Slave Songs of the United States

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Slave Songs of the United States, title page Slave Songs of the United States (1867) title page.jpg
Slave Songs of the United States, title page
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Michael Row the Boat Ashore
Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen Slave Songs of the United States (1867) - Nobody Knows.jpg
Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen

Slave Songs of the United States was a collection of African American music consisting of 136 songs. Published in 1867, it was the first, and most influential, [1] [2] collection of spirituals to be published. The collectors of the songs were Northern abolitionists William Francis Allen, Lucy McKim Garrison, and Charles Pickard Ware. [3] The group transcribed songs sung by the Gullah Geechee people of Saint Helena Island, South Carolina. [4] These people were newly freed slaves who were living in a refugee camp when these songs were collected. [5] It is a "milestone not just in African American music but in modern folk history". [6] [7] [8] [9] It is also the first published collection of African-American music of any kind. [10]

Contents

The making of the book is described by Samuel Charters, with an emphasis on the role of Lucy McKim Garrison. [11] A segment of History Detectives explored the book's history and significance. [12]

Notable Songs

Several notable and popular songs in the book include:

The book provides instructions for singing, which is accompanied by a discussion of the history of each song, with potential variations, interpretations of key references, and other related details. In the Dover edition, Harold Courlander contributes a new preface that evaluates the book's significance in both American musical and cultural history.

See also

References

Notes

  1. ↑ Darden, p. 71
  2. ↑ Southern, part g. 152
  3. ↑ Crawford, p. 416
  4. ↑ Crawford, Eric. "The Negro Spiritual of Saint Helena Island: An Analysis of its Repertoire during the Periods 1860–1920, 1921–1939, and 1972–present". Washington Research Library Consortium. The Catholic University of America. Retrieved 3 March 2023.
  5. ↑ Black, Robert (1968). "Reviewed Work: Slave Songs of the United States by Irving Schlein" . Journal of the International Folk Music Council. 20: 82–83. doi:10.2307/836087. JSTOR   836087.
  6. ↑ Darden, pp. 99–100
  7. ↑ Maultsby, Portia K.; Mellonee V. Burnin; Susan Oehler. "Overview". The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music. pp. 572–591.
  8. ↑ Ramsey, Jr., Guthrie P. (Spring 1996). "Cosmopolitan or Provincial?: Ideology in Early Black Music Historiography, 1867–1940". Black Music Research Journal. 16 (1). Black Music Research Journal, Vol. 16, No. 1: 11–42. doi:10.2307/779375. JSTOR   779375.
  9. ↑ Snell and Kelley, p. 22
  10. ↑ Chase, p. 215
  11. ↑ Charters, Samuel. 2015. Songs of Sorrow: Lucy McKim Garrison and "Slave Songs of the United States". Jackson: University Press of Mississippi. ISBN   978-1-62846-206-7
  12. ↑ "Slave Songbook | History Detectives". www.pbs.org. Retrieved 2018-03-28.
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