Next at the Kennedy Center

JASON: 'Cause I think there are people in, in our history who really go through a lot of effort to find a, a meaningful and poetic way to tell you about your life.

They sacrificed themselves and tell you about you.

For a lot of us, Toni Morrison is one of these people.

CHRISTIAN: Sister Morrison, that's right.

JASON: Right?

So, during the... For years people have been crying at Toni Morrison novels, and laughing at Toni Morrison novels.

But, what she also does is she paints this music.

Often, she's talking about this music that happens on this stage.

And I wrote a piece for her based on a, a, a fragment or a section of, The Song of Solomon.

So, we're gonna play a song for Toni Morrison, it's called, Toni Morrison Said Black is a Rainbow.

(audience applause).

(piano solo).

(piano solo).

(piano stops) JASON: "We were lost then and talking about dark.

See, you think dark is just one color, but it ain't.

It's five or six kinds of black.

Some silky, some woolly.

Some just empty.

Some like fingers.

And it don't stay still, it moves and changes from one kind of black to another.

Saying something is pitch black is like saying something is green.

What kind of green?

Green like my bottles?

Or green like a grasshopper?

Or green like lettuce, or cucumber, or green like the sky is just before it breaks loose to storm?

Well, night black is the same way.

May as well be a rainbow."

Toni Morrison, Song of Solomon.

(audience applause).

JASON: Uh!

JASON: Uh!

(bass solo) (audience applause).

(tempo slows) (song ends) (audience applause)