MUSIC LOG for GROUP 1 [NOTE: preparation for Thursday’s listening quiz includes #3, #5, #6-13, and #15-17; the notes for these are found in blue print below!]
RELIGIOUS MUSIC
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“Wondrous Love,” c. 1835; w. Rev. Jesse Mercer, m. arr.William Hauser.
This was an early camp meeting song. It uses an old ballad tune, which was easier to teach to the congregation than a newly composed tune, particularly without the benefit of a written score.
Text: What wondrous love is this! oh, my soul!
That caused the Lord of bliss
To bear the dreadful curse for my soul.
When I was sinking down
Beneath God’s righteous frown
Christ laid aside His crown for my soul.
To God and to the Lamb, I will sing
To God and to the Lamb,
Who is the great I Am,
While millions join the theme, I will sing.
And when from death I’m free I’ll sing on,
And when from death I’m free
I’ll sing and joyful be,
thro-out eternity I’ll sing on.
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“Hebrew Children” c. 1825; w. Peter Cartwright, m. arr. David Walker.
This was a typical kind of (newly-composed) camp-meeting song using a rousing melody line and many repeated phrases.
Text: Where are the Hebrew children?
Safe in the promised land.
Tho’ the furnace flamed around them,
God, while in their troubles found them,
He with love and mercy bound them
Safe in the promised land.
Where are the holy Christians?
Safe in the promised land.
Those who’ve washed their robes and made them
White and spotless pure and laid them
Where no earthly stain can fade them,
Safe in the promised land.
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“Why Must I Wear This Shroud?” (public domain)
Another solution to the problem of leading group singing at camp meetings was the “lining out” hymn.
Leader: And must I wear this shroud?
Leader & Congregation: And must I wear this shroud?
Leader: Time will rob you of your bloom.
Leader & Congregation: Time will rob you of your bloom.
Leader: Death will drag you to your tomb.
Leader & Congregation: Death will drag you to your tomb.
Leader: Then you’ll cry, “I want to be
Leader & Congregation: Then you’ll cry, “I want to be
Leader: Happy in Eternity.”
Leader & Congregation: Happy in Eternity.”
Will you go to Heaven or Hell?
One you must and there to dwell.
Christ will come and quickly too.
I must meet Him, so must you.
Then you’ll cry, I want to be
Happy in Eternity.”
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“Traveling On,” c. 1823; w. anonymous, m. S. M. Denson and J.S. James.
This is an example of another type of shape-note song, the fuging tune. Fuging tunes feature a section of staggered entry of the four voices. Again the Alabama Sacred Harp Singers perform, here following the customary tradition of reading through the entire tune once using only the “fa-sol-la” syllables before adding the words.
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“Rejoice and Sing,” Oscar G. Griffin (b. 1870).
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This tune is from the shape-note collection called The Colored Sacred Harp, compositions and traditions of African-American shape-note singers first published in 1934. It first appeared at a time when compositions by African-American sacred composers were being rejected from new editions of The Sacred Harp and other older shape-note tune books. This tune features a call-and-response pattern in which the three higher voices perform the call, with the response given by the bass voice. It was recorded in 1993 by the Wiregrass Sacred Harp Singers in Ozark, Alabama.
SECULAR MUSIC (PUBLIC)
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“Old Dan Tucker,”1843; Dan Emmett.
This tune was part of the standard repertoire of blackface minstrelsy after the establishment of the minstrel show around the 1840s; it features the standard ensemble including banjo, tambo, bones.
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“De Boatman’s Dance,” 1843; Dan Emmett.
This is another standard tune of early blackface minstrel shows; it supposedly reflects life of the roustabouts who loaded cargo on the river steamboats.
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“Nelly Was A Lady,” 1849; Stephen Foster.
Blackface minstrelsy began to incorporate styles from other genres; this tune is a blackface minstrelsy tune in the style of the sentimental ballad tradition (or “parlor song”); it uses the banjo of the minstrel show (rather than the piano of the parlor). The chorus features the close vocal harmonies that were the roots of barbershop quartet singing. The song is presented from the perspective of a slave lamenting the death of his wife.
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“Country Fiddle Music”—country dance music.
a) “College Hornpipe” (a.k.a. “Sailor’s Hornpipe”) originated as a man’s solo dance, in which the dancer mimed various tasks aboard a ship; these melodies were adapted for country dances in late 17th and 18th century and continued to be used in the 19th century.
b) “La Belle Catherine” was a tune for a circle dance, in which the participants joined hands and circled back and forth; the strain resembles the children’s song “Have You Seen the Muffin Man?”
These are fused together with no break between them, as must have been common practice for fiddlers interested in keeping the music going.
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“La Sonnambula Quadrille Number Two,” Francis Johnson, excerpt.
African-American orchestra leader Johnson wrote this dance piece, based partly on music from the 1831 opera by Bellini; it demonstrates that the line between “highbrow” and “lowbrow” was a dotted one, and interchanges across it were flexible and dynamic. The quadrille was a dance begun by four couples in a square formation; of the square dances, the quadrille was the most prescribed. Each of the sequences was signaled by a change of music; you will hear only three of the musical strains on this excerpt.
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“Prima Donna Waltz,” late 1850s; G. Jullien.
The waltz was the great novelty dance of the late 18th and early 19th century; it originally meant to turn over and over in an embrace. Its characteristic triple meter was standardized around 1814 in France. This example lacks a section of “introduction,” eight or more bars played that gave the dancers time to assemble on the floor.
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“The Hunters of Kentucky,” c. 1820; w. Samuel Woodworth, m. from tune “Miss Bally.”
The singer Noah Ludlow claims to have put the words printed in a New York newspaper to the older bawdy tune “Miss Bally” shortly before a performance in New Orleans. It went over well with the audience and was performed frequently by the touring Ludlow for years to come. It is an “in-character song,” a type popular during the era — the singer acted out the song (often in costume). The text celebrates the Battle of New Orleans, which still would have been fresh in the minds of his New Orleans audience.
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“Get Off The Track!” c. 1846; the Hutchinson Family.
The successful tour of the Rainer family from the European Tyrols sparked the formation of touring musical troupes and singing families. The Hutchinson family was the most famous of these, performing songs that ranged from parlor ballads to the “oratorical style” made famous by [English performer] Henry Russell. Many of their songs had a political message and they were very outspoken on many of the social issues of the era: temperance, women’s suffrage, abolition, and others. This was a protest song on the subject of emancipation. Notably, it uses the familiar tune from the minstrel song “Old Dan Tucker” (example 9). The instrument is a melodeon, an inexpensive, portable way for traveling troupes to accompany themselves.
Text: Ho! the Car Emancipation
Rides majestic thro’ our nation
Bearing on its train the story,
LIBERTY! a Nation’s Glory,
(Chorus)
Roll it along, Thro’ the Nation,
Freedom’s Car, Emancipation.
Men of various predilections,
Frightened, run in all directions;
Merchants, Editors, Physicians,
Lawyers, Priests and Politicians,
Get out of the way! every station
Clear the track of ’mancipation.
ETC;
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“The Indian’s Lament” by the Hutchinson family, c. 1846.
This is another example of a protest song, this one in reaction to anti-Indian sentiment that was widespread at the time. It is in the style of a parlor song, accompanied by a piano (another familiar instrument used by touring concert groups).
Text: Alas, alas said the Indian, I once had a home
And a fair forest too, where the wild deer could roam,
Where the Sachem could feast on the festival day,
But the steel of the white man has swept them away.
I once, I once had a father who watched o’er my youth
And a mother who taught me the precepts of truth,
But their spirits have vanished, and cold is their clay;
For the steel of the white man has swept them away.
And I, and I stand alone as the last of my race
Upon this earth I feel I no more have a place
Since my home, friend, and kindred are drive away
For the steel of the white man has swept them away.
And I, and I must soon follow, the Great Spirit calls
Me away to the land where the brave never falls—
To the bright blissful shores, and the fair forest shade
Where the steel of the white man will never invade.
ETC.
SECULAR MUSIC—PRIVATE
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“The Messenger Bird,” 1836; w. Felicia Hemans, m. Harriet Mary Browne.
This is an example of a parlor song, meant to be sold as sheet music and used for home entertainment. It might have been introduced by a concert group or vaudeville act, hired by publishers to advertise their products. Hemans was a prolific composer of parlor songs and her style influenced Stephen Foster.
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“Beautiful Dreamer,” 1864; Stephen Foster
Foster first experienced success as a composer of “Ethiopian tunes,” as the blackface minstrelsy repertory was known. This parlor song, the last love song Foster wrote, was composed a few days before his death
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“Ma, Ma, Where’s My Pa?” by H.R. Monroe, 1884.
In 1884, Democratic presidential candidate Grover Cleveland was accused of being the father of a ten-year-old “illegitimate” child; Cleveland explained that he may have been the father and that he had been supporting the child and his mother since the child was born. Naturally, the Republicans hired a tunesmith to make the most of the situation. The result is this late nineteenth century political protest/satire.
Text: Little Tom Tid
Was a frolicsome kid,
A cute little cuss, I declare,
With eyes full of fun,
And a nose that begun
Way up in the roots of his hair.
Jolly and fat
Was this frolicsome brat,
As he played thro’ the livelong day,
But one eve, to his cost,
His papa got lost,
And he and his ma sang a lay. Oh,
Ma! Ma! Where is my Pa?
Up in the White House, darling,
Making the laws,
Working the Cause,
Up in the White House, dear.
ETC. . .
[Selections #1, 5-7 are recorded from White Spirituals from The Sacred Harp, New World Records 205, 1977.]
[Selections #2, 4, 9-11, 15-18 are recorded from Popular Music in Jacksonian America, Musical Heritage Society 834561, 1982.]
[Selection #3 is recorded from The Gospel Ship: Baptist Hymns & White Spirituals from the Southern Mountains, New World Records 294, 1977.]
[Selection #8 is recorded from The Colored Sacred Harp: Wiregrass Sacred Harp Singers, New World Records CD 80433-2, 1993.]
[Selections #12-14 are recorded from Come and Trip It, Instrumental Dance Music 1780s-1920s, New World Records 293, 1978.]
[Selection #19 is recorded from America Sings, Volume II: “The Great Sentimental Age,” Stereo Vox Box 5304, date unknown.]
[Selection #20 is recorded from The Hand That Holds the Bread: Progress and Protest in the Gilded Age/Songs from the Civil War to the Columbian Exposition, New World Records 267, 1978; 2007.]