{"id":1697,"date":"2017-10-02T20:22:04","date_gmt":"2017-10-03T01:22:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/?p=1697"},"modified":"2017-10-02T20:27:13","modified_gmt":"2017-10-03T01:27:13","slug":"the-preservation-of-black-slave-songs-an-interview-with-billy-mccrea","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/2017\/10\/02\/the-preservation-of-black-slave-songs-an-interview-with-billy-mccrea\/","title":{"rendered":"The Preservation of Black Slave Songs: An Interview with Billy McCrea"},"content":{"rendered":"

Throughout history, many oppressed people have not received documentation or enough accurate documentation regarding their culture and other aspects of their lives. \u00a0Especially in musicology, documentation can be scarce and inaccurate. \u00a0For many sources that scholars depend on, it is crucial to think critically about the presumtions and backgrounds of those who created them. However, it is also important that we preserve the resources and works that we do have. Sometimes it is better to have semi-accurate interpretations of music and culture than nothing at all. \u00a0Even biased information can provide insightful information about who created it. \u00a0One effective way to avoid misrepresenting people is to interview and accurately preserve their traditions.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Billy McCrea in Jasper, TX 1940<\/p><\/div>\n

In this recorded interview with ex-slave Billy McCrea, McCrea elaborates about his experiences as a slave working on a Steamboat as a cook. \u00a0Upon request, McCrea sung the steamboat song, \u201cBlow Cornie Blow\u201d for the interviewer John Avery Lomax.<\/p>\nhttps:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/593\/2017\/10\/3974a.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n

Blow Cornie Blow<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cI think I hear the captain call me, blow cornie blow.\u00a0<\/em>
\nI think I hear the captain calling, blow cornie blow.
\nA blow cornie blow.
\nBlow cornie blow.
\nA blew it cold, loud and mournful.
\nBlow cornie blow.
\nI think I hear the captain??? \u2013blow cornie blow.
\nThey carried lo-o-o-o-ong onto bend.
\nBlow cornie blow.
\nThey soon will be to the landing corner.
\nBlow cornie blow.
\nDe captain hand me down my ???
\nBlow cornie blow.
\nOh, blow boy and let them hear you.
\nBlow cornie blow.
\nOh, blow loud and ???
\n<\/em>Blow cornie blow.\u00a0<\/em>
\nOh, blow loud just so he can hear you.
\nBlow cornie blow.
\nI think I hear the captain call you.
\nBlow cornie blow.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

He explained that he and \u201cthe boys\u201d would tote salt from the boat to a warehouse while singing. \u00a0Upon hearing McCrea sing, it is tempting for scholars and students alike to want to notate \u201cBlow Cornie Blow.\u201d This stems from a western presupposition that written forms of preservation are more superior, accurate or long lasting than preservation through oral tradition. \u00a0Is written preservation of oral tradition inherently problematic? Because scholars notated slave songs using a western notation system, they were limited because they could not capture all of the musical nuances and emotions of the slave songs. Notating slave songs is useful to provide context to people who were more familiar with European music, but what is problematic is imposing western traditions on slave songs and adapting them. \u00a0Many slave songs were published with harmonies that were not originally sung. This act of \u201cfixing\u201d or refining slave songs to conform to a western ideal of beauty contributes to the erasure and inauthentic representation of black folk music. \u00a0Many debates regarding notation must address the issues of preservation, authenticity and erasure of tradition.<\/p>\n

Eileen Southern’s book,\u00a0The Music of Black Americans: a History<\/i>, recalls a quote from Frederick Douglas remembering the songs as \u201cthey were tones loud, long, and deep; they breathed the prayer and complaint of souls boiling over with bitterest anguish\u2026The hearing of those wild notes always depressed my spirit, and filled me with ineffable sadness.\u201d<\/p>\n

Interviews like McCrea’s are so important regarding of preservation of history and prevention of erasure of people, or distortion of their stories. \u00a0Lomax\u2019s work positively contributes to the study of slave music because he gives voice to the people whom we draw from in music and culture.<\/p>\n

Works Cited<\/p>\n

Lomax, John Avery, et al. \u201cInterview with Uncle Billy McCrea, Jasper, Texas, 1940 (Part 1 of 2).\u201d The Library of Congress: National Jukebox<\/i>, 1940, memory.loc.gov.<\/p>\n

Southern, Eileen. \u201cChapter 5 Antebellum Rural Life.\u201d The Music of Black Americans: a History<\/i>, W. W. Norton & Company, 1997, pp. 177\u2013178.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Throughout history, many oppressed people have not received documentation or enough accurate documentation regarding their culture and other aspects of their lives. \u00a0Especially in musicology, documentation can be scarce and inaccurate. \u00a0For many sources that scholars depend on, it is … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2559,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[197,139,154,288],"class_list":["post-1697","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-american-folk","tag-john-lomax","tag-slave-songs","tag-work-songs"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7jEhR-rn","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1697","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2559"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1697"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1697\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1717,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1697\/revisions\/1717"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1697"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1697"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/americanmusic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1697"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}