Post-election, legendary jazz musician Wynton Marsalis told #FortuneGlobalForum that U.S. democracy is always “in swing.”
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00:00The fundamental of democracy is no king.
00:02Okay, and because you don't have a king, then you have to figure
00:05out how to negotiate space.
00:07So in jazz, you could be the leader of a band,
00:10but if you solo all night, democracy has the element of choice.
00:14You can choose to expend as much of your energy as you can expend
00:17on the rights of others, or you can expend it all
00:20on yourself and what you think.
00:21Jazz is the same way.
00:23One person could solo for 15 or 20 minutes,
00:25and there could be nine other people lined up waiting to play.
00:28And the rhythm section, which is the piano, bass, and drums,
00:31they tend to, when you solo too long,
00:34they do a thing that we call breathe.
00:36At the top of a cycle, we play on forms that are like a clock,
00:39has a certain number of bars.
00:41When you play too long, the rhythm section goes.
00:43And you can choose then to play through that.
00:47So the element of choice, the fact that we do not have a king,
00:51and the fact that the more global your understanding is,
00:55the more you can perceive what other people are doing,
00:57and the more successful you can be as a player in a group,
01:00but you may not be more successful as an individual soloist.