Murray, Albert L. 1916–

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Albert L. Murray 1916–

Novelist, essayist, biographer, philosopher

A well-known author and essayist, Albert L. Murray has been called, according to Malcolm Jones, Jr. in Newsweek, one of the “most influential cultural figures” of the twentieth century. Murray’s writings cover a variety of subjects, most notably his focus on African-American culture and music. Although most clearly identified as a spokesperson for African-American culture and widely acknowledged as one of black America’s foremost thinkers, Murray himself rejected that label, pointing out that his skin is brown, not black (he prefers the designations “Negro” or “colored”), and that all Americans, black and white, share a common culture. He has called himself simply an American writer. According to Murray, that common culture is most eloquently expressed in blues and jazz music; somewhat like writer Amiri Baraka, who characterized black Americans as a “blues people,” Murray identified a “blues idiom” that gives Americans the spirit and wit to overcome adversity.

In novels, essays, travel narratives, poems, and other forms, Murray has expressed his ideas with at least three mutually reinforcing levels: he writes, in the broadest sense, about the blues, in a style that resembles the blues, creating works that embody what he sees as a blues aesthetic of survival, perseverance, and a positive spirit in the face of difficulty. The writer who has created this complex style took much of a lifetime to forge it; he did not publish his first book until his sixth decade.

Albert Lee Murray was born to a single mother in Nokomis, Alabama, on May 12, 1916. He was taken in and raised by a couple in the Magazine Point neighborhood of nearby Mobile, and his teachers recognized him as uncommonly intelligent while he was still a young child. Murray was sent to the Mobile County Training School, an institution whose strong-willed and oratorically gifted teachers were the source of an influence Murray has often acknowledged.

Attended Tuskegee Institute

Murray moved on to the flagship of the pre-integration system of black higher education in the South: the Tuskegee Institute. He studied the classics of European literature and received a bachelor’s degree in education there in 1939. Of special influence during this time were the works of Austrian novelist Thomas Mann, who incorporated the music of classical composers Beethoven and Wagner into his mode of storytelling.

At a Glance …

Born Albert Lee Murray in Nokomis, Alabama, June 12, 1916; raised in Mobile, Alabama area. Married Mozelle Menefee, May 31, 1941, one child. Education: Graduated from Mobile County Training School; Tuskegee Institute, B.S. in education with much literature study, 1939; postgraduate work, University of Michigan, 1940, Northwestern University, 1941; New York University, M.A., 1948; University of Paris, Paris France, postgraduate study, 1950. Military service: U.S. Air Force, 1943-62; reached rank of major.

Career: Writer and educator. Taught at Tuskegee Institute, 1940s-50s; trained Tuskegee Airmen during World War II; moved to New York City, early 1960s; published numerous essays, 1960s; published first book, The Omni-Americans, a collection of essays, 1970; published trilogy of semi-autobiographical novels: Train Whistle Guitar, 1974; The Spyglass Tree, 1991; The Seven League Boots, 1996; worked with Count Basie on Basie’s autobiography, early 1980s; published several volumes of essays and musical criticism; numerous visting lectureships at various colleges and universities, 1970s-90s.

Selected Awards: Lillian Smith Award for fiction, for Train Whistle Guitar, 1974; ASCAP Deems Taylor Award for musical criticism, for Stomping the Blues, 1976; National Book Critics’ Circle Lifetime Achievement Award, 1996; numerous honorary doctoral degrees.

Address: 45 W. 132nd St., New York, NY 10037.

After doing graduate work at the University of Michigan and Northwestern University, Murray returned to Tuskegee, teaching English there for many years and also joining the U.S. Air Force. He became one of the trainers of the Tuskegee Airmen who distinguished themselves during World War II. Murray himself spent time in the great capitals of Europe during a stretch when he was stationed in Morocco; he studied at the University of Paris for a time. While stationed in the northeastern United States he completed an M.A. at New York University in 1948.

After retiring from the military with the rank of major in 1962, Murray moved with his wife and family to New York’s Harlem neighborhood and turned to writing in earnest. His first book, The Omni-Americans (1970), collected essays he had published during the 1960s. In these writings Murray emphasized the idea of an American culture composed of a unique mixture of elements, taking sharp issue both with black separatists and with the predominant white sociological writings of the day that emphasized only grim pathologies in the black experience. Murray then published the travel narrative South to a Very Old Place (1972), an account of a trip he made to his hometown of Mobile, with side visits to Tuskegee, Memphis, and other locales; the book, containing vivid descriptions of Mobile’s black community, embodied Murray’s original and very musical prose style.

Penned Autobiographical Trilogy

Murray’s other writings of the 1970s included the first novel of an eventual autobiographical trilogy, Train Whistle Guitar (1974), which depicted the coming-of-age of an intelligent Mobile youth named Scooter. The other two works of the trilogy followed Scooter to Tuskegee (The Spyglass Tree, 1991), and into a swing-era jazz band (The Seven League Boots, 1996); Murray considered himself a fiction writer foremost. For many years, however, music came to the fore in his writing.

In such books as The Hero and the Blues (1973) and Stomping the Blues (1976), the second of which won the music industry’s Deems Taylor Award for music criticism, Murray expressed his ideas about the place of blues and jazz in American culture. According to him, the “blues hero” is not simply a musician but the embodiment of black experience and values. Murray also regarded improvisation within a framework of a communal tradition as critical to the spirit of confrontation that resulted in the improvement of the conditions of black life in America. In other works, such as The Blue Devils of Nada (1996), he argued that the blues animated the spirit of American life itself, offering inspiration not only to African Americans beset by racism, but to anyone troubled by the lack of meaning in modern life.

A passage from The Blue Devils of Nada illustrates Murray’s unique style, seemingly composed by turns of Southern downhome speech and European didactic argument. In this passage, he argues that a complete realization of the blues attitude towards life is not only necessary for blacks but for any group of people. He says that, “a fully orchestrated blues statement” is “a fundamental device for confrontation, improvisation, and existential affirmation: a strategy for acknowledging the fact that life is a lowdown dirty shame and for improvising or riffing on the exigencies of the predicament.” In general, Murray states, suffering is a given, but can be overcome. “To protest the existence of dragons (or even hooded or unhooded Grand Dragons for that matter) is not only sentimental but naive,” he concluded.

Worked with Count Basie

Murray put his interest in music to work in practical realms in the 1980s, taking a decade off from his own writings to work with jazz bandleader Count Basie on his autobiography, Good Morning Blues (1985). He helped found and served on the board of directors of the Jazz at Lincoln Center concert series, a major institution that presented jazz as an art form comparable to classical symphonic music or opera. In the 1990s, approaching his 80th year, Murray once again began to write prolifically despite being slowed by a series of spine operations.

In addition to the second and third Scooter novels and The Blue Devils of Nada, Murray published a volume of poetry, Aubades: Epic Exits and Other Twelve Bar Riffs (2001), a new book of essays, From the Briarpatch File (2001), a collection of letters he had exchanged with his Tuskegee contemporary Ralph Ellison, and an art exhibition catalogue devoted to the work of his friend Romare Bearden. Late in life, Murray was feted with a parade of honorary doctoral degrees, one of them from his alma mater of Tuskegee. He was presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Book Critics’ Circle in 1996.