Author Archives: Jacob Noordermeer

Brudder Bones and Minstrel Song

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As we began our discussions this week on Minstrelsy, I became curious to what Minstrel songs were actually about. There is obviously plenty to talk about when it comes to blackface in Minstrelsy and the performance in general, but what we seemed to have missed was a study into the content of the Minstrel music beyond its entertainment value of inflating white perceptions African-Americans.

Lyrics to “Brudder Bones’ Trip” a Minstrel Song

As I searched, I found the minstrel song to the left, as sung by W. Chambers. The lyrics of the song tell of Brudder Bones going to the World’s Fair in London and getting called out of the crowd to perform on the bones. The lyrics “I mingled with the quality, I felt so awful proud” are striking as they display how Minstrel performers meant for African-Americans to feel in a crowd of “quality” people. The song also paints the image that Brudder Bones, and Minstrel performers in general, were valued primarily for their ability to put on a show, lending an eye to how performers were treated and how audiences got caught up in the pleasure of this entertainment.

Cover, Brudder Bones Book Stump Speeches

You may be wondering “who was Brudder Bones?” As I looked into the history of Minstrel performance, I found that Brudder Tambo and Brudder Bones were often the star characters of Minstrel shows. The publication below from 1868 includes a plethora of songs, skits, and speeches typical to the Brudder Bones Minstrel show.

When I think of Minstrelsy, I find it hard to appreciate it for what many claim it to be: the first indigenous, original form of American pop culture. Although there is no doubting that it was a force that brought folks together for entertainment and escape, I think raising it up as such puts a sense of pride behind an art so racially insensitive and offensive.

Sources:

Brudder Bones’ trip to the world’s fair: As sung by W. Chambers, the great bone player, (Philadelphia: G.S. Harris printer, Fourth & Vine, 1852).

Karen Halttunen, A Companion to American Cultural History, (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc, 2008), 317-318.

John F. Scott, Brudder Bones’ book of stump speeches, and burlesque orations: also containing humorous lectures, Ethiopian dialogues, plantation scenes, Negro farces and burlesques, laughable interludes, and comic recitations. Interspersed with Dutch, Irish, French and Yankee stories, (New York: Dick & Fitzgerald Publications, 1868).

Yaddo Festival Brings Music of Copland and Ives Together

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During the 1930s, amidst the Great Depression and the American modernist movement, works by two of the most well-recognized American composers were performed in the same place in the same weekend. The First Festival of Contemporary American Music, held at the Yaddo estate in Saratoga Springs, NY featured a weekend of music programmed largely by Aaron Copland. Included in the Sunday afternoon concert were seven pieces from Charles Ives’ “114 Songs.”1

In this letter included in The Selected Correspondence of Aaron Copland, Copland writes to Ives to gain approval to perform these works as part of the festival and to obtain scores to begin work. Although Copland does not overtly mention why he has chosen to include Ives’ pieces in the festival, the editors propose that Copland included Ives’ pieces to provide historical background for the more contemporary pieces on the program.2

Ives’ art songs performed at Yaddo, a few of which are included here, marked a turning point in his reception among critics. Critic Paul Rosenfield wrote of sensing “the presence of a first-rate composer of Lieder in the ranks of American Music.”3 The festival, while giving voice to numerous contemporary composers of the time, also served as a chance for Copland to moderate a forum between critics and young composers, greatly benefiting the reputation of Ives’ compositions while simultaneously making Copland out to be exceedingly disapproving of the way journalists impacted contemporary music.4

Although Copland’s preferences for simple, easy-to-understand music which we discussed in class last week seemed in conflict with Ives’ ultra-modernist “push-the-envelope” styles, it’s enlightening to see that parts of both composers came together successfully in the Yaddo Festival. While there are many things that set these composers apart, it still is important to note that they were able to appreciate one another for the contributions they were making in a period of economic turmoil and financial hardship for a majority of the United States.

Did Everyone Like Jazz?

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LP Album Cover. Rhapsody in Blue: the 1925 Piano Roll, Michael Tilson Thomas, Columbia Records, 1976.

One of the most notable compositions that comes to mind when ruminating on symphonicjazz is Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue” (1924). Listen Here. In thanks largely to Paul Whiteman’s clever marketing as an “Experiment in Modern Music” and its premiere performance in a well-known venue, the Aeolian Hall, the piece was largely well-received by audiences and critics.1 Much of the praise for Gershwin’s work was that it encompassed what American’s wanted out of distinctly “American Music.” As Crawford points out, it encompassed three strands of development: blues as popular music, the spread of instrumental jazz, and a want for modernism in the classical sphere.2

As we’ve discussed in class, the perception of Gershwin’s music as uniquely American can be troublesome because to some it seeks to exploit and adjust music of cultures aside from Gershwin’s own for the profit of symphonic tastes. As Crawford also points out, it was certainly not the first to present black dance music or jazz in concert settings although many think it to be so simply because the previous works by composers like Will Marion Cook or W.C. Handy are less well known simply because of their minority in that era’s society.3

Manitou Messenger, Feb. 14, 1933.

A story that’s less-often told is that some people really did not enjoy “Rhapsody in Blue” or jazz elements in general. When exploring writings on jazz, I came across an article from our very own campus paper, The Manitou Messenger. Interestingly, an article from 1933, nine years after the premiere of “Rhapsody in Blue,” conveyed stern opposition to jazz band at St. Olaf saying “jazz is profanity in music.”4

“Many…students who aspire to and cherish the higher things in life despise this type of music.”5

Is this negative reception of jazz a sign of the times at St. Olaf in the 1930s? It seems pretty forthright, which at first lead me to think there was room for anti-jazz, conservative thinking on campus at the time. However, in the publication later that month, another student wrote an opinion article which countered that the former article “was of very little consequence” and “hardly worthy of a serious reply.”6 This author claimed that this jazz band nay-sayer was fueling the fire that the college was attempting to paint itself as heavily religious.

Manitou Messenger, Feb. 28, 1933.

“Why be afraid to admit St. Olaf is not a monastery?”7

Interestingly, both authors simply signed their articles with their first initial leaving some room for anonymity. Although we don’t know who these students sharing their opinions were, what they were studying, or where they are now, we do know that responses to jazz were not all in loving favor.

1 Richard Crawford, America’s Musical Life: A History, (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2001), 573.

Theodore Thomas and the American Symphony Orchestra

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When considering the rise of concert music in America, scholarship often directs its attention to the founding of the New York Philharmonic Society in 1842 as landmark in Americans coming together for orchestral symphonic concert music. According to Crawford, the ensemble was founded as a “cooperative venture whose playing members were less interested in financial gain than in the chance to play the best symphonic music.”1 The ensemble only played four concerts in the first year, however Crawford points to its survival as proof that it “filled a need on the local scene.”2

“Theodore Thomas” New York Philharmonic Biographies https://nyphil.org/about-us/artists/theodore-thomas

However, I do not think it is fair to focus only on the Philharmonic as the sole introduction of symphonic concert music to popular American taste. Another factor to consider is Mr. Theodore Thomas and his influence on the genre. Thomas started out playing in the first violin section of the New York Philharmonic Society before moving to a conductor position with the Brooklyn Philharmonic Society.3 During his time at the Brooklyn Philharmonic, Thomas “evolved a formula to please the public and yet challenge, educate and uplift it” through the programming of European classical music.4 Through his lens, concert music by European masters was exactly what Americans needed and deserved to hear.

Later in the 1860s, Thomas went on to develop the Theodore Thomas Orchestra as resident to the Brooklyn Society and also to travel on tour along what was deemed the “Thomas Highway.”5 Thomas’s motivation to tour was likely an extension of his desire to share and spread the music he loved to the people of the America. Thomas was also notable for his impresario skills which he used to not only conduct the music but also to coordinate the finances and management of his orchestras.

“Thomas viewed himself as an agent in the work of raising musical standards to secure the symphony orchestra’s place in the United States.”6

In this article from the New-York Tribune, the journalist describes the contrast between the Boston audience’s response and the critic’s opinion upon hearing a concert including “Vorspiel” from Wagner’s opera Lohengrin. “The audience evidently liked it” the writer says, but critics found issue with the inclusion of Wagner because of his political ideology.7 Ultimately though, the journalist takes sides with the audience who loved this piece for its musical quality.

“Its undulating harmonies have a dreamy beauty which proves that Wagner, despite his extravagance and barbarie fire, is really a poet.”8

This brings me to my final query, which is whether or not we can count the music performed by Thomas and the orchestras he led as “American.” Even though a great majority of the music he chose to perform was written by European composers, I pose it is possible we consider it “American Music” if we use the label to describe it as an essential part of American culture. This leaves room for extensively more detailed research as to what exactly this music provided to audiences of the time as well as whether or not the rise of orchestral symphonic concert music, starting out with European classics, led to a later rise of American composers in this genre.

1 Richard Crawford, America’s Musical Life: A History, (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2001), 304.

Swing Along: Broadway Opens New Doors

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In Dahomey, a musical comedy with music written by Will Marion Cook, was a landmark in the development of early 20th-century musical entertainment created and performed by African Americans. In fact, it was the first full-length black musical performed inside a Broadway theatre.1

Cook was a well-educated musician not only in popular song, but also in the classical realm. His skills as a classical performer stemmed out his studies at Oberlin College Conservatory, in Berlin under Joachim, and at the National Conservatory in New York.2 Nevertheless, Cook struggled to be accepted as a serious classical composer and performer because of racial prejudices in the field in the early 1900s.3

Cleveland Gazette Article regarding “In Dahomey”

“The terrible difficulty that composers of my race have to deal with, is the refusal of American people to accept serious things from us.”4

In Dahomey did not start out in a Broadway theatre; however, audiences of the first performances received it with great enjoyment. In this article from the Cleveland Gazette, great credit for the show’s success and trajectory toward Broadway is pointed toward the main stars of the show Bert Williams and George Walker.5 Both actors were African American ex-vaudeville performers who excelled in the realm of comedy.6 Cook was firm in his opposition towards minstrelsy and black face performance and held true to African Americans being played by African American actors.7

The significance of In Dahomey to our class is the incorporation of black folk elements that have risen in our discussions around the components of spirituals, blues, and jazz. What Cook did so brilliantly was draw from black folk songs while rejecting the exaggerated and stereotyped imagery of minstrel show songs.8 Such elements include syncopation, vernacular language, and even the inclusion of the cake walk.

“Swing Along: The Songs of Will Marion Cook” William Brown and Ann Sears, Will Marion Cook, In Dahomey: Swing Along, Naxos Music Library, 4:53, 2006.

“Swing Along” is a song our textbook pointed to as being demonstrative of the inclusion of black folk components. I have included a recording here where the listener can hear syncopation used to jump the end of the phrase into the next. Crawford attests that Cook uses such syncopation to relate back to coon song of black folk culture.9 In this recording made in 2006, William Brown sings with a boisterous tone that carries the intention of a musical comedy true to the musical itself. The setting with piano accompaniment and solo singer shows that Cook’s music was indeed part of the popular genre because such editions were published for performance by all people.

It seems pretty easy to get excited about In Dahomey and its success as the first in New York to be performed African Americans. However, it is also striking that Will Marion Cook, a key contributor to this success, was led to writing for popular song because he was kept away from his true aspiration and talents in classical music. This creates a tension that we as historians must be cognizant of. That is, we have to realize that while this musical was a step forward for black Broadway theatre, it is also linked to a demonstration of racial prejudice and social discrimination in the field of classical music.

There is a Balm in Giliead

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There Is a Balm in Gilead is a well-known African-American spiritual with a rich history. Its origins cannot be pinpointed, a fact common to folk songs; however, musicologists have traced back to the first print publication as a way of identifying their mark of beginning. Most musicologists agree that the first publication of this particular spiritual is found in “Folk Songs of the American Negro” published in Nashville in 1907 and written by John Wesley Work, II who I will discuss later.1

The Original Jubilee Singers. John Wesley Work, Folk Song of the American Negro (New York: Negro University Press, 1915), 102.

The track here, recorded in December 1909 by The Fisk University Jubilee Quartet, was integral in the dissemination of this spiritual, especially to predominantly white audiences in the early 20th century. The Jubilee Quartet was a smaller product of the original Fisk Jubilee Singers which was a larger ensemble that toured on behalf of Fisk University, a university for African-Americans which opened after the end of the Civil War. The Fisk Jubilee Singers are best known for their performance tours which featured numerous spirituals and brought financial profits to support the university.2 Because of financial burdens, the ensemble was forced to cut down to a quartet in the early 1900s.3

“In the early days it was looked upon as a curiosity in the world of song, beautiful, entertaining but transient, for the world never considered it more than a commodity, through which one or two Negro schools maintained themselves.”4

This quote from John Wesley Work II, the conductor, arranger, and lead tenor for the Jubilee Quartet communicates some dissonance between the performance of spirituals in concerts so heavily influenced by financial motivations and the root of spirituals in the hardships of African-American slaves. Work was a leading force in collecting spirituals from oral tradition and transcribing them for publication and performing them on tours, yet acknowledged the history behind them in his book, attempting to go beyond the simple “commodity” that he felt audiences were attuned to.

“The reason why the Negro songs are so full of scripture, quoted and implied, is that for centuries the Bible was the only book he was allowed to “study,” and it consumed all his time and attention.”5

Balm in Gilead first published in John Wesley Work II’s book “Folk Song of the American Negro” (Page 43).

As we have brought up in class, spirituals often make reference to biblical passages. Balm in Gilead, in particular, centers around a text from Jeremiah 8:22 about hoping and longing for a better place.

The tension between origins and performance authenticity has been central to the discussions we have been having around black folk music in class. I continue to wrestle with whether it is appropriate to perform spirituals as a white person or to program them for concerts of predominantly white ensembles. Is there a way to respect and embody the grief that encompasses the ancestry of spirituals? Have we completely changed the intention or purpose of spirituals to suit our own needs, therefore exerting privilege, or is this just the nature of all folk music?

I welcome your thoughts toward these questions in respectful comments to this post.

A Glimpse into The Sun-Dance of the Sioux

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In this edition of Century Illustrated Magazine, author Frederick Schwatka describes the sights and sounds of his encounter with the Sundance of the Sioux Tribe in 1890. Schwatka was an American explorer who ventured to the frontier, the Arctic, the Yukon, and Alaska on his expeditions discovering skeletal artifacts and attempting to immerse in the local culture.1

According to his account, the particular Sundance he attended took place on a plain near a fork in the Chadron creek in Nebraska and the estimated attendance was at least 15,000 people who reported traveling varying distances in caravans.2 The Sundance was certainly a significant ritual for the members of the Sioux tribe.

Schwatka’s portrayal of the event aims for an objective detailed description of the celebration involving music, dance, and self-torture. Although some elements of the ritual, especially self-inflicted mutilation, are rather gruesome, Schwatka’s writing furthers a sense of disgust towards the tribe by using words like “savage” and “barbarous.”3 It is evident that he sees himself as superior to the tribe and traditions. He even points out his point of privilege saying, “it is almost impossible for a white man to gain permission to view this ceremony in all its details.”4

The content that stuck out most to me pertains to the sounds of the Sundance. Schwatka’s language allows the reader’s imagination to recreate the scene: “they jumped up and down in measured leaps to the monotonous beating of the tom-toms and the accompanying yi-yi-yi-yis of the assembled throng.”5 Later he depicts the horror of the self-torture being dramatized by the persistence of “the beating of the tom-toms and the wild, weird chanting of the singers.”6 Notably, these descriptions carry a tone of distaste. He considers the drumming as beating rather than playing and the singing as weird and wild. But then again, it is possible that the drumming was meant to be rough and the singing to be unusual. Our Western perspective expects the music to have some form of inherent beauty to it, but it is possible this music serves a different purpose.

What good does such a description do?

Well, first of all, this descriptive telling of a famous ritual, no matter how biased, paints a picture in our head. Whether or not the images are accurate or representative of the actual happenings, we cannot know. However, we can glean from this a better knowledge of perspective. We can better understand how whites perceived Native Americans in the late 1800s and how this perception influences the way we know and understand Native American music today.

This article’s focus is not on music, but we can profit from understanding the culture and the context behind the music. By approaching such writings with caution and awareness, we can still gain a sense of a cultural artifact.

1 Rodger, Liam and Bakewell, Joan, “Schwatka, Frederick,” Chambers Biographical Dictionary, July 2011.

2 Schwatka, Frederick, “The Sun-Dance of the Sioux,” Century Illustrated Magazine (1881-1906), Mar 1890, 754.

3 Ibid.

4 Ibid.

5 Ibid, 756.

6 Ibid, 758.

Sources:

Rodger, Liam and Bakewell, Joan. “Schwatka, Frederick.” Chambers Biographical Dictionary, July 2011. http://search.credoreference.com/content/entry/chambbd/schwatka_frederick/0

Schwatka, Frederick. “The Sun-Dance of the Sioux.” Century Illustrated Magazine (1881-1906), Mar 1890. https://search.proquest.com/docview/125509656/fulltextPDF/F0EB8385CFE644D1PQ/1?accountid=351