Композитор Джонатан Уитни выпустил джазовый альбом, посвященный истории чернокожих жителей места сражения в Куш-бридже

As a kid growing up in the Cooch's Bridge Farms neighborhood, Jonathan Whitney enjoyed fishing at Cooch's Bridge and hiking around the surrounding land. "A core memory of mine is climbing the dam and seeing the pond up there," Whitney said. At the time, he didn't give a lot of thought to the history of Cooch's Bridge, which was the site of Delaware's only Revolutionary War battle. But his boyhood experiences have come full circle in the past few years as he was commissioned to compose music based on that history. He was invited to the site by Vince Watchorn, president of the Friends of Cooch's Bridge Historic Site, which is supporting the state-led effort to turn the Old Baltimore Pike property into a public museum. "At that point, I said, I need to write music about this place because it's both historic, and it's part of my history, too" Whitney said. Whitney has composed three pieces about Cooch's Bridge, one about the Cooch family, one about the battle and one about the African American experience at the site. The latter is an 18-track jazz suite that was released last week. It includes both musical compositions and spoken-word pieces that tell the history of the enslaved people, indentured servants and employees of the Cooch family who lived or worked at the site over the years. Whitney said his favorite song, "We're Free," tells the story of Benjamin Harris Martin, an enslaved man who fought as a soldier at the Battle of Cooch's Bridge in 1777. He was later freed by Alexander Martin, a colonel in the North Carolina regiment. "He was given 440 acres and everything he needed to set up intergenerational wealth through farming for his family," Whitney said. "The song I wrote is about the moment he finds that out, and he's walking down the street with 400 acres on this side and 40 acres on that side, dancing and thinking about being free with his family." Another song is about Ardessia Douglas, who worked as a live-in caretaker for Eleanor Cooch in the 1960s. She only lived there for a few years, but she was so beloved that the bedroom where she stayed is still known as "Ardessia's room." "She left such a mark on the family, she has to have a song," Whitney said. A graduate of Glasgow High School and the University of Delaware, Whitney is a drummer and composer and leads the band The Whitney Project. He earned a master's degree in jazz studies from the University of the Arts in Philadelphia and is the artist-in-residence at the Episcopal Church of Saints Andrew and Matthew in Wilmington. He describes his style as merging jazz idioms with classical forms. Whitney said his history-based pieces start with a lot of research. "I take all of that, and then the music starts to come," he said. "I do a lot of research first, and then sit down at the piano and think about that research and think, all right, what tells that story?" His goal is for the music to inspire listeners to think about history from a different perspective.  "I hope it humanizes this history," he said. "The historians have to stick to facts, but I can ask about the things we don't know. What were they like? Did they whistle? Did they dance?" A fourth piece inspired by Cooch's Bridge, focused on the indigenous presence at the site, is set to be released next year. "Cooch's Bridge: The African American Presence" is available for purchase on CD or vinyl at jwwmusic.com and is also on all major streaming platforms.