Columbia College Chicago Digital Commons @ Columbia College Chicago Center for Black Music Research: Black Music Research Newsletter Publications Spring 4-1-1984 Black Music Research Newsletter, Spring 1984 Samuel Floyd Columbia College Chicago Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.colum.edu/cbmrnews Part of the Arts and Humanities Commons, and the Education Commons Recommended Citation Floyd, Samuel, "Black Music Research Newsletter, Spring 1984" (1984). Center for Black Music Research: Black Music Research Newsletter. 18. https://digitalcommons.colum.edu/cbmrnews/18 This Book is brought to you for free and open access by the Publications at Digital Commons @ Columbia College Chicago. It has been accepted for inclusion in Center for Black Music Research: Black Music Research Newsletter by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ Columbia College Chicago. For more information, please contact [email protected]. BLACK MUSIC RESEARCH NEWSLETTER COLUMBIA COLLEGE CHICAGO/FISK UNIVERSITY Volume 6, No. 2 ISSN Number 0271-3799 Spring1984 Afro-American Folksong Scholarship by Darius Thieme, Fisk University Originally published as the text for a brochure of the Fisk University Learning Library Program, 1982. Presented here in revised form. The repertoire of Afro-American such as the John Connu festival, autobiographical study, Really The folksong is extensive, and scholarship described by Nancy R. Ping in "Black Blues, presents the urban social in the field has been concerned with Musical Activities in Antebellum context from a white musician's several genres, principally the blues, Wilmington, North Carolina ." Replete perspective. A very interesting spirituals, gospel songs, secular with special costumes, song repertory. footnote should be added. T he folksongs, and instrumental music. and dances, this event is clearly of literature concerning the blues has The subject of the African heritage has African derivation. The same festival long included scholarly speculation also received attention. has also been reported in Jamaica by concerning its African heritage. Judith Bettelheim and others, and its Michael Coolen's recent detailed For interested readers, there are source lies in West African analysis, 'The Fodet: A Senegambian several bibliographies that list and masquerade celebrations. Among the Origin for the Blues?" presents classify the extensive literature of this early essays that discuss the African compelling evidence in a particular field. The first major compilation is musical heritage are the articles case. Perhaps a new ray of l ight may given in Charles Haywood's reprinted in Katz's The Social have been shed upon this vast topic, Bibliography of North American Implications of Early Negro Music in suggesting new avenues for Folklore and Folksong. Successive the United States. Dating prior to the comparative research. bibliographies have included those by Civil War, these sources report the use Zelma W. George, Portia K. A few of the landmark studies on the of African and African-derived spiritual are John W. Work's Folk Maultsby, John F. Szwed and Roger musical instruments, dances and Abrahams, Dominique-Rene de Songs of the American Negro, John songs. Also worthy of mention are Lerma, and this writer. W. Work lll's American Negro Dena J. Epstein's study. "The Folk Spirituals, and Miles Mark Fisher's The Maultsby work is a model for Banjo: A Documentary History," Negro Slave Songs in the United selectivity, classification. and breadth which traces the development of the States. George Pullen Jackson's White of study. It is helpful, accessible, and banjo from its basic source in Africa, and Negro Spirituals ignited a forest thorough within its stated limits. The and Charles Wolfe's Tennessee Strings: fire of controversy concerning the two-volume work by Swed and Tlte Story of Country Music in musical interrelationships delineated, Abrahams, which lists over 6,450 Tennessee. and questioned the degree of influence entries in some 870 pages. is the first Turning next to the blues, a number of of one genre upon the other. recent attempt at being significant works have appeared Subsequent scholars have since aligned comprehensive. Perhaps the best way dealing with the genre, its country and themselves on both sides of the issue of to keep in touch with the most current city (or rural and urban} song types, influence; others have straddled the writing in this field is to check the and their history in performance. A fence. Recent studies of the spiritual recent issues of The Black Perspective few of the more prominent of these are include Portia K. Maultsby's "Black in Music and the "Current LeRoi Jones's Blues People, Jarry L. Spirituals: An Analysis of Textual Bibliography" section of Oster's Living Country Blues, Jeff Forms and Structure," William £thnomusicology. compiled by Joseph Titan's Early Downhome Blues: A Tallmadge's "The Black in Jackson's C. Hickerson and Louise S. Spear. Cultural Analysis, and Charles Keil's White Spirituals," John E. Taylor's The topic of African heritage and its Urban Blues. Mezz Mezzrow's classic "Somethin' On My Mind: A Cultural impact upon folksong has been and Historical Interpretation of discussed widely. One area of interest has been special holiday celebrations, Continued 011 page 2 - 2 Spiritual Texts," and James H. Cone's Americans, John Storm Robert s's Boyer, Horace C. "Gospel Music The Spiritual and the Blues: An Black Music of Two Worlds. John Comes of Age." Black World, 33 Interpretation. Lovell's Black Song: The Forge and the (November 1973), 42-48; 79-86. Flame, Harold Courlander's Negro Recent scholarly studies of gospel Brewer, J. Mason. American Negro Folk Music, U.S.A., J. Mason Brewer's music have inc;luded Jacqueline C. Folklore. Chicago: Quadrangle Books, American Negro Folklore, Richard DjeDje's analytical work, American 1968. Dorson's Folklore and Folklife: An Black Spiritual and Gospel Songs from Introduction, Lawrence M. Levine's Cone, James H. The Spirituals and the Southeast Georgia, Pearl Williams­ Black Culture and Black Blues: An Interpretation. New York: Jones's "Afro-American Gospel Music: Consciousness, and Dominique-Rene Seabury Press, 1972. A Crystallization of the Black de Lerma's Reflections on Afro­ Aesthetic," Horace C. Boyer's "Gospel Coolen, Michael T. "The Fodet: A Music Comes of Age," and Irene V. American Music. Senegambian Origin for the Blues?" Jackson's Afro-American Religious In a yet wider context, the song is seen The Black Perspective i11 Music, 10 Music: A Bibliography and a as a dynamic continuum-as part of a (1982), 69-84. Catalogue of Gospel Music. worldwide cultural matrix which, on a Courlander, Harold. Negro Folk broad social level, may be subjected to The first major collection of Afro­ Music, U.S.A. New York: Columbia analysis. Alan Lomax and his research American folksongs was W. F. Allen's University Press, 1963. associates have developed Slave Songs of the United States. De Lerma, Dominque-Rene. Many other anthologies have since cantometrics, a methodology and system for objective song analysis, and Bibliography of Black Music, Volume appeared, inchuding Alan Lomax's have projected its utility in viewing the I: Reference Materials. Westport, Folk Songs of North America, Jerry Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1981. Silverman's Folk Blues, Lydia Parrish's position of song as a cultural element. The methodology is described in two Slave Songs of the Georgia Sea DjeDje, Jacqueline C. American Black books by Lomax, Folk Song Style and Islands, and the collections by John Spiritual and Gospel Songs from W. Work Ill and George Pullen Culture, and Cantornetrics: A11 Soutlteast Georgia. Monograph No. Jackson previously mentioned. Approach to the Anthropology of 7. Los Angeles: University of California, Music. Analyses using the Center for Afro-American Studies, An intriguing footnote to the topic of cantometrics method show the 1978. folksong is the impact of modern homogeneity of African and Afro­ radio, television, and recorded American musics as cultural Dorson, Richard, ed. Folklore and productions 0111 the definition of components, and the relation to other Folklife: An Introduction. Chicago: folksong. Walter Wiora traces the factors in these cultures. The prospect University of Chicago Press, 1972. history of folksong in '"Reflections on is that the analysis of musical data by Epstein, Dena J. 'The Folk Banjo: A the Problem: How Old Is the Concept using the cantometrics method may Documentary History." Folksong?" Historically, the term enable comparisons on a worlwide Ethnomusicology, 19 (1975), 347-371. folksong meant a song of a particular basis among cultures, customs, people. orally transmitted, and traditions, beliefs, and musical Fisher, Miles M. Negro Slave Songs in existing in a repertoire, usually with elements. the United States. Ithaca: Cornell several versions. One must ask, in this University Press, 1953. In summary, the research briefly cited context, where do composed songs George, Zelma W. A Guide to Negro that are absorbed into the repertoire fit above has cast some light upon the complexity of the problems which Music: An Annotated Bibliograplry of in, as in the case of gospel song, and Negro Art and Music by Negro how does one compare a modern scholars of Afro-American folksong encounter. Few solutions have been Composers. Ann Arbor: University singer (and his repertoire) such as a Microfilms, 1953. Charley Pride or B. 8. King with a reached, but many promising trends Mississippi John Hurt or Blind Lemon have been noted in the research. Haywood, Charles. Bibliography of Perhaps most progress has been made Jefferson 7 Also, consider the case of a Nortlr American Folklore and popular song by a black composer that in describing the boundaries of the Folksong. 2nd rev. ed. New York: is absorbed and reemerges many years topic and the breadth and depth of the Dover Publications, 1961. African heritage, developing later as a country song, as reported in Jackson, George Pullen. White and qualifying terms and definitions, and William Kearns's "From Black to Negro Spirituals.