1. MUH 3633 - Music in the United States
4/11/2018
Chapter Five
“A Language of Feeling” : Cultivating Musical Tastes in Antebellum America
DAY 13 (29 Sep 17)

2. Louis Moreau Gottschalk
Child prodigy in NOLA
Age 13 to Paris - rejected by Conservatoire - private study
Debut Salle Pleyel (age 16) - praised by Chopin (!) - “Creole” compositions “exotic”
Bamboula, danse des negres, Op. 2 (cf., next slide)
Gottschalk - The Banjo, Fantaisie Grotesque, Op.15 (LG - p. 127)
b. 1829, New Orleans; d. 1869, Rio de Janeiro

3. “The Bamboula” by E.W. Kremble for The Century Magazine (1886)

4. Gottschalk (2)
Touring piano virtuoso - US (to west coast) - Latin America
Compositions draw on: - Afro-Cuban - US (folk, trad., etc.)
Souvenir de Porto Rico (1857)
The Union (1862)
Fiesta criolla from "La Nuit des Tropiques«  ( )
First American musician to achieve international fame

5. Chapter Six
“The Ethiopian Business” : Minstrelsy and Popular Song through the Civil War

6. Minstrelsy (defined) Uniquely US popular form
Widespread from 1840s to 1880s (& beyond)
Origins in NYC (& elsewhere)
“Variety show” format - song & dance - jokes & comic dialogue/monologues
Blackface (“covers”)

7. George Washington Dixon (1801?-1861)
First (?) important US blackface performer
Working class background (NYC)
Circus act – singer & reciter of poems
“Ethiopian songs”
1829 – “Coal Black Rose” (NYC, Bowery) - Coal Black Rose – YouTube (solo banjo) - Coal Black Rose [364] (274) (vocal)
Political satire & commentary
1834 – “Long Tail Blue” (see following slide) - Long Tail Blue.wmv – YouTube (solo banjo) - Long Tail Blue (banjo w/ voice)

8. Dixon as “Zip Coon”
Music Example: Zip Coon Music Example: The Skillet Lickers-Turkey In The Straw Music Example: Tennessee Mafia Jug Band "Turkey In The Straw"

9. Thomas “Daddy” Rice (1808-1860)
b. NYC (Lower East Side) - the Bowery
Traveling performer by 1827
Mimics black/southern speech - travels Ohio Valley & South
“Jim Crow” – observations of black workers/slaves
1830s - “Jump Jim Crow”
Music Examples - Jump Jim Crow – YouTube - Melvin Wine - Jump Jim Crow

10. Virginia Minstrels 1843 – 1st performances in the Bowery
Dan Emmett (fiddle) and three co-performers
GROUP performance in blackface & costume
Extended “concert” w/ songs, dialect, etc.
“Jimmy Crack Corn” - Jimmy crack Corn played by Brad Sondahl - YouTube
“Old Dan Tucker” - The Skillet Lickers-Old Dan Tucker - Grandpa Jones - Old Dan Tucker – YouTube (start c. 0:30) - Bruce Springsteen - Old Dan Tucker (Live 2006)
“The Boatman Dance” (LG – p ) - "The Boatman Dance" with banjo & fiddle – YouTube - Boatman Dance. – YouTube - De Boatman's Dance (1843, credited to Dan Emmett)

11. “END MEN” “Mr. Tambo” [Dick Pelham] Fiddle (Violin) [Dan Emmett]
Banjo [Billy Whitlock]
“Mr. Bones” [Frank Brower]