell apart in the mid-1990s. The Scratch Poets imploded from the excesses of most of its members. Ware and his collaborators appear wary of fashionable nihilism and despair.
"Our mission statement provides our direction," Kamau told me the following evening as we stood on the Seventh Street Bridge. He was carrying two copies of Carnegie Mellon University professor Richard Florida's new book, "The Rise of the Creative Class." We'd bumped into each other at the Andy Warhol Museum reception for the author earlier in the evening.
"[BridgeSpotters] wants to establish an intellectual and artistically vibrant urban culture," Kamau said. "Museums and universities occupy urban spaces, but 'urban' remains synonymous with violence and decadence." Kamau said that he and his compatriots are determined to change such narrow perceptions of their environment and their world.
In the coming months, this column will explore the philosophy of local visionaries like the BridgeSpotters' Kamau Ware, public intellectuals like Richard Florida and other artists, activists and corporate citizens dedicated to changing Pittsburgh's cultural and political life for the better.
Evenings like the one last Friday at the Kelly-Strayhorn Theater happen more often than most of us suspect.
Tony Norman's email: tnorman@post-gazette.com
E-mail this story 
