Samples of Jazz Music:

http://www.pbs.org/jazz/beat/

This link will take you to Duke Ellington's album "Echoes of Harlem."  I chose this album because according to PBS, it was recorded on February 28, 1936 (and my birthday is February 29, leap year, and 1936 was a leap year, so it was almost recorded on my birthday but 40 years before I was born!)  One of the songs on this album is Sophisticated Lady: I'm in a Sentimental Mood and I really appreciate this song.

I do not know the background of the lyrics, but I do believe that the speaker is Ellington and he is addressing a woman whom he not only respects, but has deep affection and possibly longing for, such as a girlfriend or wife.    Duke sings "She's a different lady with a different style.  She stands tall and ready like the Eiffel Tower.  She is hip to politics, but loves her jazz.  She's got lots of rhythm, she's got lots of class..."  It's clear that this woman is unique because, like the Eiffel Tower, there is only one of her.  In comparing this lady to the Eiffel Tower Ellington explains that she is strong, and proud, but not arrogant ("she's got lots of class.")

Sophisticated Lady, although recorded after the official end of the Harlem Renaissance, still embodies the themes of this cultural rebirth: the theme that best reflects this song is the desire to reconstruct the meaning of "negro," especially negro women.  This negro lady is no longer cast in the role of pickananny or mammy; rather she is a lady in the truest sense of the word "she wears knee length dresses" indicates that she dresses with class.  "She's hip to politics" shows her intelligence and interest in national or even world affairs (and implies that she is a voter, as women gained the right to vote in 1920).  Finally, by describing the new negro woman as "the person you'd like to meet" the listeners gather that she has respect among the community as an equal, not as the subordinate old negro woman.

As the new black woman I can appreciate the sentiment to these lyrics--and the melody is just lovely!