Boogie Woogie is back (thanks to China)

 In a notorious act of censorship, Chinese activists tried to stop a local piano player from playing a public piano in a public place. Why? Did they hate music?

No: probably because they were handing out Chinese propaganda and didn't want to be filmed.

Of course, he wasn't filming them: They were in the background and most folk simply wouldn't notice what they were doing.

Watch the video: The first ten minutes shows piano playing by Dr. K and friend, until the Chinese government activists, who have been standing in the background and didn't bother to move, finally realized they were being filmed, tried to censor him. They  affront him (start video at nine minutes) to tell him to stop playing:

this caused a bit of an international kerfuffle, including the Chinese government pushing their fake story on social media and the activists trying to get the actual video censored since it shows the truth.

 it was the activists who were passing out Chinese propaganda to passerbys, who essentially started the incident by simply not bothering to back up ten feet so that their faces could not be seen. But never mind. They are China, and routinely censor stories they don't like (heck, the tech savvy Philippine Coast guard guys have them in a temper tantrum because they dared to film their aggressive moves against both the PCG and small fishermen inside the Philippine waters).

But there is something out there called the Streisand effect: as Wikipedia notes:

The Streisand effect is an unintended consequence of attempts to hide, remove, or censor information, where the effort instead backfires by increasing public awareness of the information

so the effect of the kerfuffle is to make the Chinese propaganda look absurd, but it also might have increased awareness of music that wants to make you dance:  you know: happy music that has a melody and happy lyrics that encourage people instead of making them mad.

Dr. K's videos, including playing this same piano, go back a couple of years, so it's not like he is new in "disturbing the peace". He has 2 million followers and after a couple of TV interviews it's probably more.

But he isn't hogging the spotlight: He routinely posts others playing boogie woogie etc.on his youtube site.

so if Gen Z watches his video, could this maybe start them being interested in actual music instead of the rap music being passed off as music nowaday?

well, given the popularity of Taylor Swift, whose music resembles old time Nashville etc,

   

  and Lady Gaga singing oldies with Tony Bennet,

 

there might be hope for the music world returning to music that can actually be enjoyed by all.