Title: Negro workaday songs
Author: Howard Washington Odum
Guy Benton Johnson
Release date: November 18, 2022 [eBook #69378]
Language: English
Original publication: New Caledonia: University of North Carolina Press, 1926
Credits: Tim Lindell, Harry Lamé, Jude Eylander and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
Please see the Transcriber’s Notes at the end of this text.
The cover image and music transcriptions have been created for this e-text and are in the public domain.
THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA
SOCIAL STUDY SERIES
THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA SOCIAL STUDY SERIES |
|
The Negro and His Songs | $3.00 |
Folk Beliefs of the Southern Negro | 5.00 |
Negro Workaday Songs | 3.00 |
Southern Pioneers | 2.00 |
Law and Morals | 2.00 |
The Scientific Study of Human Society | 2.00 |
Systems of Public Welfare | 2.00 |
Roads to Social Peace | 1.50 |
The Country Newspaper | 1.50 |
Children’s Interest in Reading | 1.50 |
NEGRO WORKADAY SONGS
BY
HOWARD W. ODUM, Ph.D.
Kenan Professor of Sociology and Director of
the School of Public Welfare, University of
North Carolina
AND
GUY B. JOHNSON, A.M.
Institute for Research in Social Science,
University of North Carolina
CHAPEL HILL
THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA PRESS
LONDON: HUMPHREY MILFORD
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
1926
[vii]
Copyright, 1926, By
The University of North Carolina Press
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Presses of
Edwards & Broughton Company
RALEIGH
[viii]
A vast throng of Negro workaday singers, mirrors of a race
Workingmen in the Southern United States from highway, construction camp, from railroad and farm, from city and countryside, a million strong
A half million migrants from the South, Eastward, Northward, Westward, and some South again
Negro offenders in thousand fold in local jails, county chain gangs, state and federal prisons
A horde of Southern casual laborers and wanderers down that lonesome road
A brown black army of “bad men”—creepers and ramblers and jamboree breakers, “travelin’ men” de luxe
Itinerant full-handed musicianers, music physicianers and songsters, singly, in pairs, quartets, always moving on
A host of women workers from field and home and factory at once singers and subjects of the lonesome blues
A swelling crescendo, a race vibrato inimitable, descriptive index of group character, folk urge and race power
Negro Workaday Songs is the third volume of a series of folk background studies of which The Negro and His Songs was the first and Folk-Beliefs of the Southern Negro was the second. The series will include a number of other volumes on the Negro and likewise a number presenting folk aspects of other groups. The reception which the first volumes have received gives evidence that the plan of the series to present scientific, descriptive, and objective studies in as interesting and readable form as possible may be successful in a substantial way. Since the data for background studies are, for the time being, practically unlimited, it is hoped that other volumes, appearing as they become available and timely, may glimpse the whole range—from the Negro “bad man” to the æsthetic in the folk urge.
In this volume, as in previous ones, the emphasis is primarily social, although this indicates no lack of appreciation of the inherent literary and artistic values of the specimens presented. Indeed, so far as possible, all examples of folk expression in this volume are left to tell their own story. The type melodies and musical notations are presented separately with the same descriptive purpose as the other chapters, and they are not offered as a substitute for effective harmonies and musical interpretation. For the purposes of this volume, however, the separate chapters on the melodies and phono-photographic records with musical notations are very important. It is also important that they be studied separately, but in the light of the preceding chapters, rather than inserted in the text to detract from both the social and artistic interpretation of the songs enumerated.
[xi]
The Seashore-Metfessel phono-photographic records and musical notations mark an important contribution to the whole field of interpretation of Negro music. There may be an outstanding contribution both to the musical world and to the whole interpretation of Negro backgrounds in the possible thesis that the Negro, in addition to his distinctive contribution to harmony, excels also in the vibrato quality of the individual voice. These studies were made at Chapel Hill and at Hampton by Dr. Carl E. Seashore and Dr. Milton Metfessel of the University of Iowa, under the auspices of the Institute for Research in Social Science at the University of North Carolina through a special grant of the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial. Full acknowledgment to them is here made.
It should be kept constantly in mind that this volume, like The Negro and His Songs, is in no sense an anthology or general collection, but represents the group of songs current in certain areas in North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Georgia, during the years 1924-25. Of course all of this collection cannot be included in this volume; and no doubt many of the most important or most attractive specimens extant have escaped us at this time. It is also important to note that in this volume, as in the previous one, all specimens listed, except lines or references otherwise designated, were taken directly from Negro singers and do not represent reports from memory of white individuals. So far as we know none of the songs in this collection has been published, although there are countless variations, adaptations and corruptions of the modern blues and jazz songs represented in the group. The songs, however, were all[xii] sung or repeated by actual Negro workers or singers, and much of their value lies in the exact transcription of natural lines, words, and mixtures. The collection is still growing by leaps and bounds. In this volume every type is represented except the “dirty dozen” popular models and the more formal and sophisticated creations.
Since this volume presents a series of pictures of the Negro as portrayed through his workaday songs it is important that all chapters be read before any final judgment is made. Even then the picture will not be complete. It has not been possible, of course, to make any complete or accurate classification of the songs. They overlap and repeat. They borrow sentiment and expression and repay freely. Free labor song becomes prison song, and chain gang melody turns to pick-and-shovel accompaniment. The chapter divisions, therefore, are made with the idea of approximating a usable classification and providing such mechanical divisions as will facilitate the best possible presentation.
The reader who approaches this volume from the point of view of the technical student of folk song will likely be disappointed at what he considers the lack of discrimination displayed by the authors in admitting so many songs which cannot be classed as strictly folk songs. We have frankly taken the position that these semi-folk songs, crude and fragmentary, and often having only local or individual significance, afford even more accurate pictures of Negro workaday life and art than the conventional folk songs. While we have spared no effort to make the collection valuable for folk song students, we have approached the work primarily as sociologists.
[xiii]
For assistance in recording the type melodies in Chapter XIV we are specially indebted to Mr. Lee M. Brooks, and for many of the songs of women to Mrs. Henry Odum. We wish to thank Mr. Gerald W. Johnson for his goodness in going over much of the manuscript and making valuable suggestions. To Dr. L. R. Wilson, Director of the University of North Carolina Press, we are much indebted for coöperation and suggestions.
Chapel Hill
H. W. O.
January, 1926
G. B. J.
CHAPTER | PAGE | |
---|---|---|
I. | Background Resources in Negro Songs and Work | 1 |
II. | The Blues: Workaday Sorrow Songs | 17 |
III. | Songs of the Lonesome Road | 35 |
IV. | Bad Man Ballads and Jamboree | 47 |
V. | Songs of Jail, Chain Gang, and Policemen | 71 |
VI. | Songs of Construction Camps and Gangs | 88 |
VII. | Just Songs to Help With Work | 118 |
VIII. | Man’s Song of Woman | 135 |
IX. | Woman’s Song of Man | 152 |
X. | Folk Minstrel Types | 166 |
XI. | Workaday Religious Songs | 188 |
XII. | The Annals and Blues of Left Wing Gordon | 206 |
XIII. | John Henry: Epic of the Negro Workingman | 221 |
XIV. | Types of Negro Melodies | 241 |
XV. | Types of Phono-photographic Records of Negro Singers | 252 |
Bibliography | 265 | |
Index to Songs | 271 |
NEGRO WORKADAY SONGS
[1]
To discover and present authentic pictures of the Negro’s folk background as found in his workaday songs is a large and promising task of which there are many phases. Here are spontaneous products of the Negro’s workaday experiences and conflicts. Here are reflections of his individual strivings and his group ways. Here are specimens of folk art and creative effort close to the soil. Here are new examples of the Negro’s contributions to the American scene. Here is important material for the newer scientific interest which is taking the place of the old sentimental viewpoint. And here is a mine of descriptive and objective data to substitute for the emotional and subjective attitudes of the older days.
It is a day of great promise in the United States when both races, North and South, enter upon a new era of the rediscovery of the Negro and face the future with an enthusiasm for facts, concerning both the newer creative urge and the earlier background sources. Concerning the former, Dr. Alain Locke recently has said:[1] “Whoever wishes to see the Negro in his essential traits, in the full perspective of his achievement and possibilities, must seek the enlightenment of that self-portraiture which the present development of the Negro culture offers.” One of the best examples of that self-portraiture is that of the old spirituals, long neglected, but now happily the subject of a new race dedication and appreciation. Now comes another[2] master index of race temperament and portrayal, as found in some of the Negro’s newer creations. No less important, from the viewpoint of sheer originality and poetic effort as well as of indices of traits and possibilities, are the seemingly unlimited mines of workaday songs, weary blues, and black man ballads. In a previous volume[2] we presented a sort of composite picture from two hundred songs gathered two decades ago and interpreted with something of prophetic evaluation. In this volume of Negro Workaday Songs is presented a deeper mine of source material, rich in self-portraiture and representative of the workaday Negro.
[1] The New Negro, edited by Alain Locke.
[2] The Negro and His Songs, by Howard W. Odum and Guy B. Johnson.
In his Peter the Czar, violent story of “lashed sentences,” perfectly suited to the depiction of primitive character, Klabund pictures vividly a certain Great Enemy about whose “shivering shoulders lay a rainbow like a silken shawl.” Digging to the syncopated rhythm of song and fast-whirling pick, a Negro workman sings of another rainbow, equally vivid and shoulder-draped, more concrete, personal, and real:
[3] Musical notation will be found in Chapter XIV.
In addition to the poetic imagery in this seemingly unconscious motor-minded product, one may glimpse evidences of simple everyday experience, wishful thought, childlike faith, workaday stolidity, physical[3] satisfaction, and subtle humor. But he can find still more humor and experience, with a good bit of metaphor thrown in for good measure, in the “feet rollin’” stanza of another wanderer’s song of the road:
Resourcefulness, humor, defense mechanism, imagination, all might be found in the spectacle of a group of Negroes singing over and over again on a hot July day the refreshing lines,
With the thermometer around a hundred, and the work of digging at hand, this song of “parts,” with some of the singers using the words, “be so cold, be so cold” as an echo, undoubtedly had peculiar merit.
Perhaps there have been few, if any, lines of poetry more popular than Wordsworth’s “The light that never was on sea or land.” The Negro worker sings of a more earthly yet equally miraculous light to guide his pathway, when he complains,
How much of symbolism is to be found in the Negro’s workaday songs? How much subjective imagery, how much unconscious allegory? There are abundant examples of the free use of symbolism in his love songs and popular jazz appeals. But what does he mean when he sings,
Or contrast this simple individual song, with its humor and easy-going rhythm, with the power and appeal of group singing. Here is a goodly party of two-score white folk, seated at twilight under the trees in a grove, joyous guests at a turkey dinner near the old colonial home. There is merriment. Song and jest, toast and cheer abound. The waiters have gone. Then from the kitchen door comes the song of Negroes, beginning low, rising in volume, telling of the sinking of the Titanic. What is it in that final harmony of “God moved upon the waters,” sung by a Negro group, which silenced the merrymakers into willing recognition that here may be perfect art and perfect effect? Does this Negro minstrel type, rendered thus in native setting, become for the moment the perfect expression of folk spirit and folk art?
Hundreds of verses dedicated to the business of moving about give evidence that the trail of the black knight of the road is strewn with spontaneous[5] song, often turned into polished phrase. A favorite stanza has long been descriptive of being “on road here few days longer, then I’ll be going home.” Sung again and again, the song takes on a new form but loses nothing of its emphatic meaning:
For, says the worker, “If I feel tomorrow like I feel today, I’m gonna pack my suitcase and walk away,” and “reason I’m workin’ here so long, hot flambotia and coffee strong.”
Following the trail of the workaday Negro, therefore, one may get rare glimpses of common backgrounds of Negro life and experience in Southern communities. Here were the first real plantings of the modern blues, here songs of the lonesome road, here bad man ballads, here distinctive contributions in songs of jail and chain gang, here songs of white man and captain, here Negro Dr. Jekyls and Mr. Hydes. Here are found new expressions of the old spirituals and remnants still surviving. Here man’s song of woman is most varied and original, and woman’s song of man is best echoed from days and nights of other times. Here are reflected the epics of John Henry, Lazarus, Dupree, and the others. Here are folk fragments, cries and “hollers,” songs to help with work, physical satisfaction and solace, the “Lawdy-Lawdy” vibrato of evening melancholy and morning yodel. Here may be found the subliminal jazz, rare rhythm and movement, coöperative harmony as characteristic as ever the old spirituals revealed. Nevertheless, too much emphasis[6] cannot be placed upon the danger of over-interpretation, for while the workaday songs provide a seemingly exhaustive supply of mirror plate for the reflection of folk temperament and struggle, too much analysis must not obscure their vividness or the beauty and value of their intrinsic qualities.
It is important to note the extent to which the notable popular blues of today, more formal embodiment of the Negro’s workaday sorrow songs, have come from these workaday products. Here are true descendants of the old worshipers who sang so well of the Rock in a weary land. And echoing from Southern distances, from Memphis and Natchez, from New Orleans and Macon, from Charleston and Atlanta, and from wayside roads and camps, from jail and chain gang, come unmeasured volume of harmony, unnumbered outbursts of song, perfect technique of plaintive appeal. Many of the most plaintive lines of blues yet recorded were gathered decades ago from camp and road in Mississippi before the technique of the modern blues had ever been evolved. Eloquent successors to the old spirituals with their sorrow-feeling, these songs of the lonesome road have gathered power and numbers and artistic interpretation until they defy description and record. Today the laborer, the migrant, the black man offender constitute types as distinctive and inimitable as the old jubilee singers and those whom they represented. Wherever Negroes work, or loaf, or await judgment, there may be heard the weary and lonesome blues so strange and varied as to reveal a sort of superhuman evidence of the folk soul. No amount of ordinary study into race backgrounds, or historical annals of African folk, or elaborate anthropological excursions can give so simply and completely the story of this Negro quest for expression,[7] freedom, and solace as these low-keyed melancholy songs.
And what names and lines, words and melodies, records and improvisations of the new race blues! Plaintive blues, jolly blues, reckless blues, dirty dozen blues, mama blues, papa blues,—more than six hundred listed by one publisher and producer. Here they are—the workaday sorrow songs, the errant love songs, the jazz lyrics of a people and of an age—as clearly distinctive as the old spirituals. And how like the road songs and the gang lines, straight up from the soil again, straight from the folk as surely as ever came the old spirituals.
Samples of the growing list of blues, some less elegant, some more aggressive, will be found in Chapter II. And of course we must not forget the bad man blues: Dangerous Blues, Evil Blues, Don’t Mess With Me Blues, Mean Blues, Wicked Blues, and most of all the Chain Gang Blues, Jail Blues, and the Cell-bound Blues.
And the singer presents, as one of his standard versions of many songs, a regular weekly calendar:
[8]
Perhaps the most common concept found in the chain gang and road songs and appearing here and there in all manner of song is the concept of a letter from home, the inability to go home without “ready money,” the attempt to borrow from the captain, or to get a parole.
A constant source of song is the conflict between actual conditions and desirable ends, between life as it is and ideals of wishful dreaming. “I want to go home,” says the workman, but “I don’t want no trouble wid de walker.” The resulting product is absence from home, absence of trouble with the captain or walker, and abundance of song.
Again and again the Negro wanderer portrays home, parents, brothers and sisters, friends, as the most highly esteemed of life’s values—striking paradox to the realism of his practice. Idealism in song and dreams, in workaday songs as well as spirituals,[9] alongside sordidness in living conditions and physical surroundings, appear logical and direct developments from the type of habitation which the Negro common man has ever known.
The Negro “bad man” who sings sorrowfully of his mother’s admonitions and his own mistakes, glories also in the motor-imaged refrain:
A later chapter is devoted to this notable character, the “bad man,” whose varied pictures represent a separate Negro contribution. Here are new and worthy Negro exhibits to add to the American galaxy of folk portraits: Railroad Bill alongside Jesse James, the Negro “bad man” beside the Western frontiersman, and John Henry by Paul Bunyan. For from the millions of Negroes of yesterday and as many more today, with their oft-changing and widely varying economic and social conditions, has come a rare and varied heritage of folk tradition, folk character, and folk personality. Much of this might remain forever unknown and unsung were it not for the treasure-house of Negro song, the product of a happy facility for linking up the realities of actual life with wishful thinking and imaginative story.
Of the grand old “saints,” white haired “Uncles” and “Aunties,” we have viewed from near and far scores of inimitable examples. Of the thousands of musicianers, songsters and workers, and those who sing “down that lonesome road,” recent epochs have mirrored many. But what of the real and mythical jamboree breakers and bad men, or of Po’ Lazarus and[10] Stagolee, or of John Henry, “forehanded steel-drivin’ man” and ideal of the Negro worker?
Here are rare folk figures silhouetted against a sort of shifting race background with its millions of working folk and wanderers moving suddenly and swiftly across the scene. A brown-black army of ramblers, creepers, high flyers, standin’ men, all-night workers, polish men, “stick and ready” from the four corners of the States—Lazarus, Billy Bob Russel, Shootin’ Bill, Brady, Dupree, and the others. And then John Henry, stately and strong in contrast, noble exponent of sturdy courage and righteous struggle, faithful to death.
A chapter on “Man’s Song of Woman” will make but a small beginning of a large task. Its sequel must be deferred until the lover’s specialisms can be published with a liberal usage of the psychiatrists’ terminology. A chapter on “Woman’s Song of Man” ought also to have a companion sequel in the book of Negro symbolism. A chapter on “Workaday Religious Songs” can present only a small portion of those now being sung, but will be representative of the present heritage of the old spirituals. A chapter on the miscellaneous fragments, “hollers,” lines, incoherent and expressive “Lawdy-Lawd-Lawds” gives one of the best pictures of the Negro workaday character and habits. Some of these types make a very good safety valve for the Negro singer; in a different way their plainness may restrain the enthusiast from setting too much “store” by all the Negro’s songs. The characters of John Henry and[11] Left Wing represent two types, one the mythical and heroic, the other the real and commonplace, both typical of the Negro’s idealism and his actual life. The examples of “movement and imagery” are as characteristic of the Negro workaday experience as were the harmonies and swaying of the old spirituals. They are indices to guide judgment and interpretation of the Negro temperament. In each of these chapters, it will be understood, only enough material is presented to illustrate the case, including, however, always the most representative specimens which the authors have been able to collect within their field and time limit. Much that is similar will necessarily await publication in volumes in which the chief objective will be preservation and completeness rather than interpretation.
Many pictures of the workaday Negro are presented in this volume through the medium of his songs. They are silhouetted, as it were, at first against a complex background of Negro life and experience. The pictures are vivid, concrete, distinct, often complete. But most of all, perhaps, they have been moving pictures. From the first glimpse of the Negro singer with his “feet’s gone to rollin’ jes’ lak a wheel,” to the last great scene of John Henry dying with the “hammer in his hand,” there is marvelous movement alongside rare imagery. Sometimes rhythm and rhyme, but always movement, have dominated the Negro’s chief characterizations. And this movement in the workaday songs is as much a distinctive feature as were the swaying bodies, the soothing rhythm, and swelling harmony of the old spirituals. Picture the Negro workingman in his song and story life and you picture him on the move.
It is scarcely possible to describe this element of movement in the Negro workaday songs. And yet[12] the mere citation and classification of representative examples will suffice to point out the particular qualities of action which might justify the added element of epic style, if one remembers that the singer’s concept of the heroic, while very real, is not exalted in the Greek sense. There are those who do not feel that the Negro’s workaday songs are characterized by the qualities of poetry; yet do they not arouse the feelings and imagination in vivid and colorful language? The type of language used—that is the Negro’s own. In the same way there can be no doubt of his songs emphasizing the quality of action; his heroes and principal figures, like his language, reflect his concepts and tell his stories. Whether epic or heroic,
has plenty of action and imagery in it. And it is characteristic of much of the Negro workaday style of talk, imagination, and thought.
Many of the pictures are vivid because of the action concept and the rhyming metaphors.
There was also a woman, one Eliza Stone, from a bad, bad land, who threatened to break up the jamboree with her razor but who also “jumped in de flo’, an’ doubled up her fist, say ‘You wanter test yo’ nerve jes’ jump against this.’” Note further a varying reel of moving characters and scenes.
[13]
The continuous search after the workaday folk song will always provide one of the most important guides to the “discovery” of the Negro. The task of finding and recording accurately the folk expression is a difficult one under most circumstances. Under certain circumstances it is an easy task, and always an interesting one. If we keep a record of efforts, taken at random, as experimental endeavor, in a cross country visit through North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Georgia, about ten per cent, at best, of the requests for songs will be successful. There are other times, when setting and procedure are worked out well, when almost one hundred per cent success would be attained. In most instances the Negro is at his “best” when being urged to coöperate in the rendering of his folk songs. By his “best” is meant that he reveals a striking nature and strong personality, whether in affirming stoutly that he knows no songs now or that he has forgotten what he used to know. He protests vigorously that he does not sing well enough, that he cannot say the words of songs unless he can sing, that he cannot sing unless others are singing, that he has to be in the spirit of the song, or that he will get some songs together and bring them in, or that he will bring a quartet or a pal. Rarely ever does he “produce” if let alone with only a first approach. Nor can he be blamed. He is entirely within his own self-protecting domain, so that his attitude may be put[14] down, not only as a characteristic one but also as a commendable one. He has his own fun, too, in the situation. In general there are several types from which little success may be expected. The more educated and sophisticated Negro not only does not as a rule coöperate, but looks with considerable condescension upon those who seek his help. There are many who believe that all songs desired are for immediate transcription to printed music or phonograph record. These are of little assistance. Others feel that some hidden motive is back of the request. Still others for various reasons do not coöperate. Nor will the Negro student or musician himself find ready coöperation among his common folk who feel constrained to withhold their folk art from the learned of their own race.
Perhaps the most striking observation that comes from the whole experience is the seemingly inexhaustible supply of songs among the workaday Negroes of the South. We have yet to find a “bottom” or a limit in the work songs among the crowds of working men in one community. Just as often as there is opportunity to hear a group of Negroes singing at work, just so often have we found new songs and new fragments. There is so far no exception to this rule. Likewise we have yet to find an individual, whose efforts have been freely set forth in the offering of song, whose supply of songs has been exhausted. Time and time again the approach has been made, with the response, “Naw, sir, cap’n, I don’t know no songs much,” with an ultimate result of song after song, seemingly with no limit. Partly the singer is honest; he does not at the time, think of many songs nor does he consider himself a good singer; but when he turns himself “loose” his capacity for memory and singing is astonishing.
[15]
The same general rule with reference to dialect is used in this volume as was the case in The Negro and His Songs.[4] There can be no consistency, except the consistency of recording the words as nearly as possible as rendered. Words may occur in two or three variations in a single stanza and sometimes in a single line. The attempt to make formal dialect out of natural speech renders the product artificial and less artistic. We have therefore followed the general practice of keeping the dialect as simple as possible. Dialect, after all, is a relative matter. It is the sort of speech which is not used in one’s own section of the country. As a matter of fact, much of what has passed as Negro dialect is good white Southern usage, and there is nothing to justify the attempt to set aside certain pronunciations as peculiar to the Negro simply because a Negro is being quoted. Consequently we have refrained from the use of dialect in all cases where the Negro pronunciation and the usual white pronunciation are the same or practically the same. If the reader will grasp the basic points of difference between Negro and white speech and will then keep in mind the principle of economy, he will have no difficulty in following the peculiarities of dialect.
[4] The Negro and His Songs, pp. 9-11, 293-94. There is a good discussion of dialect in James Weldon Johnson’s Book of American Negro Spirituals, pp. 42-46.
The principle of economy will be found to operate at high efficiency in Negro speech. It will nearly always explain the apparent inconsistencies in dialect. For example, the Negro often says ’bout and ’roun’ for about and around. But he might vary these to about, aroun’, ’round, and around in a single song, depending upon the preceding and succeeding sounds. He would say, “I’ll go ’bout two o’clock,” but he[16] also would say, “I went about two o’clock,” because in the former case it is easier to say ’bout than about, while in the latter the reverse is true.
Rhythm is also related to dialect. In ordinary speech most Negroes would say broke for broken, but if the rhythm in singing called for a two-syllable sound they would say broken rather than broke.
Very few of the popular songs which we heard twenty years ago are found now in the same localities. The places that knew them will know them no more. The same disappearing process is going on now, only more rapidly than formerly because of the multitude of blues, jazz songs, and others being distributed throughout the land in millions of phonographic records. One of the first tasks of this volume is, therefore, to take cognizance of these formal blues, both in their relation to the workaday native creations and as an important segment of the Negro’s music and his contribution to the American scene. In the next chapter we shall proceed, therefore, to discuss the blues.
[17]
No story of the workaday song life of the Negro can proceed far without taking into account the kind of song known as the blues, for, next to the spirituals, the blues are probably the Negro’s most distinctive contribution to American art. They have not been taken seriously, because they have never been thoroughly understood. Their history needs to be written. The present chapter is not a complete statement. It merely presents some of the salient points in the story of the blues and offers some suggestions as to their rôle in Negro life.
Behind the popular blues songs of today lie the more spontaneous and naïve songs of the uncultured Negro. Long before the blues were formally introduced to the public, the Negro was creating them by expressing his gloomy moods in song. To be sure, the present use of the term “blues” to designate a particular kind of popular song is of recent origin, but the use of the term in Negro song goes much further back, and the blue or melancholy type of Negro secular song is as old as the spirituals themselves. The following song might be taken at first glance for one of the 1926 popular “hits,” but it dates back to the time of the Civil War.[5]
[5] Allen, Ware, and Garrison, Slave Songs of the United States, p. 89. This note is appended: “A very good specimen ... of the strange barbaric songs that one hears upon the Western steamboats.”
Very few of the Negro’s ante-bellum secular songs have been preserved, but there is every reason to suppose that he had numerous melancholy songs aside from the spirituals. At any rate, the earliest authentic secular collections abound in the kind of songs which have come to be known as the blues. The following expressions are typical of the early blues. They are taken from songs collected in Georgia and Mississippi between 1905 and 1908, and they were doubtless common property among the Negroes of the lower class long before that.[6]
[6] This collection was published by Howard W. Odum in the Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 24, pp. 255-94; 351-96.
[19]
Here are blues in the making. This is the stuff that the first published blues were made of, and some of it sounds strikingly like certain of the latest blues records issued by the phonograph companies. About 1910 the first published blues appeared, and since that time they have been exploited in every imaginable form by music publishers and phonograph companies.[7] The inter-relations between the formal blues and the native blues will be discussed later. At present it is necessary to take up certain questions concerning the nature of the blues.
[7] W. C. Handy is credited with having published the first blues (Memphis Blues, 1910) and with having had much to do with their popularization. He is still writing songs. His works include Memphis Blues, St. Louis Blues, Beale St. Blues, Joe Turner Blues, Yellow Dog Blues, Aunt Hagar’s Blues, and others.
What are the characteristics of the native blues, in so far as they can be spoken of as a type of song apart from other Negro songs? The original blues were so fragmentary and elusive—they were really little more than states of mind expressed in song—that it is difficult to characterize them definitely. The following points, then, are merely suggestive.
In the first place, blues are characterized by a tone of plaintiveness. Both words and music give the impression of loneliness and melancholy. In fact, it was this quality, combined with the Negro’s peculiar use of the word “blues,” which gave the songs their name. In the second place, the theme of most blues is that of the love relation between man and woman. There are many blues built around homesickness and hard luck in general, but the love theme is the principal one. Sometimes the dominant note is the complaint of the lover:
[20]
Sometimes it is a note of longing:
At other times the dominant note is one of disappointment:
[8] The Negro and His Songs, p. 184.
[9] Ibid., p. 185.
[10] Ibid., p. 224.
[11] Ibid., p. 222.
[12] Ibid., p. 250.
[13] Ibid., p. 181.
A third characteristic of the blues is the expression of self pity.[14] Often this is the outstanding feature of the song. There seems to be a tendency for the despondent or blue singer to use the technique of the martyr to draw from others a reaction of sympathy. Psychologically speaking, the technique consists of rationalization, by which process the singer not only excuses his shortcomings, but attracts the attention and sympathy of others—in imagination, at least—to[21] his hard lot. The following expressions will make the point clear.[15]
[14] For a discussion of this subject, see Lomax, “Self-pity in Negro Folk Song,” Nation, vol. 105, pp. 141-45.
[15] Illustrations are taken from The Negro and His Songs unless otherwise indicated.
Now it is apparent to any one familiar with the folk songs of various peoples that the blues type, as it has been described above, is not peculiar to the Negro, but is more or less common to all races and peoples. So far as subject matter and emotional expression are concerned, the lonesome songs of the Kentucky mountaineer, of the cowboy, of the sailor, or of any other group, are representative of the blues type. If this be so, then why was it that the Negro’s song alone became the basis for a nationally popular type of song? The answer to this question is, of course, far from simple. For one thing, the whole matter of the Negro’s cultural position in relation to the white man is involved. The Negro’s reputation for humor and good singing is also important. Perhaps, too, the psychology of fads would have to be considered. But, speaking in terms of the qualities of the songs themselves, what is there about them to account for the superior status enjoyed by the Negro’s melancholy songs?
[22]
To begin with, the Negro’s peculiar use of the word “blues” in his songs was a circumstance of no mean importance. Much more significant, however, was the music of the blues. The blues originated, of course, with Negroes who had access to few instruments other than the banjo and the guitar. But such music as they brought forth from these instruments to accompany their blues was suited to the indigo mood. It was syncopated, it was full of bizarre harmonies, sudden changes of key and plaintive slurs. It was something new to white America, and it needed only an introduction to insure its success.
But there is still another feature of the blues which is probably responsible more than any other one thing for their appeal and fascination, and that is their lack of conventionality, their naïveté of expression. The Negro wastes no time in roundabout or stilted modes of speech. His tale is brief, his metaphor striking, his imagery perfect, his humor plaintive. Expressions like the following have made the blues famous.
[16] See Perrow, “Songs and Rhymes from the South,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 28, p. 190.
When the first published blues appeared, the problem for the student of Negro song began to become complicated. It is no longer possible to speak with certainty of the folk blues, so entangled are the relations[23] between them and the formal compositions. This inter-relation is itself of such interest and importance that it demands the careful attention of students of folk song. Only a few points can be touched upon in the present work, but an attempt will be made at least to indicate some of the ramifications of the subject.
There is no doubt that the first songs appearing in print under the name of blues were based directly upon actual songs already current among Negroes.[17] Soon after Handy began to issue his blues, white people as well as Negroes were singing them heartily. But a song was never sung long in its original version alone. The half-dozen stanzas of the original often grew to a hundred or more, for many singers took pride in creating new stanzas or adapting parts of other songs to the new one. Sometimes publishers would issue second and third editions, incorporating in them the best of the stanzas which had sprung up since the preceding edition. Thus, even before the phonograph became the popular instrument that it is today, the interplay between folk creations and formal compositions had become extremely complex.
[17] See James Weldon Johnson, The Book of American Negro Poetry, pp. x-xiv; and Dorothy Scarborough, On the Trail of Negro Folk-Songs, pp. 269-70.
In the last ten years the phonograph record has surpassed sheet music as a conveyor of blues to the public. Sheet music, however, is still important. In fact, practically every “hit” is issued in both the published and phonographed form. But the phonograph record obviously has certain advantages, and it is largely responsible for the present popularity of the blues. Most of the large phonograph companies now maintain special departments devoted to the recording[24] of “race blues.” They employ Negro artists, many of whom have already earned national reputations, and they advertise extensively, especially in the Negro press.
In spite of the extremes to which exploitation of the blues has gone in recent years, there is often an authentic folk element to be found in the present-day formal productions. Some of the phonograph artists are encouraged by their employers to sing blues of their own making. When the artist has had an intimate acquaintance with the life of his race and has grown up among the blues, so to speak, he is often able to produce a song which preserves faithfully the spirit of the folk blues. The folk productions of yesterday are likely to be found, albeit sometimes in versions scarcely recognizable, on the phonograph records of today. That this is the case is indicated by the following comparison of a few of the lines and titles of songs collected twenty years ago with lines and titles of recent popular blues songs.
Lines and Titles of Songs Collected Twenty Years Ago[18] | Lines and Titles of Recent Popular Blues |
---|---|
Laid in jail, back to the wall. | Thirty days in jail with my back turned to the wall. |
Jailer, won’t you put ’nother man in my stall? | Look here, mister jailer, put another gal in my stall. |
Baby, won’t you please come home? | Baby, won’t you please come home? |
Wonder where my baby stay las’ night? | Where did you stay last night? |
I got my all-night trick, baby, and you can’t git in. | I’m busy and you can’t come in. |
I’ll see her when her trouble’s like mine.[25] | I’m gonna see you when your troubles are just like mine. |
Satisfied. | I’m satisfied. |
You may go, but this will bring you back. | I got what it takes to bring you back. |
Joe Turner | Joe Turner blues. |
Love, Kelly’s love. | Love, careless love. |
I’m on my las’ go-’round. | Last go-’round blues. |
[18] See Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 24; also The Negro and His Songs.
When a blues record is issued it quickly becomes the property of a million Negro workers and adventurers who never bought it and perhaps never heard it played. Sometimes they do not even know that the song is from a record. They may recognize in it parts of songs long familiar to them and think that it is just another piece which some songster has put together. Their desire to invent a different version, their skill at adapting stanzas of old favorites to the new music, and sometimes their misunderstanding of the words of the new song, result in the transformation of the song into many local variants. In other words, the folk creative process operates upon a song, the origin of which may already be mixed, and produces in turn variations that may later become the bases of other formal blues. A thorough exposition of this process would take us far beyond the limits of this volume, but the following instances are cited to illustrate generally the interplay between the folk blues and the formal blues.
Here is a specimen captured from a Negro girl in Georgia who had just returned from a trip to “Troit,” Michigan.
Now this song is a mixture of several popular blues. The first stanza is from the House Rent Blues, and is sung practically the same as on the phonograph record. The second stanza is from the Salt Water Blues and is like the original except for the repetition in the original of the first two lines. The third stanza is also from the Salt Water Blues, but it is a combination and variation of two stanzas which go as follows:
This girl does not worry over the lack of consistent meaning in the third stanza of her song. Furthermore, as far as she is concerned, “soul” and “mule” rhyme about as well as “fool” and “mule.” The fourth[27] stanza of her song, finally, is taken from Any Woman’s Blues, there having been, however, a slight variation in the second line. The original is:
Thus in a single song we have examples of the processes of borrowing, combining, changing, and misunderstanding through which formal material often goes when it gets into the hands of the common folk. The composite of four stanzas presented above has no very clear meaning in its present form, but at that it is about as coherent as any of the blues from which it was assembled.
Left Wing Gordon, whose story is told in Chapter XII, is a good study in the relation of folk song and formal blues. Left Wing’s repertoire is practically unlimited, for he appears to have remembered everything that he has ever heard. One of his favorite expressions is
This comes from You Don’t Know My Mind Blues, a popular sheet music and phonograph piece today. Left Wing sings dozens of stanzas, some evidently from the published versions, some of his own making, ending each one with “You don’t know my mind,” etc. Nearly all of his songs showed this sort of mixture of formal and folk material.
As an example of the misunderstanding, deliberate twisting of the words of a phonograph blues, or lapse[28] of memory, the following instance may be cited. In the Chain Gang Blues this stanza occurs.
A Southern Negro on a chain gang recently sang it thus:
Examples of this kind might be multiplied indefinitely, but these will suffice. In the notes on the songs in the various chapters of this book will be found comments bearing upon the relation of formal blues and folk songs.
Thus it is clear that in many cases there is a complex inter-relation and interaction between the folk song and the formal production. But the tendency has been on the whole for the latter to get further and further away from folk sources. Few authors now attempt to do more than imitate certain features of the old-time blues. In order to understand more clearly the present situation, it is necessary to consider for a moment the blues as they are manufactured today.
There are at least three large phonograph companies which give special attention to Negro songs. They will be designated herein as “A,” “B,” and “C.” The following table, compiled from data obtained from the general “race record” catalogs of these three companies, gives an idea of the importance of the blues.
[29]
Brand of Record |
Total No. of Titles in Catalog |
No. Religious and Classical Titles |
No. Secular Titles |
Titles Containing Word “Blues” |
|
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Number | Percentage of Secular Songs |
||||
“A” | 592 | 34[19] | 558 | 263 | 43 |
“B” | 430 | 90[20] | 340 | 154 | 40 |
“C” | 298 | 44[19] | 254 | 108 | 42 |
In this table only those titles including the word “blues” have been counted as blues. If the term were expanded to include all songs which are now popularly known as blues, it would be found that upwards of seventy-five per cent of the total number of secular songs listed in the catalogs would fall in this class. The “A” catalog bears the title, “A” Race Records—The Blue Book of Blues; the “B” catalog follows titles like Oh, Daddy, Brown Baby, Long Lost Mama, etc., with the explanation, “blues song” or “blues record”; and the “C” catalog bears the title, “C” Race Records—The Latest Blues by “C” Colored Artists. Certainly the popular notion among both whites and Negroes now is that practically every Negro song which is not classed as a spiritual is a blues. The term is now freely applied to instrumental pieces, especially to dance music of the jazz type, and to every vocal piece which, by any stretch of the imagination, can be thought of as having a bluish cast.
A survey of the titles in the three catalogs mentioned above yields some interesting data concerning the nature of the formal blues. For one thing, there are sixty or seventy titles of the place or locality type. Southern states and cities figure prominently in this[30] kind of blues, although the popularity of Northern localities is on the increase. The favorite states are Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Texas, and Virginia. The chief titles for these states are as follows:
There are also, to name only a few others, Arkansas Blues, Florida Blues, California Blues, Carolina Blues, Omaha Blues, Michigan Water Blues, Memphis Blues, Tulsa Blues, St. Louis Blues, Salt Lake City Blues, Wabash Blues, and Blue Grass Blues. Finally there are foreign titles, such as London Blues and West Indies Blues. Titles, of course, are not to be taken as accurate indices of the contents of the songs. As a matter of fact, most of the songs bearing titles of the locality type really deal with the relation of man and woman.
Another feature of the formal blues is their tendency to specialize in certain slang expressions. “Sweet[31] mama,” “sweet papa,” “daddy,” “jelly roll,” and a few other expressions have been thoroughly popularized among certain classes, white and Negro, by the blues songs. By actual count, titles containing one or more of the words, “mama,” “daddy,” “papa,” “baby,” constitute twenty-five per cent of the total number of secular titles in the catalogs referred to above.
It is to be expected that a very large proportion of these present-day blues (using the term now in the broad sense as it is popularly used) deals with the relation of man and woman. In fact, if the locality types, most of which are based on the love relation, and the “mama-papa” type were eliminated from the count, there would be a mere handful left. The following titles will give some impression of the nature of the songs which deal with the man-woman relation.[21]
[21] Any one who is acquainted with the slang and vulgarity of the lower class Negro will suspect immediately that there are often double meanings in titles like those listed here. Such is the case. Negro songs writers and phonograph artists usually have had intimate acquaintance with Negro life in all of its forms, and they have doubtless come across many a song which was too vulgar to be put into print, but which had certain appealing qualities. Often a melody was too striking to be allowed to escape, so the writer fitted legitimate verses to it and, if it was at all possible, preserved the original title. Thus it comes about that many of the popular Negro songs of today—and white songs, too, as for that—have titles that are extremely suggestive, and are saved only by their perfectly innocuous verses. The suggestiveness of the titles may also be one explanation of why these songs have such a tremendous appeal for the common folk, black and white. It may be that in these songs, whitewashed and masked though they be, they recognize old friends.
Then there are innumerable miscellaneous titles and sentiments. One may have the Poor Man Blues, Red Hot Blues, Through Train Blues, Railroad Blues, Crazy Blues, Stranger Blues, Don’t Care Blues, Goin’ ’Way Blues, Bleedin’ Hearted Blues, Cryin’ Blues, Salt Water Blues, Mountain Top Blues, Thunderstorm Blues, Sinful Blues, Basement Blues, House Rent Blues, Reckless Blues, and even the A to Z Blues. Here again however, titles are misleading, for practically all songs bearing such titles really deal with the man-woman theme.
It may be worth mentioning that the majority of these formal blues are sung from the point of view of woman. A survey of titles in the “A,” “B,” and “C” catalogs shows that upwards of seventy-five per cent of the songs are written from the woman’s point of view. Among the blues singers who have gained a more or less national recognition there is scarcely a man’s name to be found.
It is doubtful whether the history of song affords a parallel to the American situation with regard to the blues. Here we have the phenomenon of a type of folk song becoming a great fad and being exploited in every conceivable form; of hundreds of blues, some of which are based directly upon folk productions, being distributed literally by the million among the American people; and the Negro’s assimilation of these blues into his everyday song life. What the effects of these processes are going to be, one can only surmise. One thing is certain, however, and that is that the student of Negro song tomorrow will have to know what was[34] on the phonograph records of today before he may dare to speak of origins.
Whether the formal blues have come to stay or not, it is impossible to tell at present. Possibly they will undergo considerable modification as the public becomes satiated and the Negro takes on more and more of the refinements of civilization. That their present form, however, is acceptable to a large section of Negro America is indicated by the fact that the combined sales of “A,” “B,” and “C” blues records alone amount to five or six millions annually.
The folk blues will also undergo modification, but they will always reflect Negro life in its lower strata much more accurately than the formal blues can. For it must be remembered that these folk blues were the Negro’s melancholy song long before the phonograph was invented. Yet the formal songs are important. In their own way they are vastly superior to the cruder folk productions, since they have all of the advantages of the artificial over the natural. They may replace some of the simpler songs and thus dull the creative impulse of the common Negro folk to some extent, but there is every reason to suppose that there will be real folk blues as long as there are Negro toilers and adventurers whose naïveté has not been worn off by what the white man calls culture.
The plaintiveness of the blues will be encountered in most of the songs of this volume. It is present because most of the songs were collected from the class of Negro folk who are most likely to create blues. In the next chapter certain general songs of the blues type have been brought together but the note of lonesomeness and melancholy will be struck in the songs of the other chapters as well, especially in those dealing with jail and chain gang, construction camp, and the relation of man and woman.
[35]
The blues par excellence are, of course, to be found in those songs of sorrow and disappointment and longing which center around the love relation.[22] But the song of the “po’ boy long ways from home” who wanders “down that lonesome road” is rich in pathos and plaintiveness. The wanderer is not unlike the old singer who sang,
[22] See Chapters VII and VIII for the songs of this type. This chapter deals with more general lonesome songs.
Typical of the lonesome note in the present-day songs of the wanderer are the following lines:
In the “Annals and Blues of Left Wing Gordon”[23] will be found something of the story of one representative of all those black folk who sing down the lonesome road. Left Wing had traveled the lonesome road in at least thirty-eight states of the union. His type is legion. Here is another whose parents died before he was eight years of age. Thence to Texas, and Louisiana, across Mississippi to Georgia, then down to Florida, back through South Carolina to his home state, North Carolina. Abiding there shortly, thence to Maryland and Washington, to St. Louis, thence to Ohio, thence to New York, back to Philadelphia, across again to Ohio, then the war and camp, and armistice and more travels, with periods of “doing time.” Then back again to the lonesome road.
[23] See Chapter XII.
Nowhere is self-pity in the plaintive song better expressed than in the forlorn Negro’s vision of himself, the last actor in the wanderer drama, folks mourning his death, hacks in line, funeral well provided for.[37] Sometimes reflecting on his hard life, he pictures his own funeral!
Perhaps he will jump into the sea or off the mountain or lay his head on a railroad track. Then folks will miss him and mourn his tragic end. He feels that he has more than his share of trouble and hard luck. Sometimes he sings that he cannot keep from crying:
The following songs show this note of hard luck, weeping, and self-pity:
Ship My Po’ Body Home
[38]
Pity Po’ Boy
I Rather Be in My Grave
Throw Myself Down in de Sea
Po’ Nigger Got Nowhere to Go
I Wish I Was Dead
[40]
Trouble All My Days[24]
[24] This song is very much like a popular phonograph record, Downhearted Blues. Cf. also Trouble, Trouble Blues.
I Can’t Keep From Cryin’[25]
[25] A somewhat condensed version of a phonograph song, Death Letter Blues.
Po’ Little Girl Grievin’
The old line, “po’ boy ’long way from home,” is still a favorite. In the Negro’s songs and stories of wanderings, home and father and mother are themes of constant appeal, apparently much in contrast to the[42] Negro’s actual home-abiding experiences. The old spirituals sang mostly of the heavenly home of dreams and ideals as opposed to the experience in which “this ol’ world been a hell to me.” In his wanderer song of today the Negro’s wish-dream to be back home appears an equally striking contrast. Nowhere in the workaday songs is childlike and wishful yearning so marked as in these constant songs of homesickness and of the desire for something that is not.
Always accompanying the singer’s dreams of home is his contrasting forlorn condition in the present hour. It would be difficult to find better description of situations than that in which he pictures himself as tired and forsaken on the lonesome road. Parts of this picture may be gathered from the following lines taken here and there from his songs:
[43]
A variety of songs of home or home-folk, of surcease from work, will be found wherever Negroes sing. This fact is recognized by the publishers of blues when they advertise, “These blues will make every Negro want to hurry back home.” The plaintive longing for home, alongside expressions of weeping and self-pity, is the theme of most of the following songs of the road:
I’m Goin’ Home, Buddie
That Ol’ Letter
Po’ Homeless Boy
Take Me Back Home
Please, Mr. Conductor
[45]
Captain, I Wanta Go Home
Will I Git Back Home?
Lawd, Lawd, I’m on My Way
Goin’ Down Dat Lonesome Road[26]
[26] For the music of this song, see Chapter XIV. A song of this name has been found in the Kentucky mountains, and a phonograph record (Lonesome Road Blues) based on it has recently appeared. Cf. also The Lonesome Road in Miss Scarborough’s On the Trail of Negro Folk-Songs, p. 73.
[47]
There is this fortunate circumstance which contributes to the completeness and vividness of the Negro portraits as found in workaday songs: the whole picture is often epitomized in each of several characters or types of singers and their songs. Thus the picture may be viewed from all sides and from different angles, with such leisure and repetition as will insure accurate impressions. One of these types is the “po’ boy long way from home” singing down “that lonesome road,” as represented in the previous chapter. Whether in his ordinary daily task, or on his pilgrimages afar, or in the meshes of the law, this singer approaches perfection in the delineation of his type. Another type is that to be found in the story of Left Wing Gordon as presented in Chapter XII, and of John Henry in Chapter XIII. Likewise, the songs of jail and chain gang, the songs of women and love, and the specialized road songs all embody that fine quality of full and complete reflection of the folk spirit in the Negro’s workaday life and experience.
There is perhaps no type, however, which comes more nearly summarizing certain situations, experiences, and backgrounds than the Negro “bad man,” whose story will make an heroic tale of considerable proportions. In many ways the “bad man from bad man’s land” is a favorite. He is eulogized by the youngsters and sung by the worker by the side of the road. One preacher even described Christ as a man who would “stand no foolin’ wid.” “Jesus such great man, no one lak him. Lord, he could pop lion’s head[48] off jes’ lak he wus fryin’-size chicken an’ could take piece o’ mountain top and throw it across the world.” And as for that other bad man, “Nicotemus,” why Jesus, when he got through with him, had him following behind a donkey like any other slave.[27] There was that other young Negro who “was no comfort to preacher, but was a hawk like pizen. Mens like him and wimmin belonged to him wid his winnin’ ways.” In a previous volume[28] we pointed out some of the characteristic experiences and modes of the Negro bum, “bully of this town,” Railroad Bill, Stagolee, Brady, and the others, of twenty years ago. Since that time the tribe has apparently not diminished and flourishes well in the atmosphere of modern life, migration, and the changing conditions of race relations. Of the statistical and environmental aspects of the Negro criminal much will be reported in another study.[29] In this chapter we are concerned with the portrait of a type, perhaps inexorably drawn into the maelstrom of his day and turned into an inevitable product. He is no less an artist than the wanderer, the “travelin’ man,” or Left Wing Gordon. He is the personification of badness mixed with humor, of the bad man and the champion of exploits. We have already referred to the Negro who “wus so mean wus skeered of hisself,” competitor to that other one whose
There were still other companions to these in Slippery Jim, Slewfoot Pete, and Ann-Eliza Stone, “mean wid[49] her habbits on” and breaking up the “jamboree.”[30] A common phrase, indeed, threatened always to “break up dis jamboree” in exchange for slighting one’s “repertation.”
[27] Cited by Dr. E. C. L. Adams of Columbia, S. C.
[28] The Negro and His Songs, page 164 seq.
[29] A study of Negro crime directed by J. F. Steiner, for the Institute for Research in Social Science, at the University of North Carolina.
[30] See Swan and Abbot, in Eight Negro Songs, New York, 1923.
Many are the bad men, and vivid the descriptions. Said one, “Lawd, cap’n, take me till tomorrow night to tell ’bout dat boy. Eve’ybody skeered uv him. John Wilson jes nachelly bully, double j’inted, awful big man, didn’t fear ’roun’ nobody. Would break up ev’y do he ’tended. Go to picnic, take all money off’n table. Couldn’t do nothin’ wid him. Seen feller shoot at him nine times once an’ didn’t do nothin’ to him, an’ he run an’ caught up wid feller an’ bit chunk meat out o’ his back, ... but one man got him wid britch loader an’ stop ’im from suckin’ eggs.”
We have found no black bad-man ballads superior to the old ones, Railroad Bill, Stagolee, That Bully of this Town, Desperado Bill, Eddy Jones, Joe Turner, Brady,[31] and the others. And yet, the current stories sung on the road are more accurate portrayals of actual characters and experiences, and perhaps less finished songs, less formal rhyme. Take Lazarus, for instance, a hard luck story, portraying something of Negro sympathy, burial custom, general reaction. Here is a character more to be pitied than censured, according to his companions. Listen to three pick-and-shovel men, tracing “po’ Lazarus” from the work camp where he, poor foolish fellow, robbed the commissary camp and then took to his heels. Thence between the mountains where the high sheriff shot him down, back to the camp and burying ground, with mother, wife,[50] brothers, sisters, comrades weeping, attending the funeral, where they “put po’ Lazarus away at half pas’ nine.”
[31] The Negro and His Songs, pages 196-212.
Bad Man Lazarus
It would be difficult to find a scene and setting more appealing than this ballad being sung by a group of workingmen in unison, with remarkable harmony, fine voices, inimitable manner. “Doesn’t this singing[53] hinder you in your work?” we asked one of the pick-and-shovel men, just to see what type of reply he would make. With first a slow look of surprise, then a sort of pity for the man who would ask such a question, then a “Lawdy-Lawd-Cap’n” outburst of laughter, “Cap’n dat’s whut makes us work so much better, an’ it nuthin’ else but.” And one of the group acted the part of the “shouter” very much like the hearers in the church. He would sing a while, then dig away in silence, then burst out with some exhorter’s exclamation about the song, giving zest to the singing, contrast to the imagery, authority to the story. Once as the singers recorded the shooting of Lazarus, he shouted, “Yes, yes, Lawd, Lawd, I seed ’em, I wus dere”; and again when they sang of his mother weeping, “Yes, Lawd, I wus right dere when she come a-runnin’. I know it’s true.” Taken all in all, the sorrowful story of Lazarus, with its painstaking sequence and its melody as sung on this occasion, it is doubtful if ever Negro spiritual surpassed it in beauty and poignancy.
The above version was heard at Danielsville, Georgia. A similar but shorter one, current in North Carolina, is called Billy Bob Russell. “Reason why dey calls it dat is Billy Bob Russell an’ Lazarus been buddies for years, pretty mean boys til dey gits grown. Billy Bob Russell, he’s from Georgia an’ I think Lazarus act sorta like robber or highway robber or somethin’, follow road camp all time.”[32]
[32] Other Negroes affirm that Billy Bob Russell was a white man, a Georgia construction foreman and a very noted one.
[54]
Billy Bob Russell
In contrast to the more finished rhyming stanzas of Railroad Bill and the earlier heroic epics, note the simple, vivid ballad-in-the-making type of unrhymed song so common as a type of pick-and-shovel melody. Note the accuracy of the picture, its trueness to actual workaday experience, the phrase description. Such a song in the making and in the rendering defies description or competition as a folk-mirror. Differing somewhat and yet of the same general sort of characterization is the current story of Dupree, versions of which have been taken from Asheville, North Carolina, and various other places in Georgia and North Carolina. One of the most interesting aspects of this Dupree song is that it may be compared with the Atlanta ballad of the white Frank Dupree as popularly sung on the phonograph records. The story of the white culprit warns his young friends in the usual way and asks them to meet him in heaven. His crime was, first, snatching a diamond ring for his sweetheart, then shooting the policeman to death, then fleeing but coming back because he could not stay away from his “Betty.” There is little similarity of expression between the white version and the Negro one. Here is the more finished of the Negro songs.
Dupree
[33] See phonograph record, Michigan Water Blues.
In striking contrast to the Dupree just given is one sung by a young Negro who had been in the chain gang[57] a number of times and whose major repertoire consisted of the plaintive chain gang songs. Here the singer has translated the version into his own vernacular, varying lines, eschewing rhyme, carrying his story through the regular channels of the prison type. The lines are given exactly as sung, repetitions and irregularities constituting their chief distinction. And yet something of the same story runs through it. It is perhaps a little nearer the Atlanta version, and the singer adds still another interpretation that Dupree and Betty had quarreled and as a result Dupree had killed her and hidden her body in the sawdust. An interesting local color is that Dupree was sent to Milledgeville, Georgia, where as a matter of fact is situated the combined state prison and hospital. Here, then, is the song with its mixed imagery and reflection of a certain mentality.
Dupree Tol’ Betty
A popular bad man song of many versions is the Travelin’ Man. No one has ever outdistanced him. A long story, rapidly moving, miraculously achieving, triumphantly ending, it represents jazz song, phonograph record, banjo ballad, quartet favorite, although it is not easy to capture. Three versions have been found in the actual singing, one by a quartet which came to Dayton, Tennessee, to help entertain the evolution mongers; another by Kid Ellis, of Spartanburg, South Carolina, himself a professed traveling man; a third by a North Carolina Negro youth who had, however, migrated to Pennsylvania and returned after traveling in seven or eight other states of the union. The South Carolina version, which is given here, is of the Ain’t Gonna Rain No Mo’ type of vaudeville and ballad mixture.
Travelin’ Man
For the rest of this picture of the bad man the simple presentation of songs and fragments in sufficient numbers to illustrate main types will suffice. His name is legion, and he ranks all the way from the “polish man” to the “boll-weevil nigger,” much despised of the common man of the better sort. Bad men come into peaceful and industrious communities and disturb the peace. They flow in from other states to add to the number of offenders, yet in spite of their numbers and character, the church throng, the picnic, the funeral and other social occasions seem to have much fewer murders and fracases than formerly. If the bad man can be turned into song and verse, with the picture of adventure and romance becoming more and more mythical, the Negro will profit by the evolution. For the present, however, here are samples of the portrayals most commonly sung, with apologies to all improvisators, minstrel artists, and white-folk imitators of Negro verse.
[62]
Bolin Jones
Roscoe Bill
Layin’ Low
Don’t Fool Wid Me
Creepin’ ’Roun’
Shootin’ Bill
I Am Ready For de Fight
Slim Jim From Dark-town Alley
I’m a Natural-bo’n Ram’ler
I’m de Hot Stuff Man
Reuben[34]
[34] We are told that this song is common among the whites of Western North Carolina.
Bloodhoun’ on My Track
[67]
Buffalo Bill
Dat Leadin’ Houn’
Outrun Dat Cop
[68]
Don’t You Hear?
I’s a Natural-bo’n Eastman
I Steal Dat Corn
[69]
I’m de Rough Stuff
I Ain’t Done Nothin’
When He Grin
Shot My Pistol in the Heart o’ Town[35]
[35] For music see Chapter XIV.
[71]
Not all Negro “bad men” achieve an abiding place in jail or chain gang. Not all Negroes in jail or chain gang are “bad men”—not by long odds. And yet the prison population of the South contains abundant representations of both major and minor Negro offenders, although the indications are that the ratio of Negroes to whites is decreasing rapidly. And if one wishes to obtain anything like an adequate or accurate picture of the workaday Negro he will surely find much of his best setting in the chain gang, prison, or in the situations of the ever-fleeing fugitive from “chain-gang houn’,” high sheriff or policeman. “I ain’t free, Lawd, I ain’t free,” sings the prisoner who bemoans the bad luck in which he had “nobody to pay my fine.” Never did the old spiritual, as in “Go down, Moses, tell ol’ Pharaoh, let my people go,” express more determined call for freedom than the Negro singer behind the bars. Yet the Negro prisoner combines admirable humor with his wailing song:
I Ain’t Free
This chapter makes no approach to the study of the Negro criminal. That will be done in the scientific inquiries which are now being made at length and in later studies of the Negro bad man. What the chapter attempts is simply to give further pictures of the Negro workaday singer as he is found behind prison bars, or with ball and chain, or in humorous workaday retrospect or prospect of experiences what time he pays the penalty for his misdoings. For these prison and road songs, policeman and sheriff epics, jail and chain[73] gang ballads constitute an eloquent cross-section of the whole field of Negro songs. Many are sung even as the ordinary work songs; others are improvised and varied. One may listen to high-pitched voices, plaintive and wailing, until the haunting melody will abide for days. The prisoners sing of every known experience from childhood and home to “hard luck in the family, sho’ God, fell on me.” One youngster about twenty-one years of age, periodic offender with experience on the chain gang and in jail, sang more than one hundred songs or fragments and the end was not yet. They cannot be described; selections are not representative. And yet, listen for a while:
Jail House Wail
Once on the gang or in the jail continuous song is not unusual. Waking folk with song in early morning, chanting after meal time, plaintive in the evening, the Negro lives over his past life, gives expression to his feelings, and plans the new day, “standin’ on rock pile with ball an’ chain,” or “standin’ on rock pile, with hammer in my hand.” He sings of past days, sorrows that some other man will get his girl, boasts a woman in the white man’s yard—
Sometimes he is more cheerful and sings, “cawn pone, fat meat, all I gits to eat, better’n I git at home,” “Rings on my arms, bracelets on my feet, stronger’n I has at home!” And with bunk for a bed and straw for his head, he sings, “baby, baby, let me be.” How could he help falling into the hands of the officers anyway?
[75]
’Tain’t as Bad as I Said
[36] “Black Mariah” is frequently encountered in Negro songs. It refers to the patrol wagon.
The songs that follow will illustrate further the Negro’s story of his prison life, his desire for freedom, his efforts to escape, his attitude toward the policeman, jailer and sheriff, and his humorous interpretation of various situations in which he finds himself. Vivid pictures they are.
If I Can Git to Georgia Line
Got Me in the Calaboose
I Don’t Mind Bein’ in Jail
[37] This stanza is found in somewhat different form in the popular song entitled Jail-House Blues.
[78]
Chain Gang Blues[38]
[38] The first four stanzas of this song, except for some slight variations, are also found in Chain Gang Blues, a popular phonograph piece.
All Boun’ in Prison[39]
[39] Cf. phonograph record, Cell Bound Blues.
I Went to de Jail House
Judge Gonna Sentence Us So Long
My Man He Got in Trouble
[82]
The Judge He Sentence Me
I Got a Letter, Captain
Prisoner’s Song[40]
[40] Except for a few minor variations, this is the now popular Prisoner’s Song. It was of folk origin, however.
Woke up Wid My Back to the Wall
In the Negro’s prison songs is revealed again that dual nature which sings of sorrowful limitations alongside humorous and philosophical resignation. Here are scenes of the lonesome road illuminated by entertainment of rare quality. “I’m in jail now,” he sings,[85] “but jes’ fer a day.” “I ain’t got no parole, but I’m a-comin’ back.” It is true that he has only corn bread and fat meat to eat but that’s “better’n I has at home.” And then with genuine humor he sings also of the iron cuffs about his hands which also are “stronger’n I has at home.”
Better’n I Has at Home
I’m Comin’ Back
Goin’ Back to de Gang
Dem Chain Gang Houn’s
[87]
Shoot, Good God, Shoot!
Ol’ Black Mariah
Jes’ Fer a Day
All Us Niggers ’hind De Bars
[88]
In the old days—and sometimes in more recent years—there were characteristic and unforgettable scenes of groups of Negroes singing in the fields. Here was a picture of late afternoon in the cotton field, the friendly setting sun a challenge to reviving energies; rows of cotton clean picked, rivalry and cheerful banter, faster picking to the row’s end, sacks and baskets full for weighing time; group singing, now joyous, then the melancholy tinge of eventide, Swing Low, Sweet Chariot, Since I Laid My Burden Down or Keep Inchin’ Erlong. Another picture is vivid: A spring morning, a few Negroes following mule and plow, many chopping cotton to the accompaniment of song, all making rhythm of song, movement, and clink of hoe resound in rare harmony, duly interspersed with shouts and laughter. Or the morning yodel or “cornfield holler,” with its penetrating vibrato, Ya-a-ee-ah—oo-a-ee-ou—indescribable either in words, sound, or musical notation.[41] Or wagons lumbering on cold mornings, drivers and workers on the way to field or mill, songs echoing across the hills. And there were the other group scenes: the roustabouts on the levee, the singers around the cabins, the groups in the kitchen. Many of these scenes, of course, in modified form may yet be found and songs of their setting are still to be heard, but they do not constitute the most commonly abounding characteristic workaday songs of the present.
[41] The phono-photographic record of such a yodel is given in Chapter XV.
[89]
Modern scenes, however different, are no less impressive. Whoever has seen a railroad section gang of five score Negroes working with pick and shovel and hammer and bars and other tools, and has heard them singing together will scarcely question the effectiveness of the scene. Likewise steel drivers and pick-and-shovel men sing down a road that is anything but “lonesome” now. Four pickmen of the road sing, swinging pick up, whirling it now round and round and now down again, movement well punctuated with nasal grunt and swelling song. Another group unloading coal, another asphalt, another lime, or sand, sing unnumbered songs and improvisations. Another group sings as workers rush wheelbarrows loaded with stone or sand or dirt or concrete, or still again line up on the roadside with picks and shovels. And of course there are the songs of the chain gangs already described, but nevertheless gang songs of the first importance. All these singers constitute the great body of workers and singers who sing apparently with unlimited repertoire. The selections in this chapter, as in the others, are representative in that they were taken directly from Negro singers and workers in the South during 1924 and 1925.
Among the most attractive of all the Negro workaday songs are those sometimes called “free labor gang songs,”[42] of which there are many. Some of these are reserved for Chapter VII in which many miscellaneous examples of songs to help with work are given. Other samples have been included in the “Songs of the Lonesome Road.” Examples of the melodies are given in Chapter XV. It will be understood, of course, that other songs such as John Henry,[90] Jerry on the Mountain, Lazarus, are sung in this capacity, although classified primarily in other groups for the sake of better illustration.
[42] The Negroes use the term “free labor” to distinguish ordinary work from convict labor.
“Free Labor” Gang Song
O Lawd, Mamie
He-i-Heira
Section Boss
[94]
The mind of the worker and wanderer is perhaps reflected better in his annals of the day’s work as expressed in his “captain” songs than anywhere else. Some of the “captain” songs have been sung until they are on the verge of folk songs; some approach the haven of the blues, and many more are in the formative stage. The examples immediately following in this chapter are combinations of all three, with the predominating mode that of combination and improvisation. Some of them are clearly songs of the chain gang as well as of free labor construction work. That they are fairly accurate portrayals of the worker and his task, of the captain and his ways, of the thoughts and customs of the worker and singer will be evident to any one who knows the field. To the uninitiated the laborer is merely a laborer, silent, reserved, certainly keeping back from the white man his innermost thoughts, wishes, and feelings. But hear him sing—hear him repeat the formal songs, hear him make new ones.
O Captain, Captain[43]
[43] This song and some others in this chapter are excellent illustrations of the chain gang sentiment becoming mixed with ordinary “free labor” gang songs.
I’m Goin’ Back Home
[44] The meaning of this expression is uncertain. In other songs it appears as “Hikin’ Jerry” or “Mike and Jerry.” There is a tradition among the Negro workers that two large mules, named Mike and Jerry, broke loose from their driver and hiked a remarkable distance in one day. If this was the origin of the song, then “I can Jerry” is a result of misunderstanding.
My Home Ain’t Here, Captain
Captain, I’ll Be Gone
If I’d A-Known My Cap’n Was Blin’[45]
[45] For music see Chapter XIV.
I Tol’ My Cap’n That My Feet Was Col’[46]
Captain, Captain, Let Wheelers Roll
[46] For music see Chapter XIV.
’Way up in the Mountain
[47] This stanza and the preceding one are also found in a popular song, Jail-House Blues.
Don’t You Give Me No Cornbread
July’s for the Red-bug
But after all there are no workaday songs superior to the gang songs, heave-a-horas, steel-driving songs, short pick-and-shovel songs, and the scores of other short specimens which accompany special tasks requiring hard work, team unison, or continuous effort. There is, of course, no attempt here to present even an approach to exhaustive lists. We have so far found no intimation of where the number of such songs will stop. But the examples which follow are adequate to continue the portraiture of the Negro as he works and as he sings.
[107]
Boys, Put Yo’ Hands on It
Never Turn Back[48]
[48] Here a spiritual theme is used as a gang song.
No More
All Right
Help Me Drive ’Em[49]
[49] This is an example of a steel-driving song. As the driver raises his hammer he sings a line, then stops singing for a moment, brings the hammer down with a grunt, then sings another line, and so on. The technique is the same as the digging technique described in some detail in Chapter XIV.
I Belong to Steel-drivin’ Crew
O Buckeye Rabbit
U—h, U—h, Lawdy[50]
[50] This is an example of a pick song, although it could be used, of course, for almost any kind of rhythmic work. For a description of the singing-digging technique see Chapter XIV.
This Ol’ Hammer
We Are Clambin’ Jacob’s Ladder[51]
[51] Here a theme from a spiritual is made to do service as a pick song.
Reason I Stay on Job So Long[52]
[52] For music see Chapter XIV.
Hot Flambotia an’ Coffee Strong
I’m Goin’ On[53]
[53] This song has been heard also as “I’m on road here few days longer” and “I’m gonna roll here few days longer.” “Row” may well be a corruption of “road” or “roll.”
I Don’t Want No Trouble With de Walker[54]
[54] This is a pick song commonly heard around Chapel Hill, N. C. The “walker” refers to the walking boss or overseer on the job. The first two lines of each stanza are repeated as shown in the first stanza. For music see Chapter XIV.
I Don’t Want No Cornbread[56]
[56] This is sung to the same tune as the preceding song, I Don’t Want No Trouble With the Walker, the music of which is given in Chapter XIV.
[57] All of the stanzas have this form, first two lines always repeated.
[115]
Turning from the songs of construction or railroad gangs, some of the mixed songs, partly remnants of former years, partly products of sophistication, may be cited. There are many songs about the white man and the captain, excellent samples of which have already been cited in this chapter. Some were given in The Negro and His Songs and many more are to be found. Indeed, songs about the white man may well constitute a separate chapter in a later volume. A stock joke among the older Negroes used to be that of telling how the white man always brought “nigger out behind.” The modern singer, albeit not always in joking mood, still thrusts “at” his “captain” or “boss” or “white man.” “Captain,” he sings, “you look mo’ lak farmer than railroad man,” and with considerable glee asks, “Captain, captain, where’d you come frum?” On the other hand, reminiscent of farm days and echoing current life, he still sings:
In another song the Negro complained that no matter if he worked all the time, “Boss sho’ bring nigger out behin’.” So now in some Georgia scenes he sings:
Nothin’ to Keep
Everybody Call Me the Wages Man
[117]
Missus in de Big House
[118]
In some respects it is unfortunate that classification of the Negro workaday songs must be attempted, for, strictly speaking, accurate classification is not possible. There is much overlapping apparent in most of the best types. There are mixed pictures in the majority and a cross index would be necessary for any sort of complete analysis. And yet the total picture is clearer when the songs are grouped according to prevailing themes, as has been done in other chapters on the wanderer songs, the bad man ballads, chain gang and jail songs, favorites of the construction gang, songs of woman, songs of man, and religious remnants. In each of these classes it is readily seen that there is abundance of new material of great value. And yet, after these attempts at classification, there are scores of songs, some the favorites of the present day, some among the most attractive, which appear best as simple work songs, sung as an integral physical part of the Negro’s workaday efforts. These songs are not simply the “miscellaneous” and “all others” group. They are more than that; they are the songs for song’s sake, expression for expression’s sake, and “hollerin’ jes’ to he’p me wid my work.”
This chapter, therefore, presents a varied group of songs, many of which, for simple spontaneity, imagery, and creative art might well represent the choice of the collection. Among these are the lyric types like those quoted in Chapter I, figures of a “rainbow ’round my[119] shoulders,” the “feet rollin’ lak a wheel,” the winter song in summer, and many other fragments of similar quality. There are fragments, pick-and-shovel songs, driving songs, mostly short, which are sung perhaps more often than any others by the group of workers. This chapter will present, first, some of the miscellaneous and more artistic songs that are most difficult to classify except as “just songs to help with work.” Then will follow certain types, corruptions from blues, jazz and minstrel, but sung on any and all occasions, one as well as another, in the kitchen, on the road, in the field, in the alley, in the barber shop, or on the street. Then, finally, there will be the group of incoherent words and lines, senseless for the most part and merely expressive of feeling and effort. In addition to these there are still more than one hundred miscellaneous songs, improvisations, fragments and other collected items which must await a special collection of this sort.
One of the most attractive of all the work songs is Mule on the Mountain, in which the title constitutes the bulk of the song. It is a pick-and-shovel favorite repeated over and over with variations and exclamations. The simplest form of this song is as follows:
Mule on the Mountain
In the following version this simple stanza has taken seven others for companions, thus making a lengthy pick song.
[120]
I Got a Mulie[58]
[58] For music see Chapter XIV.
[60] Probably refers to Rome and Decatur, Georgia. The distance between these two places is about a hundred miles, a pretty good “hike” for the mules if they made it in one day!
Very much after the same manner and type is the pick-and-shovel song, Lookin’ over in Georgia, which apparently has nothing specific as its historical base and no more sense to it than Mule on the Mountain. And yet it is one of the prettiest of Negro songs when accompanied by group movement, rhythm, and harmony.
Lookin’ Over in Georgia
For sheer artistry, however, one would have to search a long time to find a superior to the following verses, sung by a young Negro workingman, on platform and swing, washing the brick walls of a newly constructed university building.
Bear Cat Down in Georgia
Scarcely less mixed and informal is the delightful song Shoot that Buffalo sung in low undertone suitable to any sort of work such as digging, cutting, laying rock, unloading coal or gravel, or doing domestic duties. The melody of this “song just to help with work” is presented in Chapter XIV.
[123]
Shoot That Buffalo
One of the bad man songs listed in Chapter IV was Dupree, of which two versions were presented. The following song was sung by a young Negro recently from the chain gang. It purports to be a song made up by Dupree while in prison. As a matter of fact it is a composite jumble composed largely while being sung. It illustrates well the general situation in which any song of any sort will do just as well as any other.
Dupree’s Jail Song
Another illustration of the common promiscuity of these current songs adapted as a part of the physical effort of work is the following mongrel song of the self-styled bad man who mixes metaphors and lines to his own satisfaction.
I’m Goin’ out West
[61] That is, his pistol.
The selections that follow are typical of the large number of miscellaneous songs of almost every imaginable mixture and variety. They are examples of corruptions and also of the song-making process and of the insignificance of words and meaning in the workaday song.
Julia Long
[126]
Turn Yo’ Damper Down
Casey Jones[62]
[62] Casey Jones is still heard occasionally. The version given here is somewhat below par, but represents the sort of thing a worker is likely to sing. Note that Casey wants to ride “three mo’ roads,” but names only two. Also, in the last stanza, Casey, instead of his wife, is represented as speaking to the children.
Wash My Overhalls
Dove Came Down by the Foot of My Bed
He Wus de Gov’nor of Our Clan
[128]
I Got Chickens on My Back
I Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Make a Fool Out o’ Me
On My Las’ Go-’Round[63]
[63] There are now popular songs entitled Last Go-’Round Blues and I’m on My Last Go-’Round, but they do not resemble this song. For an older version, see The Negro and His Songs, p. 180.
Berda, You Come too Soon
[129]
Rain or Shine
Who’s Goin’ to Buy Your Whiskey?
You Calls Me in de Mornin’
Dig-a My Grave Wid a Silver Spade
[130]
Yonder Come de Devil
Dem Turrible Red Hot Blues[64]
[64] Compare Red Hot Blues, a popular phonograph and sheet music piece.
Das ’Nough Said
Diamond Joe
[131]
He Run Me In
De Goat’s Got a Smell
Goodby Sookie
Out in de Cabin
[132]
Darlin’ Get on de Road
I’m Gonna Have Me a Red Ball All My Own
[65] A fast freight train.
Great Scots, You Don’t Know What to Do
Chicken Never Roost too High fo’ Me[66]
[66] In a somewhat different version, this song was popular as a minstrel some twenty years ago.
Stewball Was a Racer[67]
[67] This is a fragment of a song, Skewball, which used to be almost an epic among the Negroes. Its origin probably goes back to an old Irish song. For a discussion of this point, see Scarborough, On the Trail of Negro Folk-Songs, pp. 61-4.
Shanghai Rooster
[135]
There is probably no theme which comes nearer being common to all types of Negro songs than the theme of the relation of man and woman. It is the heart and soul of the blues. The Negro bad man is often pictured as being bad because of a woman. The jail and chain gang songs abound in plaintive references to woman and sweetheart, and the worker in railroad gang and construction camp often sings to his “cap’n” about his woman. Likewise, in the songs of woman, man plays the leading rôle. These man and woman songs are of such significance that special attention must be given to them as a type of Negro song in order to round out the picture of Negro workaday life which this volume is trying to present. In this chapter and the one following, therefore, there have been brought together examples of songs which deal primarily with the relation of the sexes.
Conflicts, disagreements, jealousies and disappointments in the love relation have ever been productive of song. They are the chief source of “hard luck” songs or blues, and the Negro’s naïve way of singing of his failure and disappointments in love is what has made the blues famous. Sometimes his songs portray vividly, often with a sort of martyr-like satisfaction, his difficulties with women. At times his song is defiant. At other times it is merely a complaint. Again, it is despondent, in which case he is going “to jump in the rivuh an’ drown” or “drink some pizen down” or do[136] something else calculated to make the woman sorry that she mistreated him. Some of the “hard luck” stories of the Negro man are told in the following group of songs.
Lawd, She Keep on Worryin’ Me
My Girl She’s Gone and Left Me
[137]
Brown Gal Baby Done Turn Me Down
I Brung a Gal From Tennessee
Don’t Wanta See Her No Mo’
I’s Havin’ a Hell of a Time
[139]
Lawdy, What I Gonna Do?
Some o’ Dese Days
[140]
You Take de Stockin’, I Take de Sock
Pull off Dem Shoes I Bought You
A
B
[141]
Mammy-in-Law Done Turn Me Out
De Women Don’t Love Me No Mo’
The Negro man runs true to masculine style when he philosophizes upon the subject of woman. Needless to say, his philosophy is often the result of his failure to get along with the other sex. When he is “down” on womankind the burden of his song is that woman is the cause of most of the trouble in the world. He avows that
[142]
Or he declares that he will never again have anything to do with women:
One of his strong points is giving advice to others in order that they may avoid his mistakes. “Listen to me, buddy,” he says, “let me tell you what a woman’ll do.”
De Woman Am De Cause of It All and the songs immediately following it are typical of the songs of the woman-hater. Dey Got Each and de Other’s Man is as clever a bit of cynicism as one could want.
De Woman Am de Cause of It All
A
[143]
B
If Dere’s a Man in de Moon[68]
[68] Probably derived from the song If the Man in the Moon Were a Coon, which was a popular minstrel several years ago.
A Vampire of Your Own
Dey Got Each and de Udder’s Man
The Negro man is at his best when he sings of his “gal” or his “baby.” Sometimes his song is boastful of the qualities of his “gal.” Sometimes he compares the merits of the brown girl and the yellow girl or of the black and the yellow and casts his vote for his favorite color. Again, he sings the story of his courtship, and he counts it a never-to-be-too-much-talked-about experience to have been driven away from his sweetheart’s house by an irate father. In My Jane the lover characterizes his “gal” with enviable terseness and humor.
My Jane
[145]
My Gal’s a High Bo’n Lady
If You Want to See a Pretty Girl
Honey Baby
[146]
Give Me a Teasin’ Brown
You Take de Yaller, I Take de Black
Long, Tall, Brown-skin Girl
I Got a Gal an’ I Can’t Git Her
I Went to See My Gal
[148]
Baby, Why Don’t You Treat Me Right
Dey’s Hangin’ ’Roun’ Her Do’
Unfaithfulness in love is another great source of song. “Somebody stole my gal” is a common tale, and the sequel, “I’m gonna git dat man,” is equally common. The “creeper,” the man who “fools wid another man’s woman,” is the most despised of all Negro characters. Says the Negro man,
In the following group of songs the man pays his respects to the unfaithful woman and to the “creeper.”
[149]
A Creeper’s Been ’Roun’ Dis Do’
Dew-drop Mine
He Tuck Her Away
[150]
I Got My Man
Home Again, Home Again[69]
[69] Cf. Home Again Blues, a popular phonograph piece.
I’s Done Spot My Nigger
He Got My Gal
She’s Got Another Daddy
[152]
Woman’s song of man is in most respects parallel to man’s song of woman. Her themes are about the same. She sings of her “man” or “daddy,” of her disappointments and failures in love, of her unfaithful lover, and of her own secret amours.
It will be noticed that woman’s song conforms quite closely to the blues type as it is popularly known today. In Chapter I examples of the “mama” blues titles were given and in Chapter II it was pointed out that the majority of the formal blues of today deal with the sex theme. Furthermore, most of these blues are sung from the point of view of woman. Consequently, as songs that may be remembered and sung from day to day, they appear more acceptable to woman than to man. Perhaps this explains why the influence of the formal blues is encountered so frequently in the kind of songs with which this chapter is concerned. At any rate, it is becoming increasingly difficult to find a song of woman on the man theme which does not show the influence of the popular blues.[70]
[70] After consulting dozens of popular pieces, in both sheet music and phonograph record form, we have been able to trace some of these songs to them, but we feel sure that the influence of the formal blues is present in many other songs in this and other chapters, even though we have failed so far to locate the direct evidence. We have omitted many songs that were clearly of formal origin, although the singers insisted that they were entirely original.
Woman’s song of man frequently concerns itself with “the other woman,” the rival in the case. The first two songs given here are only indirectly concerned with man, but they are of interest because they[153] touch upon the “conflict of color” within the Negro community. They are only samples of a voluminous literature of “chocolate” versus “yellow,” or “black” versus “brown,” which is to be found in the songs of the Negro.
De Mulatto Gal
De Chocolate Gal
Songs like those just given are varied to suit the color of the singer. If the black girl has an off-color rival, she sings that it is the yellow girl who “steals an’ lies,” who “cries an’ begs,” who “can cuss an’ rare,” and so on.
In the next few songs woman sings of her “man.” Her appellations, “my man,” “my daddy,” “sweet papa,” “chocolate drop,” “Black Jack,” and others, are an interesting study in themselves. I’s Dreamin’ of You has simplicity and a note of tenderness which approaches the better type of love song. The other songs are quite crude, but it should be remembered that they are characteristic only of the Negro woman of the lower class.
I’s Dreamin’ of You
On de Road Somewhere
My Black Jack
Daddy Mine
[156]
My Man Am a Slap-stick Man
Don’t You Two-time Me
Can Any One Take Sweet Mama’s Place?[71]
[71] Cf. phonograph record, Can Anybody Take Sweet Mama’s Place?
[157]
But the chief theme in woman’s song, as in man’s, is trouble. Sometimes the dominant note is disappointment:
Sometimes it is regret:
Again the key-note is one of despondency:
And it is usually the “other woman” who is at the bottom of the trouble.
These “hard luck” songs of woman are presented in the next group. It is here that one finds the closest relation between folk songs and the formal blues.
When I Wore My Ap’on Low
[158]
I Done Sol’ My Soul to de Devil[72]
[72] Very similar to phonograph piece, Done Sold My Soul to the Devil.
I Got a Letter From My Man[73]
[73] This song represents the lament of a construction-camp woman. The sentiment of the first four stanzas is found, in a very different form, in the phonograph piece, Death Letter Blues.
I Ain’t No Stranger
[160]
What Can the Matter Be?[74]
[74] This song, which is probably of white origin, has a wide distribution. The present version is from North Carolina. The song is mentioned in Pound’s syllabus, Folk Song of Nebraska and the Central West. Perrow gives a version in Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 28, p. 169.
Worried Anyhow[75]
[75] Cf. phonograph record, Worried Anyhow Blues.
[161]
Dere’s Misery in Dis Lan’
Dat Chocolate Man
[162]
Dem Longin’, Wantin’ Blues
Dat Nigger o’ Mine Don’t Love Me No Mo’.
I Don’t Love Him No Mo’.
[163]
I Wish I Was Single Again[76]
[76] Cf. Campbell & Sharp, English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians, p. 256; also phonograph record version, I Wish I Was a Single Girl.
Dere’s a Lizzie After My Man
[164]
Dat Sly Gal
I Don’t Feel Welcome Here
Occupied
[165]
I’m Gonna Get Me Another Man
I Got Another Daddy
[166]
One of the most interesting of all the Negro’s secular songs is the folk minstrel type. This minstrel song is similar to the original minstrel, in which one or more wandering musicians and songsters travel from place to place rendering song and music with varied accompaniments. Sometimes one singer goes alone, sometimes two, sometimes a quartette. They are entertainers in the real sense that they exhibit themselves and their art with all the naturalness and spontaneity possible. Furthermore, such minstrels are not infrequently ingenious in composing new verses and adapting them to old tunes or to newly discovered ones. Such songs are also well adapted to social gatherings and to various special occasions. They should be distinguished from the black-face type of vaudeville song and the minstrel show, although of course the song of the traveling show must inevitably influence the minstrel type a great deal. For sheer type-portraiture, however, the minstrel Negro and his song must undoubtedly be presented if the whole picture is to be complete.
Typical scenes are the singing on special gala occasions, such as fairs, holidays, and picnics, at resorts of the whites, on the road or on street corners. Such singers also accompany many a patent-medicine man or other street-corner vender of wares. Sung in this way, of course, are many of the ordinary secular creations, but in general the minstrel type is[167] more finished and formal, with more of rhyme and something of the ballad technique, with much of the humor and entertaining qualities implied in its kind. Most of these songs would repay special study on the part of the student of folk songs and ballads who wishes to trace origins and developments. While all the songs we have listed are Negro songs in the sense that they are sung much and regularly by Negroes, with the special artistic expression and manner common to them, they are, of course, often much mixed with similar songs originating elsewhere. In the case of It Ain’t Gonna Rain No Mo’,[77] for instance, the origin of course is a common one, and many of the scores of verses are sung alike by white and Negro minstrels, with only minor distinctions due to manner and situation. And yet of the several hundred verses which are even now extant, some are very clearly of Negro origin, exhibiting something of the Negro’s traditional phrases and his blues. A Negro quartette singing It Ain’t Gonna Rain No Mo’ is undoubtedly singing a Negro song. Among the songs in the previous volume which are adapted to the minstrel type of singing are Railroad Bill, Lilly, Stagolee, Eddy Jones,[78] and some of the more recently composed religious types.
[77] No verses of It Ain’t Gonna Rain No Mo’ are given in this volume, although our collection included several score. They are scarcely within the bounds of the present collection.
[78] See The Negro and His Songs, pp. 196, 198, 205, 228.
One of the most attractive of all the Negro songs we have heard was That Liar, sung by two elderly Negro men at Columbia, South Carolina, through the courtesy of Dr. E. L. C. Adams. The main part of the song is always chanted by the leader in recitative sing-song very much after the fashion of a sermon when the minister has reached his emotional climax. Then upon reaching the chorus, he suddenly turns into rapid[168] song, accompanied by his companion. They sing the chorus with the usual accompaniment of “Oh” or “Lawd” or “Let me tell you.” The song, with some variations and repetitions, is good for almost an hour’s entertainment. It is also a very good shouting song.
That Liar[79]
[79] Cf. The song given by Ballanta in his St. Helena Island Spirituals, p. 72.
Sung in very much the same way is the War Jubilee Song, itself a type of popular traveling song. It was the favorite of the same two singers, both noted songsters of the Columbia environs, and they claimed to have learned it from a traveling Negro secretary of the Y. W. C. A., who came from Florida immediately after the World War. Here again the chorus was sung with effective variations, “Now I’m so glad,” or “You know I’m so glad,” or “I declare I’m so glad,” and many others.
War Jubilee Song
[171]
One of the most entertaining songs in all the repertoire of the Negro’s aggregate creations is Mr. Epting, sung by four Negro pick-and-shovel men with such zest and harmony as we have rarely heard. It is apparently a parody on the war song Good Morning, Mr. Zip, and with this particular quartette of workers would make a hit on any stage. In the singing, the largest member of the group dances a jig and exclaims in his big bass voice, “Lawd, Lawd, I feels funny when I sings this song. Lawd, Lawd, I can’t keep still, it gives me such a funny feelin’. Whoopee! Singin’ ’bout white man gives me funny feelin’.” In addition to the verses sung here the singer may substitute for whiskey and cocaine such words as gun, woman, policeman, work, and other forces which may be calculated to lead to the demise of these slanderers of Mr. Epting.
Good Morning, Mr. Epting
The old song Raise a Rukus Tonight is now a popular one in various forms, those given here representing Georgia, Tennessee and North Carolina. There are many other versions and fragments, but these will suffice to indicate the type and mixture so common at present. One may easily see the similarity to the old song but also its corruption by such modern types[173] as It Ain’t Gonna Rain No Mo’. Wring Jing, while not a “rukus” chorus, is so much of the same sort as to make its comparison of value. The other much varied and corrupted types are also valuable for comparative purposes.
Raise a Rukus Tonight
A
Raise a Rukus Tonight
B
Raise a Rukus Tonight
C
Wring Jing Had a Little Ding
[176]
Gwine to Git a Home By an’ By
There are many songs of the mule, some of which are old and being revived, some of which have been made new by the phonograph records. The first illustration here was sung with remarkable effect at the Dayton, Tennessee, Scopes trial, with hundreds of whites and Negroes standing around the quartette of Negroes[177] who came for the occasion. Most of their songs were of the stereotyped sort, such as Ain’t Gonna Rain No Mo’. The mule song is the best illustration of the minstrel type given in this volume. The other mule songs are presented largely for comparison, and are not particularly valuable. One of these, exhorting Miss Liza to keep her seat, is similar to the version collected twenty years ago in Mississippi.[80]
[80] See The Negro and His Songs, p. 235.
Go ’Long Mule
[81] Evidently refers to a Ku Klux Klan meeting.
[179]
Hump-back Mule
Whoa, Mule
A Nigger’s Hard to Fool
[181]
I’m Fishin’ Boun’
Co’n Bread
Other songs which are current through the singing of the minstrel type, or distributed widely on printed sheets in much the same way as the “mule” songs, are No Coon But You, De Co’t House in De Sky, and[183] Hi-Jenny-Ho, sent us by Mr. J. D. Arthur of Tennessee. The Pullman Porter is a little more sophisticated, but represents a type of humor and easy-going vaudeville style.
No Coon But You
De Co’t House in de Sky
Hi, Jenny, Ho, Jenny Johnson
Pullman Porter
Kitty Kimo[82]
[82] Cf. Scarborough, On the Trail of Negro Folk-Songs, pp. 156-7.
[188]
Many a laborer, although singing his full quota of secular songs, still finds his workaday solace best in his favorite heritage of church and religious melodies. There is surcease of sorrow in the plaintive
And the appeal for relief from present difficulties, so eloquently expressed in the previous chapters, finds its counterpart in this favorite of many workers of the present day.
There seems to be an impression abroad to the effect that the making of Negro spirituals stopped long ago. On the contrary, it is quite probable that more spirituals are being made today than during the days of slavery. As a matter of fact the old spirituals have never been[189] static. It is no longer possible to speak of the “pure” or “original” version of Swing Low, Sweet Chariot, of Roll, Jordan, Roll, or any other of the old favorites. If any one is in doubt of this, let him compare the words and music of the spirituals as they were recorded by Allen and others in 1867 with the records of the same songs later made by Fenner and Work and with the recent versions in James Weldon Johnson’s Book of American Negro Spirituals. Or let him compare the songs as they are sung at Hampton with the same songs as they are sung at Tuskegee or at Fisk. The spirituals, like all other folk songs, are dynamic. Sometimes in the process of constant change there appear variations which are so unlike the parent songs as to constitute virtually new songs. In this way the old spirituals have been the inspiration for untold numbers of new religious songs.
Among the lowly Negro folk of the South the making of spirituals is still a reality. Every community has its “composers.” Often they are supposed to possess some special gift of the “spirit.” From sermon, prayer, and crude folk wisdom they draw ideas and inspiration for their compositions. Sometimes the results are pathetic, but not infrequently there springs up a song which would compare favorably with the old spirituals.
It is not the purpose of this chapter to present the old spirituals or merely their newer variations, but rather to give some of the more unsophisticated religious songs of the workaday Negro as they are sung today in the South, by the same groups and individuals whose songs and verbal pictures this volume presents. They are not the kind of songs which are usually sung in the Negro churches, for many of them have only individual or local significance, while others show distinct secular touches.
[190]
Biblical themes continue to find a place in the Negro’s religious songs. Moses and Pharaoh and Noah and the ark are still the favorites. Here are a few of the workaday religious songs now current in the South. Pharaoh’s Army Got Drownded is a favorite with children, and is often sung by them as a sort of reel. The three songs following it were sung by a woman in Georgia who is known locally as Sanctified Mary Harris. She claims that they are her own compositions and says that she composes only when she in “under de spirit.”
Pharaoh’s Army Got Drownded
[191]
Gonna Turn Back Pharaoh’s Army
Didn’t Ol’ Pharaoh Get Lost?
Who Built de Ark?
The old songs had much to say about trouble, the struggle with sin and the devil, and the warning to the sinner man. Favorite lines used to be:
Perhaps Satan and the terrors of hell and judgment are not pictured as frequently and as vividly as they used to be, but they are still a vital part of Negro song. The following songs portray the struggle with sin, the warning to the sinner, and the superior status of the sanctified as opposed to the sinner.
Good Lawd, I Am Troubled
We Will Kneel ’Roun’ de Altar
De Devil’s Been to My House[83]
[83] The next three songs are compositions of Sanctified Mary Harris. Have Everlastin’ Life has little originality, however.
Jes’ Behol’ What a Number!
Have Everlastin’ Life
[195]
The Sanctified
What You Gonna Do?
I Love Jesus
Save Me, Lawd
Parting and death are the subjects of the saddest songs that the Negro sings. The following songs awaken thoughts of the old folk saying their goodby’s at the last service of a revival meeting or parting after a long-hoped-for family reunion. I Bid You a Long Farewell is one of the favorites of Aunt Georgia Victrum, age eighty-three, of Jasper County, Georgia.
[197]
I Bid You a Long Farewell
I Don’t Want You All to Grieve After Me
[84] And so on for father, sister, brother, etc., etc.
When I’s Dead an’ Gone
Angels Lookin’ at Me
[199]
You Mus’ Shroud My Body
But death holds no terror for the Negro. He maintains that death’s stream “chills the body but not the soul,” and he believes that
As of old, heaven is the greatest theme of his religious song. He used to sing:
Now he sings:
But let the songs speak for themselves. Among them are some which might now be famous if they had only been born seventy years ago.
I Never Will Turn Back
When I Lay My Burden Down
[201]
Since I Laid My Burden Down
In de Mornin’ Soon
[202]
Oh, de Gospel Train’s A-Comin’
Some o’ These Days
I Wants to Go to Heaven
When I Git Home
I’s Gonna Shine
I’s Swingin’ in de Swinger[85]
[85] The idea for this novel song probably came from Swing Low, Sweet Chariot. It is another composition of Sanctified Mary Harris, as are also the two remaining songs in this chapter.
Goodby, Sing Hallelu
I Calls My Jesus King Emanuel
[206]
Here is a construction camp which employs largely Negro workers. In four years 8,504 laborers were employed and there was an average labor turnover of once each month, or forty-eight different sets of men working on the buildings and road under construction during that time. This camp employed men from different Southern states in the order named: North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Texas, Mississippi, Louisiana; while stragglers represented eleven states outside the South. Why this turnover? Why do men travel from state to state? Of what sort are they? How many road camps and construction groups throughout the South duplicate this record? What are the experience, history, difficulties of the Negro worker by the roadside? Why does he quit his job? Where will he go for the next?
The entire story of the casual laborer will, of course, have to be told elsewhere in thorough studies of migration and case studies of many individuals. It is a remarkable story, sometimes unbelievable. It is not the purpose of this chapter to go into the matter of causes, but to present a picture of the workaday songster as a sort of cumulative example of the whole story of this volume. It is true that his early home life, his training, his experience, his relation to the whites, have all influenced him greatly. It is true also that there is often slack work, poor conditions of housing and work, little recreation, small wages, and always a[207] call to some better place. But we are concerned with these here only as they are a part of the background of the picture. Here is a type perhaps more representative of the Negro common man than any other. Now a youngster of eight, father and mother dead, off to Texas to an uncle, then—“po’ mistreated boy”—he goes to Louisiana, then to Mississippi, then to Georgia, across South Carolina, back home to North Carolina, then off to Philadelphia, to Pittsburg, to Ohio, to Chicago, then back to the East and Harlem and back South again. He is typical of a part of the Negro movement of the decade. But there is continuously a stream of moving laborers from country to town, from town to town, from city to city, from state to state, from South to North. Here is hardship, but withal adventure, romance, and blind urge for survival.
As an example of this worker and songster we present John Wesley Gordon, alias Left Wing[86] Gordon, commonly called “Wing.” He is very real, and one could scarcely imagine a better summary of the lonesome road, if made to order. Recent popular volumes portraying the species hobo show no wanderers arrayed like these black men of the lonesome road. Walt Whitman’s
would seem a gentle taunt to Left Wing Gordon on the red roads of Georgia or on the Seaboard rods in “sweet ol’ Alabam’.” He had, at the last writing, given excellent tale of working, loafing, singing his way[208] through thirty-eight states of the union, with such experience and adventure as would make a white man an epic hero. “You see, boss, I started travelin’ when I wus ’leven years ol’ an’ now I’ll be thirty this comin’ August 26th. I didn’t have no father an’ mother, so I jes’ started somewheres. I’d work fer folks, an’ they wouldn’t treat me right, so I moved on. An’, Lawd, cap’n, I ain’t stopped yet.” And so he hadn’t, for when on the morrow we came to put the finishing touches on his story, a fellow laborer said, “Law’, boss, Wing done gone to Philadelphia.”
[86] So called because he had lost his right arm.
“Wing,” who started from St. Joseph in Missouri, lost his arm at eighteen years of age. He gives the following concrete data about some of the places where he has worked and loafed. What story might have been written if we had taken the states alphabetically, asking him for full details, with plenty of time, one can only imagine. Here is the order in which he volunteered information about the different states, in the geography of which he appears to be something of a scholar. The phraseology belongs to Wing and the inconsistencies remain as in his Iliad.
Louisiana. Worked on boat some an’ saw-mill some.
Florida. Worked on hard roads.
Alabama. Worked in steel plants six miles from Birmingham.
Texas. Didn’t do nothin’ in Texas, had a little money to spend.
Arkansas. Worked at H—— Hotel at New Port, fellow runnin’ name Jack N——.
Missouri. Worked on boat.
Illinois. Sold papers in Chicago, started mowin’ lawns, white-washin’ fences, brushin’ furniture, an’ worked in packin’ house.
[209]
Wyoming. Had a little money in Cheyenne an’ didn’t have nothin’ to do.
Nebraska. At Omaha worked at packin’ house.
Iowa. Worked in mines and on railroad.
Canada. Worked at government camp ’cross from Detroit, an’ broom factory at Montreal.
Michigan. Worked at Ford factory at district on P. & M. railroad out north of Detroit.
Kansas. In harvest fields ’bout 37 miles from Leavenworth—Naw sir, never been in Leavenworth prisons.
North Carolina. On a job.
Arizona. Didn’t do nothin’ much.
South Carolina. On hard roads an’ Southern Power Company.
Georgia. Comin’ in a hurry, never fooled ’round there much. Did work in saw mill eight miles out from Waycross two weeks.
Tennessee. Out at Knoxville and Maysville at maloominum plant.
Mississippi. In boats at Vicksburg and Natchez.
Virginia. Worked most everywhere—Richmond at Broad Meadows, 1227 Brook Avenue.
New York. Out at Bessemer plants stirrin’ pots.
Washington. At Alexandria, Virginia side.
Ohio. Worked for Mayor of Bridgeport, named C. J—.
West Virginia. At coal mines.
Pennsylvania. Worked in Pittsburg steel mills eight miles from Pittsburg.
Maryland. I’s in Baltimore, had boat carry us out an’ bring us back, Double A flashlight factory at 47 cents a hour.
New Jersey. Cross from New York, four miles from Nooark, work on Hansack River.
Wisconsin. Used to work out o’ Milwaukee, butler on C. B. & Q. road; eight miles out but we stayed in Milwaukee.
[210]
Connecticut. Used to ketch boat an’ go over to New Haven, Hartford, Thomasville, eight miles out from Springfiel’, Massachusetts.
Massachusetts. Springfiel’ and Boston, too. Didn’t work none in Boston but had sister there.
Rhode Island. Never stopped there but I could walk all over that little state. Hartford is capital.
North Dakota. Wiped up engine on Great Northern, 237 miles from Minneapolis.
South Dakota. Worked out in Aberdeen in wheat fields, harvest for Al T——, mostly carried water.
California. When war was goin’ on, time of government camp at Los Angeles an’ Sacramento an’ Miles City.
Wing was also a great songster. “When de ‘Wing Blues’ come out, dat’s me,” he would say. His chief refrain was always
of which he had many versions. This chorus was easily adapted to a hundred songs and varied accordingly. “When you see me laughin’, I’m laughin’ just to keep from cryin’,” or “I’m tryin’ to keep from cryin’,” or “When you think I’m laughin’, I’m cryin’ all the time.” There were his other versions, such as
with its similar variety, such as “I’m leavin’ to worry you off my min’,” or “When you think I’m leavin’[211] I’m comin’ right behin’.” Wing claimed a “Blues” for every state and more; if there was none already at hand, he would make one of his own. There were the various Southern blues, the Boll Weevil Blues, Cornfield Blues, Gulf Coast Blues, Atlanta Blues, Alabama Blues, Birmingham Blues, Mississippi Blues, Louisiana Low Down, Shreveport Blues, New Orleans Wiggle, Norfolk Blues, Virginia Blues, Oklahoma Blues, Memphis Blues, Wabash Blues, St. Louis Blues, Carolina Blues, Charleston Blues, and many others.
[87] One of the most popular blues today is a piece called You Don’t Know My Mind Blues. We have evidence, however, which tends to show that numerous vulgar versions of the same title were current among the Negroes long before the formal song was published.
It must be admitted that Wing’s blues were mixed and of wonderful proportions. He could sing almost any number of blues, fairly representative of the published type, with, of course, the typical additions, variations, and adaptations to time and occasion.
Wing called that the Louisiana Blues, and certainly for the time being it was so. And for Georgia, although in his narrative he had given the Empire State of the South the usual Negro reputation of quick passage, he sang a mixed blues.
[213]
Then for Alabama, Tennessee, Florida, California, Virginia, there were other fragments, besides numerous formal versions.
[88] This and many other of Wing’s stanzas have no clear meaning as far as we can tell. Sometimes his songs give the impression that he has learned the titles of numerous popular blues and has woven as many of them as possible into each stanza.
Before continuing Left Wing’s story, giving something more of the scope of his adventures, perhaps the best further introduction will be the exact record of some of his songs in the order in which he gave them. Wing had practically no variation in his tunes and technique of singing. A high-pitched voice, varied with occasional low tones, was the most important part of his repertoire. But what variation in words and scenes, phrases and verses, the recording of which would exhaust the time and endurance of the listener and call for an ever-recording instrument! For certainly the effort to transcribe everything Wing gave left the visitor amazingly exhausted, marveling at the jumbled resourcefulness of the singer, wishing for some new type of photography which would register the voice, looks, experience, and inimitable temperament of this itinerant camp follower.
Differing slightly in tone, Wing sets out on a new song only to swing back again to the same lonesome blues; indeed he makes his technique and his whines as he goes, the result blending into a remarkable product.
Left Wing’s story of his wanderings does not omit, of course, the woman part of his “lovin’ worl’.” Try as he might to sing of other experiences, inevitably he would swing back to his old theme.
Wing, however, does not jump into the deep blue sea, although like the other traditional bull frog he does jump from place to place. Concerning the women about whom he sings, he affirmed, “Can’t count ’em, take me day after tomorrow to count ’em. Find fifteen or twenty in different cities. New Orleans best place to find most fastest, mo’ freer women,—person find gang of ’em in minute.
“But I had some mighty fine women. Fust one was Abbie Jones, ’bout —— Ioway Street. Nex’ was in M——, Missouri, Jennie Baker, Susan Baker’s daughter. Nex’ one St. Louis, lady called Bulah Cotton, Pete Cotton’s daughter. Nex’ one was in Eas’ St. Louis, her name Sylvia Brown. Nex’ I had in Poplar Bluff, one dat took my money an’ went off, Effie Farlan, had father name George Farlan. Nex’ Laura, she’s in Memphis, Tennessee, she’s ’nother took my money an’ gone. Jes’ lay down, went to sleep, jes’ took money an’ gone. Wake up sometimes broke an’ hongry, they jes’ naturally take my money. Nex’ woman was at Columbia, S. C., ’bout las’ regular one I had, Mamie Willard, mother an’ father dead. Sweethearts I can git plenty of if I got money. If I[219] ain’t got none I’se sometimes lonesome, but not always, ’cause sometimes dey feel sorry fer you an’ treat you mighty fine anyway.”
Wing tells some remarkable stories, evidently products of the perfect technique of appeal and approach, in which formality and easy-going ways are blended with great patience and persistence. This series of adventures alone would make a full sized volume albeit there is no need to publish it abroad. Typical, however, are the chant verses below.
Wing says he never stays in any place more than three weeks, “leastwise never mo’ ’n fo’.” Sometimes he walks, sometimes he rides the rods, sometimes when money is plentiful he rides in the cars. He has had his tragic and his comic experiences. The spirit of the road is irrevocably fixed in him and he can think in no other terms. Some day a Negro artist will paint him, a Negro story teller will tell his story, a “high she’ff” will arrest him, a “jedge” will sentence him, a “cap’n” will “cuss” him, he will “row here few days longer,” then he’ll be gone.
[221]
Left Wing Gordon was and is a very real person, “traveling man” de luxe in the flesh and blood. Not so John Henry, who was most probably a mythical character. Whatever other studies may report, no Negro whom we have questioned in the states of North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia has ever seen or known of John Henry personally or known any one who has, although it is well understood that he was “mos’ fore-handed steel-drivin’ man in the world.” Still he is none the less real as a vivid picture and example of the good man hero of the race.
Although, like the story of Left Wing, the John Henry ballad carries its own intrinsic merit, this song of the black Paul Bunyan of the Negro workingman is significant for other reasons. It is, first of all, a rare creation of considerable originality, dignity and interest. It provides an excellent study in diffusion, and, as soon as the settings, variations, comparisons, and adaptations have been completed, will deserve a special brochure. For the purposes of this volume, however, we shall present simply the John Henry ballad in the forms and versions heard within the regions of this collection, with some comparative evidence of the workingman’s varied mirror of his hero. John Henry is still growing in reputation and in stature and in favor with the Negro singer, ranging in repute from the ordinary fore-handed steel-driving man to a martyred president of the United States struck down, with the[222] hammer in his hand, by some race assassin. One youth reminiscent of all that he had heard, and minded to make his version complete, set down this:
We have found a few Negroes who were not clear in their minds about Booker T. Washington, but we have found none in North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia who had not heard something some time about John Henry. In other places, however, in Mississippi and Maryland, for instance, we understand he is not so well known. To trace the story of the ballad to its origin[89] is a difficult task and one awaiting the folk-lorist; but to gather these samples of this sort of nomad ballad is a comparatively easy and always delightful task.
[89] Prof. J. H. Cox traces John Henry to a real person, John Hardy, a Negro who had a reputation in West Virginia as a steel driver and who was hanged for murder in 1894. We are inclined to believe that John Henry was of separate origin and has become mixed with the John Hardy story in West Virginia. We have never found a Negro who knew the song as John Hardy, and we have no versions which mention the circumstance of the murder and execution. For Cox’s discussion and several versions of John Hardy, see his Folk-Songs of The South, pp. 175-188; also Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 32, p. 505 et seq. Bibliographies will be found in these references.
There are many versions of the common story. Some hold that John Henry’s “captain” made a large wager with the boss of the steel-driving crew that John Henry could beat the steam drill down, and that John Henry did succeed but died with the last stroke of his hammer. Others claim that the wager was John Henry’s own doing and that he never could stand the new-fangled steam contraption. Leastwise he died with the hammer in his hand, some claiming in the mountain drilling stone, others in railroad cuts or tunnels[223] of various roads recently under construction. But in all cases the central theme is the same: John Henry, powerful steel-driving man, races with the steam-drill and dies with the hammer in his hand.
Of the fragments or variations of John Henry there seems to be no end. One at Columbia, South Carolina, sets the standard of conduct as at par with John Henry and affirms that “If I could hammer like John Henry, I’d bro-by, Lawd, I’d bro-by,” which was interpreted to mean the act of passing by the whole procession of steel drivers. An Atlanta version represented John Henry as sitting on his mother’s knee, whereupon she “looked in his face an’ say, ‘John Henry, you’ll be the death o’ me’.” Another fragment from an old timer, self-styled “full-handed musicianer,” described John Henry as a steel driver who “always drove the steel” and always “beat the steam drill down,” and added that if he could drill like John Henry he would “beat all the steam drills down.” While most of the versions limited John Henry to steel driving on mountain or railroad, nevertheless there seems to be a general idea that he took turns at being a railroad man, not in the sense of working on the railroad section gangs but as an engineer, perhaps a skilled one. Part of this is the natural story centering around the logical outcome of a railroad man, and part is corruption of the Casey Jones and other noted engineer songs. One opening stanza has it,
while still others thought the K. C. or Frisco or C. & O. roads would be fatal. In the colloquial story, part of[224] which is given later, John Henry usually told his mother and friends, just as did Jagooze and the other railroad men, about his proprietary powers in the noted railroads across the continent. Then there were the references to his firemen and “riders” and the fear of a wreck. Sometimes, as indicative of the changing form, the singer switches off from the standard John Henry lines to some other, like “goin’ up Decatur wid hat in my hand, lookin’ for woman ain’t got no man.”
For the most part, however, the versions are rather consistent. The chief differences have to do with minor details. The main story is always the same. We are now presenting a dozen or more versions of the song, beginning with what may be called the purer or more composite versions and ending with versions that have strayed far from the simple story of John Henry. The first is a common Chapel Hill version, but even that is varied almost as often as it is sung by different groups. In this and the other versions, John Henry’s wife or woman becomes in turn Delia Ann, Lizzie Ann, Polly Ann, or whatever other Ann may be thought of as representing an attractive person. Sometimes John Henry carried her in the “palm of his hand,” as indeed he is also reported to have carried his little son. When a child, John Henry also sat on his father’s knee as well as his mother’s. Sometimes it was seven-, sometimes nine-, sometimes ten-pound hammer that would be the death of him. Sometimes it was the C. & O. tunnel, sometimes steel, sometimes the hammer which was going to bring him down.
[225]
John Henry[90]
A
[90] The music of this version is given in Chapter XIV. For the music of a version of John Hardy, see Campbell and Sharp, English Folk-Songs From The Southern Appalachians, p. 87. There is available also a very good phonograph version of John Henry.
B
C
D
E
[91] Stanzas of this kind are frequent in John Henry. They came originally from the old English ballad, The Lass of Roch Royal. See Child, The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, No. 76.
F
G
H
[92] The “shaker” is the man who holds the drill upright and turns it between the strokes of the hammer.
I
J
[234]
K
It would take a large volume to record all of the ways in which John Henry is known to the Negro worker and singer. He is known far and wide in song and story and he is the hero of hundreds of thousands of black toilers. Negroes who do work that requires rhythmic movements, such as digging or driving steel, naturally like to dwell upon the thought of the great[236] John Henry, and they make work songs about the great hero. The four songs which follow are not only good examples of this kind of work song, but reveal something of the worker’s feeling for John Henry.
Dis Here Hammer Kill John Henry
If I Could Hammer Like John Henry
Heard Mighty Rumblin’
John Henry Was a Man o’ Might
[93] The first line of each stanza is sung three times as indicated in the first stanza.
[238]
In story John Henry’s deeds often assume magnificent proportions. Indeed, the stories about him are in many respects more interesting than the songs, for the stories usually have more range and reflect more imagination than the songs. Occasionally one can find a Negro who will tell the story simply and without exaggeration, but one usually gets a version which is more or less embellished with the legendary attributes and attainments of John Henry. In the following story, John Henry is credited with such powers as would make him a close rival of Paul Bunyan himself.[94]
[94] This story was recorded at Chapel Hill, N. C., but, as far as we can tell it came originally from Stone Mountain, Ga. It is given as nearly as possible in the words in which it was told.
“One day John Henry lef’ rock quarry on way to camp an’ had to go through woods an’ fiel’. Well, he met big black bear an’ didn’t do nothin’ but shoot ’im wid his bow an’ arrer, an’ arrer went clean through bear an’ stuck in big tree on other side. So John Henry pulls arrer out of tree an’ pull so hard he falls back ’gainst ’nother tree which is full o’ flitterjacks, an’ first tree is full o’ honey, an’ in pullin’ arrer out o’ one he shaken down honey, an’ in failin’ ’gainst other he shaken down flitterjacks. Well, John Henry set there an’ et honey an’ flitterjacks an’ set there an’ et honey an’ flitterjacks, an’ after while when he went to git up to go, button pop off’n his pants an’ kill a rabbit mo’ ’n hundred ya’ds on other side o’ de tree. An’ so up jumped brown baked pig wid sack o’ biscuits on his back, an’ John Henry et him too.
“So John Henry gits up to go on through woods to camp for supper, ’cause he ’bout to be late an’ he mighty hongry for his supper. John Henry sees lake down hill and thinks he’ll git him a drink o’ water, cause he’s thirsty, too, after eatin’ honey an’ flitterjacks an’[239] brown roast pig an’ biscuits, still he’s hongry yet. An’ so he goes down to git drink water an’ finds lake ain’t nothin’ but lake o’ honey, an’ out in middle dat lake ain’t nothin but tree full o’ biscuits. An’ so John Henry don’t do nothin’ but drink dat lake o’ honey dry. An’ he et the tree full o’ biscuits, too.
“An’ so ’bout that time it begin’ to git dark, an’ John Henry sees light on hill an’ he think maybe he can git sumpin to eat, cause he’s mighty hongry after big day drillin’. So he look ’roun’ an’ see light on hill an’ runs up to house where light is an’ ast people livin’ dere, why’n hell dey don’t give him sumpin’ to eat, ’cause he ain’t had much. An’ so he et dat, too.
“Gee-hee, hee, dat nigger could eat! But dat ain’t all, cap’n. Dat nigger could wuk mo’ ’n he could eat. He’s greates’ steel driller ever live, regular giaunt, he wus; could drill wid his hammer mo’ ’n two steam drills, an’ some say mo’ ’n ten. Always beggin’ boss to git ’im bigger hammer, always beggin’ boss git ’im bigger hammer. John Henry wus cut out fer big giaunt driller. One day when he wus jes’ few weeks ol’ settin’ on his mammy’s knee he commence cryin’ an’ his mommer say, “John Henry, whut’s matter, little son?” An’ he up an’ say right den an’ dere dat nine-poun’ hammer be death o’ him. An’ so sho’ ’nough he grow up right ’way into bigges’ steel driller worl’ ever see. Why dis I’s tellin’ you now wus jes’ when he’s young fellow; waits til’ I tells you ’bout his drillin’ in mountains an’ in Pennsylvania. An’ so one day he drill all way from Rome, Georgia, to D’catur, mo’ ’n a hundred miles drillin’ in one day, an’ I ain’t sure dat wus his bes’ day. No, I ain’t sure dat wus his bes’ day.
“But, boss, John Henry wus a regular boy, not lak some o’ dese giaunts you read ’bout not likin’ wimmin[240] an’ nothin’. John Henry love to come to town same as any other nigger, only mo’ so. Co’se he’s mo’ important an’ all dat, an’ co’se he had mo’ wimmin ’an anybody else,’some say mo’ ’n ten, but as to dat I don’t know. I means, boss, mo’ wimmen ’an ten men, ’cause, Lawd, I specs he had mo’ ’n thousand wimmin’. An’ John Henry wus a great co’tin’ man, too, cap’n. Always wus dat way. Why, one day when he settin’ by his pa’ in san’ out in front o’ de house, jes’ few weeks old, women come along and claim him fer deir man. An’ dat’s funny, too, but it sho’ wus dat way all his life. An’ so when he come to die John Henry had mo’ wimmin, all dressed in red an’ blue an’ all dem fine colors come to see him dead, if it las’ thing they do, an’ wus mighty sad sight, people all standin’ ’roun’, both cullud an’ white.”
Of course, no Negro believes that the foregoing story is true. But there are innumerable stories which stay within the bounds of possibility—though not always probability, to be sure—and which are thoroughly believed by the Negroes who tell them. One of the most widespread of these, and at the same time interesting and artistic, was concluded as follows by a North Carolina Negro workman:
“An’ John Henry beat dat ol’ steam drill down, but jes’ as he took his las’ stroke he fell over daid wid de hammer in his han’. Dey buried him dere in de tunnel, an’ now dey got his statue carved in solid rock at de mouth o’ de Big Ben’ tunnel on de C. & O.—das right over dere close to Asheville somewhere. No, I ain’t never been dere, but dere he stan’, carved in great big solid rock wid de hammer in his han’.”
[241]
We have pointed out again and again the utter futility of trying to describe accurately the singing of a group of Negroes when they are at their best. A group of twenty workers singing, carrying various parts, suiting song to work, and vying with one another for supremacy in variations and innovations—this is a scene which defies musical notation and description. And yet the picture which we have tried to present in this volume would certainly be incomplete without the addition of some of the simple melodies of typical workaday songs. They are added, therefore, merely as final touches to the picture rather than as attempts to reproduce the complex harmonies of Negro songs.
Heretofore the spirituals have received most of the attention of those who were working toward the preservation of Negro music. The secular songs have nothing like the standardization of words and music that the spirituals have, simply because they have not been preserved. It is inevitable, however, that due attention will be given to Negro secular music. Indeed much has recently been done toward that end.[95] But the task of recording the majority of Negro secular tunes is yet to be done. It is to be hoped that the forthcoming volume of secular songs which is being edited by James Weldon Johnson will go a long way toward giving the Negro’s secular music the place which it deserves.
[95] For a discussion of the recent collections of Negro songs, see Guy B. Johnson, “Some Recent Contributions to the Study of American Negro Songs,” Social Forces, June, 1926.
[242]
Any one who has tried to record the music of Negro songs knows that it is very difficult to do more than approximate the tunes as they are actually sung. Several reasons may be cited to account for this. In the first place, there are slurs and minute gradations in pitch in Negro songs which it is impossible to represent in ordinary musical notation. Some of these effects can be reproduced on a stringed instrument, but they cannot be shown on a musical scale which is only divided into half-step changes of pitch. A notation in the form of curved lines would come nearer representing the Negro’s singing than does the system of definite notes along a staff. It is what the Negro sings between the lines and spaces that makes his music so difficult to record.
Another factor which must be reckoned with is the inconsistency of the singer. When the recorder thinks that he has finally succeeded in getting a phrase down correctly and asks the singer to repeat it “just one more time,” he often finds that the response is quite different from any previous rendition. Requests for further repetition may bring out still other variations or a return to the previous version. Again, after the notation has been made from the singing of the first stanza of a song, the collector may be chagrined to find that none of the other stanzas is sung to exactly the same tune. The variations are not marked. They are elusive and teasing, and they add beauty to the song.
How often the song collector wishes for some instrument which will record group singing in its native haunts! He cannot hope to catch by ear alone all of the parts—and there are undoubtedly six or eight of many of these songs—that go into the making of those rare harmonies which only a group of Negro workers[243] can produce. If he coaxes the singers to keep repeating their song, some of them become self-conscious and drop out. Perhaps the whole group will refuse to sing any more. If perchance he gets one or two singers to give him some special help, he gets but a suggestion of the group effect. He must be contented with securing the leading part of the song and harmonizing it later as best he can.
So these rare work harmonies have never been faithfully reproduced in musical notation.[96] Rather than give an artificial harmonization to the tunes recorded in this chapter, we are presenting only the leading part of each song.
[96] The nearest approach ever made to accurate recording of such songs is found in the work of the late Natalie Curtis Burlin. See her Negro Folk Songs, Hampton Series, vols. III and IV.
Since several of the songs in this chapter are work songs, let us examine for a moment the technique of the worker-singer. Many work songs, of course, are not really work songs except in the sense that they are sung during work. When the work is such that it does not necessitate continuous rhythmic movements, one song is about as good as another. But rhythmic movements, being especially adapted to song accompaniment, have given rise to a distinct type of work song. Digging, hammering, steel-driving, rowing, and many other kinds of work fall in the rhythmic class. The technique for all of these is practically the same.
Let us take digging as an example, since it is a very common type of Negro labor in the South. Typical pick-song patterns are as follows:
Now in the type of song illustrated by the first of the above patterns the strokes of the pick are not all of equal length. The rhythm of the song demands a short stroke alternated with a longer stroke. In the second type of song, however, the meter is such that all of the strokes of the pick may be of equal length. At the end of each line there is a cæsura or pause. This represents the time during which the worker swings his pick from the upright position to the ground. When the pick strikes the ground, the worker gives a grunt, loosens the pick, and raises it. It is during this loosening and upward movement that he sings. The down-stroke calls for much more effort than raising the pick, so he rarely ever sings on the down-stroke. The time required for a digging stroke is, however, shorter than the time required for loosening and raising the pick, so that ordinarily the pauses in the song are relatively brief.
It is in a group that the work song is to be heard at its best. When a group is digging and singing, picks are swung in unison. On a few occasions we have observed that one or two men took their strokes out of unison in order to sing certain exclamations or echoes during the pauses in the singing of their companions. This, however, is a rare procedure, for the most striking variations in both music and words can be introduced without breaking the unison of the strokes.
[245]
To call a song a pick song does not mean that it is not also a good song for general purposes. I Got a Rainbow, I Don’t Want No Trouble Wid de Walker, and other pick songs are quite effective when sung as solos with guitar accompaniment. On the other hand, many general songs can easily be converted into pick songs by slight changes in meter.[97]
[97] For other discussions of work songs, see Natalie Curtis Burlin, Negro Folk Songs, vols. III and IV; Dorothy Scarborough, On the Trail of Negro Folk Songs, chapter VIII; R. Emmet Kennedy, Mellows; Odum and Johnson, The Negro and His Songs, chapter VIII.
A few of the tunes presented in the following pages are the older Negro secular tunes. Stagolee and Railroad Bill are rarely heard now, but they were common twenty years ago, and their music is included in the present collection for whatever its preservation may be worth. The words of Stagolee, Railroad Bill and She Asked Me in de Parlor are reprinted in full from The Negro and His Songs, but only the first stanzas of the other songs are given, since the rest of the words can be found in the preceding chapters of the present volume. The songs in every case are written in the key in which they were sung.
Stagolee
Stag-o-lee, Stag-o-lee, What’s dat in yo’ grip? “Noth-in’ but my
Sunday clothes, I’m gonna take a trip.” Oh, dat man, bad man, Stagolee done come.
Railroad Bill
Rail-road Bill might-y bad man, Shoot dem
lights out de brake-man’s han’, Was look-in’ for Rail-road Bill.
She Asked Me in de Parlor
Well, she asked me in her par-lor An’ she cooled me wid her fan,
An’ she whis-pered to her moth-er, “O Ma, I love that dark-eyed man.”
John Henry
John Hen-ry was a steel-driv-in’ man, Ca’d his hammer all the
time,... An’ be-fo’ he’d let the steam-drill beat him down,
Die with the hammer in his han’, Die with the hammer in his han’.
Goin’ Down That Lonesome Road
Goin’ down that lone-some road, Oh, goin’ down that lone-some
road, An’ I won’t be treat-ed this-a way. Springs on my
bed done brok-en down, An’ I ain’t got no-where to lay my head.
[249]
Shoot That Buffalo
Went down to Raleigh, Was nev-er there be-fo’, White folks on de feather bed,
Nig-gers on de flo’. Shoot dat buf-fa, shoot dat lo, Shoot dat buf-fa-lo.
I Got a Rainbow
A
Oh, ev-’ry-where I, where I look this morn-in’, It looks like
rain, Lawd, O my Lawd, looks like rain, it looks like rain, Lawd, O my Lawd,
looks like rain, Oh, ev-’ry-where I, where I look this morn-in’.
I Got a Rainbow
B
Oh, ev-’ry-where I, Where I look dis morn-in’, Oh, ev-’ry-where I,
Where I look dis morn-in’, It look like rain, Lawd, Lawd, looks like rain.
I Don’t Want No Trouble Wid de Walker
Oh, I don’t want no, Want no trouble wid de walk-er; Oh, I don’t want no,
Want no trouble wid de walker. Wanta go home, Lawd, Lawd, wanta go home.
[250]
Reason I Stay on de Job So Long
Reason I stay on de job so long, Gimme flam-donies an’ de cof-fee strong.
Tol’ My Cap’n That My Feet Was Col’
Tol’ my cap’n that my feet was col’, “God damn yo’ feet, let the car wheel roll.”
If I’d Known My Cap’n Was Blin’
If I’d a-known my cap’n was blin’, dar-lin’,
If I’d a-known my cap’n was blin’, dar-lin’, If I’d a-known my
cap’n was blin’, I wouldn’-a went to work till half-pas’ nine, dar-lin’.
I Got a Muley
I got a mul-ey, Mul-ey on the mountain, call him Jer-ry; Oh, I can
ride him, Ride him an-y time I wanta, All day long, Lawd, Lawd, all day long.
Shot My Pistol in the Heart of Town
O - o - o - h, L - a - a - w-d, Shot my pis-tol
in de heart o-town,......... Lawd, de big Chief holled, “Don’t you blow me down.”
[252]
We have referred often in these pages to the wealth of material found in the great variety and number of the Negro’s songs. We have appraised the collections which have been published and those which are to come as valuable source material for the study of folk life and art and especially for their value in the portrayal of representative Negro life. Adequate analysis and presentation of these values will be possible only after a number of the other collections have been completed and comprehensive studies made.
There are other values not yet presented. For example, the scientific study of the Negro’s musical ability has barely begun, but it promises much. The work of Professor Carl E. Seashore and others has resulted in the formulation of various tests and methods for studying musical talent and singing ability. Many valuable studies have been reported from various psychological laboratories. One of the latest developments in this field is the phono-photographic method of recording voices. In this method the phono-photographic machine makes it possible to take pictures of sound waves of all kinds. Among other things, it registers the most delicate variations in pitch, variations which are often too subtle for the human ear to perceive. In short, it gives a picture of exactly what a voice or a musical instrument does.
Naturally this method of sound wave analysis may be of untold value in the study of the human voice. It[253] enables the singer to see his voice in detail. It furnishes the scientist with data for the study of the qualities which make a voice good or poor. It opens up many possibilities, both practical and theoretical, as a method of voice analysis.
Of special interest and importance is the application of this method to the study of Negro singers and Negro voices. It was therefore a fortunate turn of circumstances which made it possible for the authors of this volume to join Professor Seashore and Dr. Milton Metfessel of the University of Iowa in making extensive phono-photographic studies of various Negro singers during the fall of 1925, with headquarters at the University of North Carolina Institute for Research in Social Science. Professor Seashore was able to coöperate personally in the work at Hampton, while Dr. Metfessel remained throughout the entire period of the study.[98]
[98] Dr. Metfessel, using the perfected machine which long years of work at the University of Iowa psychological laboratories have produced, was successful in obtaining a large number of satisfactory records. He also took moving pictures of the singers. Needless to say, we are indebted to him for the material of this chapter.
Among the types of Negro singers whose voices were subjected to the phono-photographic process were practically all of the common types which we have been recording in the pages of this volume and of The Negro and His Songs. There were the typical laborers, working with pick and shovel. There was the lonely singer, with his morning yodel or “holler.” There were the skilled workers with voices more or less trained by practice and formal singing. There was the more nearly primitive type, swaying body and limb with singing. The noted quartet from Hampton Institute, as well as individual singers there, coöperated. Men and women from the North Carolina College for Negroes represented other types. Quartets[254] and individuals from the high schools at Chapel Hill and Raleigh, North Carolina, were still other types. Finally the voices of one hundred and fifty Negro children from the Orange County Training School at Chapel Hill and the Washington School at Raleigh were recorded. Types of songs included in the experiments were the gang work song, the pick-and-shovel song and various other work songs, the yodel, the “1926 model laugh,” the blues, formal quartet music, spirituals, and children’s songs. It would thus appear that both the selections and the numbers were adequate to make a valuable beginning in a new phase of the subject.
The results of this study will be published fully later. The present chapter is in no sense a report of the results. It is intended merely to describe the phono-photographic study, to give some examples of records obtained during the study, and to indicate certain possibilities of this method as a scientific means of research into Negro singing abilities and qualities.
The following explanation will suffice to acquaint the reader with the method of reading the photographic records presented in this chapter. Along the left side of each graph are the notes of the scale in half steps. When the heavy line which represents the voice rises or falls one space on the graph, the voice has changed a half tone in pitch. Time value is shown along the bottom of the graph. The vertical bars occurring every 5.55 spaces along the bottom mark off intervals of one second.
If one were to sing a perfectly rigid tone, its photographic record would be a horizontal straight line. Such a thing is very rare, however, in any type of singing, for most sustained tones photograph as more or less irregular wavy lines. Indeed, a voice whose sustained tones photographed as a straight line would[255] not produce as good tones as one with rapid and regular variations of the vocal cords. A good singing voice possesses what is called the vibrato. In terms of the photographic records, the pitch vibrato consists of a rise and fall of pitch of about half a tone about six times a second. In Figure I are given samples of tones photographed by Seashore and Metfessel from the singing of Annie Laurie by Lowell Welles. The first represents the singing of the word “dew” in the line, “Where early fa’s the dew.” The second is the word “and” from the line, “And for bonnie Annie Laurie.” The vibrato is present in both tones. Note how the voice line varies above or below the note E on “dew” and F-sharp on “and,” sometimes as much as a quarter of a tone. Note also the smoothness and regularity of the pitch fluctuations. It is this smoothness of the vibrato which characterizes good singing.
“AND” F♯
“DEW” E
Fig. I
To illustrate their scope, methods, and possibilities three specimens of photographic records of Negro voices are presented: a song, I Got a Muley,[99] by[256] Odell Walker; a yodel or “holler,” as it is commonly called, by Cleve Atwater; and Cleve’s “1926 Model Laugh.”
[99] The tune is slightly different from the music of the song of the same name given in Chapter XIV. It is variously called I Got a Mule on the Mountain, I Got Mule Named Jerry, I Got a Muley, Jerry on Mountain.
Figure II is the photographic notation of I Got a Muley. The music of the song as best it can be represented in ordinary notation is given below. Several interesting things are revealed by the song picture in Figure II.[100] For one thing, we have here a picture of some of those elusive slurs which are so common among Negro singers. Take the words “muley on a mount’n” in Figure II-A, for example.
I GOT A MULEY, MULEY ON A MOUNT’N CALL ’IM JERRY; I GOT A MULEY,
MULEY ON A MOUNT’N CALL’IM JERRY. I CAN RIDE HIM, RIDE’IM ANY TIME I
WAN’ UH; I CAN RIDE HIM RIDE’IM ANY TIME I WAN’UH, LAWD, LAWD, ALL DAY LONG.
When one hears these words as they were sung by Odell Walker, one is apt to feel that with the exception of the last syllable of “mount’n” they are all sung on the same pitch. The graph shows that this is not so. There are really drops in pitch of one and a half or two whole tones at two places in this phrase. Or take the word “ride,” as it occurs in the phrase, “ride ’im any time I wan’ uh,” which phrase occurs twice in the song. One can tell while listening to the song that there is some sort of slur present, but it is impossible to tell by means of the ear alone exactly what is happening. The graph reveals the fact that the singer[257] actually begins the word “ride” between D-sharp and E and carries it as high as G-sharp. The outstanding tone heard, however, is G-sharp. Other pitch changes not shown in the ordinary musical notation may be easily detected by the reader.
[100] A measure on the graph is equivalent to approximately nine spaces on the horizontal scale. Note that the singer did not keep accurate time. His measures range from six to twelve spaces.
The vibrato is present in places in the record of this song. In section A there is a trace of it on the word “muley” the first time it occurs. In section B there is an approach to it on the word “Jerry.” In section C it occurs on the word “ride” the first time it appears. In section D there is a tendency toward it on “Lawd, Lawd,” but it shows best in “long”, the last word of the song. A comparison with the examples of artistic singing in Figure I shows that our Negro workman’s vibrato is rough and irregular and that it does not maintain a steady general pitch level as does Welles’s vibrato. It must be borne in mind, however, that this particular song does not afford good opportunities for sustained tones and that the Negro singer’s vibrato might have shown to better advantage on a different song.
In Figure III is a picture of a yodel or “holler.” It is the sort of thing which one hears from field hands as they go to work in the morning, or from some gay-spirited pick-and-shovel man as he begins digging on a frosty morning.
No attempt is made to include the ordinary musical notation of the yodel, for it would give but a suggestion of the vocal idiosyncrasies involved in the execution of the yodel. The most remarkable thing about this record is the sudden changes of pitch which it portrays. In Figure III-A just at the beginning of the fifth second interval the voice takes a sudden drop. Then it rises from F to G in the octave above in about a third of a second. In section B of the yodel, near the end of the fifth second interval, the same spectacular rise occurs, this time from F-sharp to G-sharp in about one-tenth of a second. Still more remarkable are the several rapid rises and falls in pitch in section C. In the production of such sudden changes the vocal cords must undergo a snap. Even in speech, where pitch changes are very rapid, such sudden ascents and descents do not occur.
[258]
Fig. II-A
Fig. II-B
[259]
Fig. II-C
Fig. II-D
[260]
Fig. III-A
Fig. III-B
[261]
Fig. III-C
Fig. III-D
[262]
Fig. IV-A
Fig. IV-B
[263]
It is also interesting to note that the vibrato is present at times in the yodel. It is fairly plain on C-sharp along the middle of section A and still better on G at the end of the same section. It also shows at the end of section B, continuing into section C; and the yodel ends with a semi-vibrato. There is an approach to it in several other places. The vibrato of our Negro worker, however, is rather erratic and wavering in comparison with the vibrato of the vocal artist in Figure I. Yet one must remember that our subjects, both in Figure II and Figure III, were Negro workers whose voices have never had a touch of formal training.
In Figure IV we have a photographic record of a hearty Negro laugh. Its musical quality is at once evident. In the first three seconds of the laugh there is an unusual effect. It would not be called a vibrato because the pitch changes are too rapid and too extensive to give the vibrato effect. Near the beginning of the fifth second of the laugh the voice breaks up into a series of interrupted speech sounds. During the sixth second it suddenly becomes musical again and remains so for about two seconds. Then, after a rest, (see section B) the speech sounds reappear and continue intermittently to the end of the laugh.
These observations indicate some of the possibilities of the phono-photographic method of studying Negro voices and Negro songs. When the complete results of[264] the recent study are ready for publication we may have data which will make it possible to compare scientifically the voices of different kinds of Negro singers as well as the voices of Negro and white singers.
Other studies and correlations may be made through the articulation of the moving pictures of the singers, their faces, their bodily movements, their emotional expressions, and whatever reactions the camera may reveal. In nearly all instances where phono-photographic records were made of Negro voices in the recent study, moving pictures were made of the singers. In addition to these, moving pictures were made of groups of workmen while singing. Some remarkable examples of skill in movement, of coördination of song with work, of mixture of humor, pathos, and recklessness with work and song were brought to light. These have been incorporated into a series of three reels. Some of these pictures of facial expression during singing will be included in the report of the study when it is published in complete form.
Many interesting questions may find their solutions if the scientific method is applied to the study of Negro singing ability. Is the vibrato a native endowment? Is the vibrato more frequent among Negroes than among whites? At what age does it appear in the voice?[101] What other qualities cause the rank and file of Negroes to excel as singers? Is the Negro’s capacity for harmony greater than the white man’s? Is his sense of rhythm better? These are some of the questions which science should be able to answer in the near future.
[101] A study of the voices of white and Negro school children now being made by Milton Metfessel and Guy B. Johnson may throw some light upon some of these questions.
[265]
[102] This bibliography is not intended to cover all that has been written on Negro songs. It includes references to actual collections of songs and to a few other contributions which are of value to the serious student of Negro songs. Dozens of merely appreciative articles have been omitted. For a larger bibliography one may consult the latest issue of the Negro Year Book.
Abbot, F. H., and Swan, A. J., Eight Negro Songs. Enoch & Sons, New York, 1923. Eight songs from Bedford County, Virginia. Explanatory comments and notes on dialect are given for each song.
Allen, W. F., and others, Slave Songs of the United States. New York, 1867. Words and music of 136 songs are given.
Armstrong, M. F., Hampton and Its Students. New York, 1874. Fifty plantation songs.
Ballanta, N. G. J., St. Helena Island Spirituals. G. Schirmer, New York, 1925. A collection of 115 spirituals from Penn School, St. Helena Island. This island is off the coast of South Carolina, and its semi-isolation makes it an interesting field for the study of Negro songs. Ballanta’s work is prefaced by a valuable but somewhat pedantic discussion of Negro music.
Burlin, Natalie Curtis, Negro Folk-Songs. G. Schirmer, New York, 1918-19. Four small volumes of Negro songs recorded at Hampton Institute. Volumes I and II are spirituals, volumes III and IV are work songs and play songs. These songs are of special value in that the late Mrs. Burlin came nearer than any one else to the accurate reproduction of Negro songs in musical notation.
Campbell, Olive Dame, and Sharp, Cecil J., English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians. The student who is interested in the origin of Negro songs and their relation to English folk songs will find valuable data in this book.
Cox, J. H., Folk Songs of the South. Harvard University Press, 1924. Most of these songs are songs of the whites of the mountains, but they are particularly valuable in that they throw light on the origin of many Negro songs.
Fenner, T. P., Religious Folk Songs of the American Negro. Hampton Institute Press, 1924. (Arranged in 1909 by the Musical Directors of Hampton Normal and Industrial Institute[266] from the original edition by Thomas P. Fenner. Reprinted in 1924.) This volume contains the words and music of 153 religious songs.
Fenner, T. P., and Rathbun, F. G., Cabin and Plantation Songs. New York, 1891. Old Negro plantation songs with music.
Hallowell, Emily, Calhoun Plantation Songs. New York, 1910. A number of songs with music collected from the singing of Negroes on the Calhoun plantation.
Harris, Joel Chandler, Uncle Remus, His Songs and Sayings. New York, 1880. Nine songs.
Harris, Joel Chandler, Uncle Remus and His Friends. New York, 1892. Sixteen songs.
Higginson, Thomas Wentworth, Army Life in a Black Regiment. Boston, 1870. Chapter IX of this book is devoted to Negro spirituals as they were sung in Col. Higginson’s regiment during the Civil War.
Hobson, Anne, In Old Alabama. New York, 1903. Ten dialect stories and songs.
Johnson, James Weldon, The Book of American Negro Spirituals. Viking Press, New York, 1925. A collection of sixty-one spirituals. Most of these songs have been published in other collections, but the musical arrangements in this volume are new. While the melodies of the old songs are retained intact, an effort has been made to improve the rhythmic qualities of the accompaniments. The preface of the book is devoted to the origin, development, and appreciation of Negro spirituals.
Kennedy, R. Emmet, Black Cameos. A. & C. Boni, New York, 1924. A collection of twenty-eight stories, mostly humorous, with songs interwoven. The words and music of seventeen songs are given.
Kennedy, R. Emmet, Mellows: Work Songs, Street Cries and Spirituals. A. & C. Boni, New York, 1925. Several spirituals and street songs from New Orleans. The author includes character sketches of his singers. His discussion of the relation of Negro songs to printed ballad sheets is especially interesting.
Krehbiel, H. E., Afro-American Folk Songs. G. Schirmer, New York and London, 1914. A careful study of Negro folk songs from the point of view of the skilled musician. Songs and music[267] from Africa and other sources are analyzed and compared with American Negro productions. The music of sixty or more songs and dance airs is given.
Marsh, J. B. T., The Story of the Jubilee Singers. Boston 1880. An account of the Jubilee Singers, with their songs.
Odum, Howard W., and Johnson, Guy B., The Negro and His Songs. University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, 1925. A study of the origin and characteristic of Negro songs from the historical and sociological point of view. The words of 200 songs are given. The songs are discussed under three general classes: spirituals, social songs, and work songs.
Peterson, C. G., Creole Songs from New Orleans. New Orleans, 1902.
Pike, G. D., The Jubilee Singers. Boston and New York, 1873. Sixty-one religious songs.
Scarborough, Dorothy, On the Trail of Negro Folk-Songs. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1925. One of the most important contributions yet made to the study of Negro songs. This book presents some 200 secular songs, including the music of most of them. Especially interesting is the chapter on “The Negro’s part in the Transmission of Traditional Songs and Ballads.” The lack of any sort of index somewhat decreases the value of the book for purposes of reference and comparison.
Talley, Thomas W., Negro Folk Rhymes. Macmillan, New York, 1922. This volume contains about 350 rhymes and songs and a study of the origin, development, and characteristics of Negro rhymes. Besides a general index of songs, a comparative index is included.
Work, John Wesley, Folk Songs of the American Negro. Fisk University Press, Nashville, 1915. The words of fifty-five songs and music of nine, together with a study of the origin and growth of certain songs.
Adventure Magazine. The files of this magazine for the last few years should be of considerable interest to the student of folk song. A department called “Old Songs That Men Have Sung” is conducted by Dr. R. W. Gordon, a Harvard-trained student of folk song. Many of the songs printed in this department are Negro songs or Negro adaptions.
[268]
Backus, E. M., “Negro Songs from Georgia,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 10, pp. 116, 202, 216; vol. 11, pp. 22, 60. Six religious songs.
Backus, E. M., “Christmas Carols from Georgia,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 12, p. 272. Two songs.
Barton, W. E., “Hymns of Negroes,” New England Magazine, vol. 19, pp. 669 et seq., 706 et seq. A number of songs with some musical notation and discussion.
Bergen, Mrs. F. D., “On the Eastern Shore,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 2, pp. 296-298. Two fragments, with a brief discussion of the Negroes of the eastern shore of Maryland.
Brown, J. M., “Songs of the Slave,” Lippincott’s, vol. 2, pp. 617-623. Several songs with brief comments.
Cable, George W., “Creole Slave Songs,” Century, vol. 31, pp. 807-828. Twelve songs with some fragments, music of seven.
Clarke, Mary Almsted, “Song Games of Negro Children in Virginia,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 3, pp. 288-290. Nine song games and rhymes.
Cox, J. H., “John Hardy,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 32, p. 505 et seq. Here will be found Cox’s discussion of the John Hardy or John Henry story, together with several versions of the song.
Garnett, L. A., “Spirituals,” Outlook, vol. 30, p. 589. Three religious songs. However, they appear to have been polished considerably by the writer.
Haskell, M. A., “Negro Spirituals,” Century, vol. 36, pp. 577 et seq. About ten songs with music.
Higginson, T. W., “Hymns of Negroes,” Atlantic Monthly, vol. 19, pp. 685 et seq. Thirty-six religious and two secular songs, with musical notation.
Lemmerman, K., “Improvised Negro Songs,” New Republic, vol. 13, pp. 214-215. Six religious songs or improvised fragments.
Lomax, J. A., “Self-pity in Negro Folk Song,” Nation, vol. 105, pp. 141-145. About twenty songs, some new, others quoted from Perrow and Odum, with discussion.
“Negro Hymn of Day of Judgment,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 9, p. 210. One religious song.
[269]
Niles, Abbe, “Blue Notes,” New Republic, vol. 45, pp. 292-3. A discussion of the significance of the blues and the music of the blues. The style is somewhat too verbose and technical for the average reader.
Odum, Anna K., “Negro Folk Songs from Tennessee,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 27, pp. 255-265. Twenty-one religious and four secular songs.
Odum, Howard W., “Religious Folk Songs of the Southern Negroes,” Journal of Religious Psychology and Education, vol. 3, pp. 265-365. About one hundred songs.
Odum, Howard W., “Folk Song and Folk Poetry as Found in the Secular Songs of the Southern Negroes,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 35, pp. 223-249; 351-396. About 120 songs.
Odum, Howard W., “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot.” Country Gentleman, March, 1926, pp. 18-19, 49-50. Several religious songs with discussion.
Odum, Howard W., “Down that Lonesome Road.” Country Gentleman, May, 1926, pp. 18-19, 79. Several secular songs, music of six, some new and some quoted from The Negro and His Songs and from the present collection.
Peabody, Charles, “Notes on Negro Music,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 16, pp. 148-52. Observations on the technique of the Negro workman in the South, with some songs and music.
Perkins, A. E., “Spirituals from the Far South,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 35, pp. 223-249. Forty-seven songs.
Perrow, E. C., “Songs and Rhymes from the South,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 25, pp. 137-155; vol. 26, pp. 123-173; vol. 28, pp. 129-190. A general collection containing 118 Negro songs, mostly secular.
Redfearn, S. F., “Songs from Georgia,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 34, pp. 121-124. One secular and three religious songs.
Speers, M. W. F., “Negro Songs and Folk-Lore,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 23, pp. 435-439. One religious and one secular song.
Steward, T. G., “Negro Imagery,” New Republic, vol. 12, p. 248. One religious improvisation, with discussion.
[270]
Thanet, Octave, “Cradle Songs of Negroes in North Carolina,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 7, p. 310. Two lullabies.
Truitt, Florence, “Songs from Kentucky,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 36, pp. 376-379. Four white songs, one of which contains several verses often found in Negro songs.
Webb, W. P., “Notes on Folk-Lore of Texas,” Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 28, pp. 290-299. Five secular songs.
[271]
PAGE | |
---|---|
A Creeper’s Been ’Roun’ Dis Do’ | 149 |
A Nigger’s Hard to Fool | 180 |
A Vampire of Your Own | 143 |
All Boun’ in Prison | 79 |
All Right | 109 |
All Us Niggers ’hind de Bars | 87 |
Angels Lookin’ at Me | 198 |
Baby, Why Don’t You Treat Me Right? | 148 |
Bad Man Lazarus | 50 |
Bear Cat Down in Georgia | 121 |
Berda, You Come Too Soon | 128 |
Better’n I Has at Home | 85 |
Billy Bob Russell | 54 |
Bloodhoun’ on My Track | 66 |
Bolin Jones | 62 |
Boys, Put Yo’ Hands on It | 107 |
Buffalo Bill | 67 |
Can Any One Take Sweet Mama’s Place? | 156 |
Captain, Captain, Let Wheelers Roll | 102 |
Captain, I’ll Be Gone | 100 |
Captain, I Wanta Go Home | 45 |
Casey Jones | 126 |
Chain Gang Blues | 78 |
Chicken Never Roost Too High fo’ Me | 133 |
Co’n Bread | 181 |
Creepin’ ’Roun’ | 63 |
Daddy Mine | 155 |
Darlin’, Get on de Road | 132 |
Das ’Nough Said | 130 |
Dat Brown Gal Baby Done Turn Me Down | 137 |
Dat Chocolate Man | 161 |
Dat Leadin’ Houn’ | 67 |
Dat Nigger o’ Mine Don’t Love Me No Mo’ | 162 |
Dat Sly Gal[272] | 164 |
De Chocolate Gal | 153 |
De Co’t House in de Sky | 184 |
De Devil’s Been to My House | 193 |
De Goat’s Got a Smell | 131 |
De Mulatto Gal | 153 |
De Woman Am de Cause of It All | |
A | 142 |
B | 143 |
De Women Don’t Love Me No Mo’ | 141 |
Dem Chain Gang Houn’s | 86 |
Dem Longin’, Wantin’ Blues | 162 |
Dem Turrible Red Hot Blues | 130 |
Dere’s a Lizzie After My Man | 163 |
Dere’s Misery in Dis Lan’ | 161 |
Dew-Drop Mine | 149 |
Dey Got Each and de Udder’s Man | 144 |
Dey’s Hangin’ ’roun’ Her Do’ | 148 |
Diamond Joe | 130 |
Didn’t Ol’ Pharaoh Get Lost? | 191 |
Dig-a My Grave Wid a Silver Spade | 129 |
Don’t Fool Wid Me | 63 |
Don’t Wanta See Her No Mo’ | 137 |
Don’t You Give Me No Cornbread | 105 |
Don’t You Hear? | 68 |
Don’t You Two-time Me | 156 |
Dove Came Down by the Foot of My Bed | 127 |
Dupree | 55 |
Dupree’s Jail Song | 123 |
Dupree Tol’ Betty | 57 |
Everybody Call Me the Wages Man | 116 |
“Free Labor” Gang Song | 90 |
Give Me a Teasin’ Brown | 146 |
Go ’Long Mule | 177 |
Goin’ Back to de Gang | 86 |
Goin’ Down Dat Lonesome Road[273] | 46 |
Gonna Turn Back Pharaoh’s Army | 191 |
Good Lawd, I Am Troubled | 192 |
Good Morning, Mr. Epting | 171 |
Goodby, Sing Hallelu | 205 |
Goodby, Sookie | 131 |
Got Me in the Calaboose | 76 |
Great Scots, You Don’t Know What to Do | 132 |
Gwine to Git a Home By an’ By | 176 |
Have Everlastin’ Life | 194 |
He Got My Gal | 151 |
He-i-Heira | 92 |
He Run Me In | 131 |
He Tuck Her Away | 149 |
He Wus de Gov’nor of Our Clan | 127 |
Help Me Drive ’Em | 109 |
Hi, Jenny, Ho, Jenny Johnson | 185 |
Home Again, Home Again | 150 |
Honey Baby | 145 |
Hot Flambotia an’ Coffee Strong | 112 |
Hump-back Mule | 179 |
I Ain’t Done Nothin’ | 69 |
I Ain’t Free | 71 |
I Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Make a Fool Out o’ Me | 128 |
I Ain’t No Stranger | 159 |
I Am Ready For de Fight | 64 |
I Belong to Steel-drivin’ Crew | 110 |
I Bid You a Long Farewell | 197 |
I Brung a Gal From Tennessee | 137 |
I Calls My Jesus King Emanuel | 205 |
I Can’t Keep From Cryin’ | 40 |
I Done Sol’ My Soul to de Devil | 158 |
I Don’t Feel Welcome Here | 164 |
I Don’t Love Him No Mo’ | 162 |
I Don’t Mind Bein’ in Jail | 77 |
I Don’t Want No Trouble Wid de Walker[274] | 113 |
I Don’t Want No Cornbread | 114 |
I Don’t Want You All to Grieve After Me | 197 |
I Got a Gal an’ I Can’t Git Her | 147 |
I Got a Letter, Captain | 82 |
I Got a Letter From My Man | 158 |
I Got a Muley | 120 |
I Got Another Daddy | 165 |
I Got Chickens on My Back | 128 |
I Got My Man | 150 |
I Love Jesus | 195 |
I Never Will Turn Back | 200 |
I Rather Be in My Grave | 38 |
I Steal Dat Corn | 68 |
I Tol’ My Cap’n That My Feet Was Col’ | 102 |
I Wants to Go to Heaven | 203 |
I Went to de Jail House | 79 |
I Went to See My Gal | 147 |
I Wish I Was Dead | 39 |
I Wish I Was Single Again | 163 |
If Dere’s a Man in de Moon | 143 |
If I Can Git to Georgia Line | 75 |
If I’d A-known My Cap’n Was Blin’ | 101 |
If You Want to See a Pretty Girl | 145 |
I’m a Natural-bo’n Ram’ler | 65 |
I’m Comin’ Back | 85 |
I’m de Hot Stuff Man | 65 |
I’m de Rough Stuff | 69 |
I’m Fishin’ Boun’ | 181 |
I’m Goin’ Back Home | 96 |
I’m Goin’ Home, Buddie | 43 |
I’m Goin’ On | 112 |
I’m Goin’ Out West | 124 |
I’m Gonna Get Me Another Man | 165 |
I’m Gonna Have Me a Red Ball All My Own | 132 |
In de Mornin’ Soon[275] | 201 |
I’s a Natural-bo’n Eastman | 68 |
I’s Done Spot My Nigger | 150 |
I’s Dreamin’ of You | 154 |
I’s Gonna Shine | 204 |
I’s Havin’ a Hell of a Time | 138 |
I’s Swingin’ in de Swinger | 204 |
Jail House Wail | 73 |
Jes’ Behol’ What a Number | 194 |
Jes’ Fer a Day | 87 |
John Henry (See Chapter XIII) | 221-240 |
Judge Gonna Sentence Us So Long | 80 |
Julia Long | 125 |
July’s for the Red-bug | 106 |
Kitty Kimo | 187 |
Lawd, She Keep on Worryin’ Me | 136 |
Lawd, Lawd, I’m on My Way | 46 |
Lawdy, What I Gonna Do? | 139 |
Layin’ Low | 62 |
Left Wing Gordon (See Chapter XII) | 206-221 |
Long, Tall, Brown-skin Girl | 146 |
Lookin’ Over in Georgia | 121 |
Mammy-in-law Done Turn Me Out | 141 |
Missus in de Big House | 117 |
Mule on the Mountain | 119 |
My Black Jack | 155 |
My Gal’s a High Bo’n Lady | 145 |
My Girl She’s Gone and Left Me | 136 |
My Home Ain’t Here, Captain | 98 |
My Jane | 144 |
My Man Am a Slap-stick Man | 156 |
My Man He Got in Trouble | 81 |
Never Turn Back | 107 |
No Coon But You | 183 |
No More | 108 |
Nothin’ to Keep[276] | 115 |
O Buckeye Rabbit | 110 |
O Captain, Captain | 94 |
O Lawd, Mamie | 91 |
Oh, de Gospel Train’s A-comin’ | 202 |
Occupied | 164 |
Ol’ Black Mariah | 87 |
On de Road Somewhere | 155 |
On My Las’ Go-’round | 128 |
Out in de Cabin | 131 |
Outran Dat Cop | 67 |
Pharaoh’s Army Got Drownded | 190 |
Pity Po’ Boy | 38 |
Please, Mr. Conductor | 44 |
Po’ Homeless Boy | 43 |
Po’ Little Girl Grievin’ | 41 |
Po’ Nigger Got Nowhere to Go | 39 |
Prisoner’s Song | 83 |
Pull off Dem Shoes I Bought You | 140 |
Pullman Porter | 186 |
Rain or Shine | 129 |
Raise a Rukus Tonight | |
A | 173 |
B | 174 |
C | 174 |
Reason I Stay on Job So Long | 112 |
Reuben | 66 |
Roscoe Bill | 62 |
Save Me, Lawd | 196 |
Section Boss | 93 |
Shanghai Rooster | 134 |
She’s Got Another Daddy | 151 |
Ship My Po’ Body Home | 37 |
Shoot, Good God, Shoot! | 87 |
Shoot That Buffalo | 123 |
Shootin’ Bill[277] | 63 |
Shot My Pistol in the Heart o’ Town | 70 |
Since I Laid My Burden Down | 201 |
Slim Jim From Dark-town Alley | 64 |
Some o’ Dese Days | 139 |
Some o’ These Days | 202 |
Stewball Was a Racer | 133 |
’Taint as Bad as I Said | 75 |
Take Me Back Home | 44 |
That Liar | 168 |
That Ol’ Letter | 43 |
The Judge He Sentence Me | 82 |
The Sanctified | 195 |
This Ol’ Hammer | 111 |
Throw Myself Down in de Sea | 38 |
Travelin’ Man | 59 |
Trouble All My Days | 40 |
Turn Yo’ Damper Down | 126 |
U-h, U-h, Lawdy | 110 |
War Jubilee Song | 169 |
Wash My Overhalls | 126 |
’Way Up in the Mountain | 104 |
We Are Climbin’ Jacob’s Ladder | 111 |
We Will Kneel ’Roun’ de Altar | 193 |
What Can the Matter Be? | 160 |
What You Gonna Do? | 195 |
When He Grin | 69 |
When I Git Home | 203 |
When I Lay My Burden Down | 200 |
When I Wore My Ap’on Low | 157 |
When I’s Dead an’ Gone | 197 |
Who Built de Ark? | 191 |
Whoa, Mule | 179 |
Who’s Goin’ to Buy Your Whiskey? | 129 |
Will I Git Back Home?[278] | 45 |
Woke up Wid My Back to the Wall | 84 |
Worried Anyhow | 160 |
Wring Jing Had a Little Ding | 175 |
Yonder Come de Devil | 130 |
You Calls Me in de Mornin’ | 129 |
You Mus’ Shroud My Body | 199 |
You Take de Stockin’, I Take de Sock | 140 |
You Take de Yaller, I Take de Black | 146 |
The text has been transcribed verbatim from the source document, including inconsistencies and (phonetic representations of) dialects and speech and pejorative and offensive language.
Page 29, table: the percentages are as printed in the source document, but appear to be off slightly for brand C and by several percentage points for brands A and B.
Page 255, The first represents ...: first and second are reversed compared to the illustration.
Changes made:
Footnotes have been moved to under the song or text paragraph in which they are referenced.
Some minor inconsistencies and obvious typographical and punctuation errors have been corrected silently. Several contractions such as aint’, dont’ and wont’ etc. have been changed to ain’t, don’t and won’t etc.
Text in a dashed box was not present in the text as such, but has been transcribed from the accompanying illustration.
Page 25: Love, careless, love changed to Love, careless love.
Page 30: Lake Ponchartrain Blues changed to Lake Pontchartrain Blues.
Page 66: I’m a greasy streak o’ lightin’ changed to I’m a greasy streak o’ lightnin’ (last verse but one).
Page 111: trottin’ Sallie changed to Trottin’ Sallie (second verse).
Page 226: O dat dress dat you wear so fine? changed to O’ dat dress dat you wear so fine?