III
Attention was not directed to the value of negro songs till the middle of the nineteenth century. Considerable research resulted finally in the publication of several collections, of which the 'Slave Songs of the United States,' already mentioned above, was the first. This collection of songs represents every phase in the gamut of expression. The so-called 'sorrow' songs, the oldest surviving negro songs, are perhaps the most expressive. Some of them have sprung from the memories of a single act of cruelty, or an event of such tragedy as to create a really deep impression. Others echo simply the hardships encountered day by day. There are songs, too, that reflect the sunshine and gaiety that was not altogether foreign to plantation life, but those inspired by grief are the most beautiful. Then there are the 'occupational' songs suggested by the rhythm of labor which form a part of every kind of folk-song the world over. The value of such songs was fully recognized by the slaves' masters, for they were unfailing accelerators of labor, and it is known that the slaves who led the singing in the field were given special rewards. In consequence of this the negroes generally came to abhor that class of songs, and it is significant that very few of the 'corn songs,' 'reel tunes,' 'fiddle songs,' and 'devil songs' have been preserved, while hundreds of the religious songs—'spirituals,' etc.—are now common property.[70]
A special class of labor songs were the so-called 'railroad songs,' which originated during the Civil War, when negroes were employed in building earth works and fortifications. They consisted of a series of rhythmic, protracted chants, upon words usually originated by a leader. Railroad tracks were laid to these same strains—hence their name. Their originality of thought and the fact that they represent the last spontaneous outburst of the negro under rapidly changing conditions, lends them a special interest. The railroad itself naturally stimulated the negro's imagination. He introduced it metaphorically even in his religious songs: the Christian was a traveller, the Lord was the conductor and the ministers were the brakemen. At gospel stations the train stopped for those that were saved, or to supply the engine with the water of life. All of the negro's power of imagery was here brought into play.
The love songs of the negro are few and those few lack depth, and sometimes border on frivolity. An exception is usually made for 'Poor Rosy,' concerning which one old negress has said that 'it cannot be sung without a full heart and troubled spirit.'
We have already pointed out the preponderance of religious songs in the folk-music of the negro. The reason is not hard to find. In his aboriginal home religious rite, music and dance were closely associated, as they are in the life of all primitive peoples. The African's religion was a form of idolatry known as voodooism. Connected with it were certain chants and rites, relics of which have long survived.[71] These primitive rites were calculated to excite the emotions rather than to uplift the spirit and under this excitement the negro gave voice to the music that was in him. He accepted the Christian religion as a substitute just as he accepted the English language as a substitute for his African tongue. He garbled both. He considered the new religion not in a dogmatic, philosophical, or ethical sense, but rather as an emotional experience. When under religious excitement he would wander through the woods in swamps much like the ancient Bacchantes. 'A race imbued with strong religious sentiment,' says Mr. M. A. Haskell,[72] 'one rarely finds among them an adult who has not gone through that emotional experience known as conversion, after which it is considered vanity and sinfulness to indulge in song other than of a sacred character.'
His religion became the negro's one relief, comfort, and enjoyment. His daily life became tinged with his belief; in his very sufferings he saw the fulfillments of its promises. Nothing but patience for this life, nothing but triumph in the next—that was the tenor of his lay. Emancipation he thought of in terms of ultimate salvation rather than earthly freedom. Thus he sang:
'Children, we shall all be free,
Children, we shall all be free,
Children, we shall all be free,
When the Lord shall appear.'
A religious allegory colored nearly all his songs, a pathetic, childlike trust in the supernatural spoke through them, and biblical references, echoes of the 'meetin',' shreds of the minister's teaching, were strewn indiscriminately through all of them. 'The rolling of Jordan's waters, the sound of the last trumpet, the vision of Jacob's ladder, the building of the ark, Daniel in the lion's den, Ezekiel's wheel in the middle of a wheel, Elijah's chariot of fire, the breaking up of the Universe, the lurid pictures of the Apocalypse—all asked for swelling proclamation.' Analogies between the chosen people and their own in bondage were inevitable—and 'Hallelujahs' seemed as appropriate in secular songs as in spiritual ones.
Often biblical words were garbled into mere nonsense. Thus 'Jews crucified him' became 'Jews, screws, defidum,' etc. The personality of the Prince of Darkness assumed a degree of reality which reminds us of the characters of mediæval miracle plays. One of the songs personifies him thus:
'O Satan comes, like a busy ole man,
Hal-ly, O hal-ly, O hal-lelu!
He gets you down at de foot o' de hill,
Hal-ly, O hal-ly, O hal-lelu!'
The so-called spirituals ('sper'chels) hold perhaps the largest place in the negro's sacred repertory. These plantation songs—'spontaneous outbursts of intense religious fervor'—had their origin chiefly in the camp-meetings, the revivals, and other religious exercises. 'They breathe a childlike faith in a personal Father and glow with the hope that the children of bondage will ultimately pass out of the wilderness into the land of freedom.' To them belong such gems as 'You May Bury Me in the Eas',' the plaintive 'Nobody Knows de Trouble I see,' the tender 'Swing Low, Sweet Chariot,' and many others as rare.
At meetings the spirituals were often accompanied by a most extraordinary form of religious ceremony, namely the so-called 'shouts,' which flourished particularly in South Carolina and south of it during antebellum days.[73] The spirituals sung in this connection were consequently called 'shout songs' or 'running spirituals.' The shouts were veritable religious orgies, or bacchanalia, and no doubt represent a relic of an African custom. Julien Tiersot refers to them as 'dishevelled dances.'[74] A vivid description of a shout is given by a writer in 'The Nation' of May 30, 1867:
'... The "shout" takes place on Sundays, or on "praise" nights throughout the week, and either in the praise-house or in some cabin in which a regular religious meeting has been held. Very likely more than half the population of a plantation is gathered together. Let it be the evening, and a light fire burns red before the door of the house and on the hearth. For sometime one hears, though at a good distance, a vociferous exhortation or prayer of the presiding elder or of the brother who has a gift that way and is not "on the back seat"—a phrase the interpretation of which is "under the censure of the church authorities for bad behavior"—and at regular intervals one hears the elder "deaconing" a hymn-book hymn, which is sung two lines at a time and whose wailing cadences, borne on the night air, are indescribably melancholy.
'But the benches are pushed back to the wall when the formal meeting is over, and old and young, men and women, sprucely dressed young men, grotesquely half-clad field hands—the women generally with gay handkerchiefs twisted about their heads and with short skirts—boys with tattered shirts and men's trousers, young girls barefooted, all stand up in the middle of the floor, and when the "sperichil" is struck up begin first walking and by and by shuffling around, one after the other, in a ring. The foot is hardly taken from the floor, and the progression is mainly due to a jerking, twitching motion which agitates the entire shouter and soon brings out streams of perspiration. Sometimes they dance silently, sometimes as they shuffle they sing the chorus of the spiritual, and sometimes the song itself is sung by the dancers. But more frequently a band, composed of some of the best singers and of tired shouters, stand at the side of the room to "base" the others, singing the body of the song and clapping their hands together on the knees. Song and dance are alike extremely energetic, and often, when the shout lasts into the middle of the night, the monotonous thud, thud of the feet prevents sleep within half a mile of the praise house.'
Closely related to the shout songs are the funeral songs which accompanied the 'wakes' and burials of the negroes. They were sung in a low monotonous croon by those who 'sat up' and are particularly noted for their irregularity in everything except rhythm. The negroes are especially inclined to voice their sorrow in nocturnal song, as their savage ancestors did before them, and likewise they indulged in funeral dances at night. Mrs. Jeanette Robinson Murphy, writing in 'The Independent,' speaks of a custom in which hymns are sung at the deathbed to become messengers to loved ones gone before and which the departing soul is charged to bear to heaven. 'When a woman dies some friend or relative will kneel down and sing to the soul as it takes flight. One of these songs contains endless verses, conveying remembrances to relatives in glory.' Often these funeral songs convey deep emotion in a nobly poetic vein. An example recorded by Colonel Thomas Wentworth Higginson has the following words:
'I know moonlight, I know starlight,
I lay dis body down.
I walk in de moonlight, I walk in de starlight,
I lay dis body down.
I know de graveyard, I know de graveyard,
When I lay dis body down.
I walk in de graveyard, I walk troo de graveyard,
Fo lay dis body down.
I lay in de grave, and stretch out my arm;
I lay dis body down.
I go to de judgment in de evenin' of de day,
When I lay dis body down,
An' my soul an' your soul will meet in de day
When I lay dis body down.'
'Never, it seems to me,' comments Col. Higginson, 'since man first lived and suffered, was his infinite longing for peace uttered more plaintively than in that line.' There are many other examples of such funeral songs preserved; some of them Mr. Krehbiel has reprinted in his 'Afro-American Folksongs' (pp. 100 ff.).
Few of the secular songs have survived. Even these, it seems, were often made to do service in the religious meeting, on the Wesleyan principle that it would not do to let the devil have all the good tunes. Some songs, on the other hand, were used to accompany rowing as well as 'shouting'—probably because of the similarity of the rhythm in the two motions. In 'Michael, Row the Boat Ashore,' which was a real boat-song, not a human Michael but the archangel himself was meant. Other tunes used for rowing were 'Heav'n Bell a-ring',' 'Jine 'em,' 'Rainfall,' 'No Man,' and 'Can't stay behin'.' Similarly, other spirituals were used as working songs, for their rhythms were hardly ever sluggish. As a good specimen of purely secular songs—'the strange barbaric songs that one hears upon the Western steamboats'—Mr. W. F. Allen points to the following:
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I'm gwine to Al-a-ba-my, Oh!———
For to see my mam-my, Oh!———
She went from ole Virginny,
And I'm her pickaninny,
She lives on the Tombigbee,
I wish I had her wid me.
Now I'm a good big nigger,
I reckon I won't git bigger,
But I'd like to see my mammy,
Who lives in Alabamy.
The negro's natural impulse for dancing seems to have found its outlet in the 'shout,' as far as the Atlantic seaboard states are concerned at least, for the Christian sects promptly stamped out the dances which were connected with primitive superstition. In Louisiana, however, the negro came in contact with a very different sort of people, the Spanish and French settlers—southern races of a more sensuous turn than the Anglo-Saxon. The musical result was the superposition of Spanish and French melody over negro rhythms—the two ingredients of the Creole folk-songs, which are to a large extent dance songs.
The warlike and lascivious dances of the African took on a more civilized form under the influence of Spanish and French culture, though they are said in some cases to have remained licentious enough. But the product has been highly influential musically. Thus the fascinating Habañera, the familiar rhythm of many a Spanish melody, is, according to Albert Friedenthal,[75] of negro origin. As its name indicates, Havana was its home and from there it spread to all Spanish and Portuguese America, the West Indies, Central and South America. 'Extended and complicated rhythms are known only where the negroes are to be found,' says our investigator. Mr. Krehbiel quotes a creole song from Martinique, built upon the Habañera rhythm, entitled Tant sirop est doux, and speaks of Afro-American songs in which the characteristic rhythm is so persistently used as to suggest that they were influenced by a subconscious memory of the old dance. Other dances of negro origin, mentioned by writers on the Antilles, are the Bamboula, Bouèné, Counjai, Kalinda, Bélé, Bengume, Babouille, Cata, and Guiouba. The term 'juba' applied to the plucking accompaniments of negro dance-songs in minstrel shows may be a derivative of the last.
In speaking of the Creole we must emphasize that the word is not properly applied to any persons of mixed stock, as has been frequently done. Creole is a word of Spanish etymology and was used to denote the pure-blooded Spanish or French native of the American colonies. But it is the negro slaves of these creoles—whom we may call black creoles (including mulattoes, quadroons, etc.)—that created the charming songs breathing the spirit of the tepid zone along the great gulf and the Father of Waters. They, too, are the creators of the patois to which the songs are set. Concerning the origin of this patois Mr. Krehbiel gives some interesting details: 'The creole patois, though never reduced to writing by its users, is still a living language. It is the medium of communication between black nurses and their charges in the French families of Louisiana to-day, and half a century ago it was exclusively spoken by French creoles up to the age of ten or twelve years. In fact, children had to be weaned from it with bribes or punishment. It was, besides, the language which the slave spoke to his master and the master to him. The need which created it was the same as that which created the corrupt English of the slaves in other parts of the country.... Thus, then, grew the pretty language, soft in the mouth of the creole as bella lingua in bocca toscana, in which the creole sang of his love, gave rhythmical impulse to the dance, or scourged with satire those who fell under his displeasure.'
The Creole songs, according to Lafcadio Hearn, are 'Frenchy in construction but possess a few African characteristics of method.' 'There could neither have been creole patois nor creole melodies but for the French and Spanish blooded slaves of Louisiana and the Antilles. The melancholy, quavering beauty and weirdness of the negro chant are lightened by the French influence, subdued and deepened by the Spanish.' Unlike the negro slave of the Virginias and Carolinas, etc., who poured out all his emotion in gospel hymn and spirituals, the black creole was especially fond of love-songs—crooning love songs in the soft, pretty words of his patois—some sad, some light-hearted. One is 'the tender lament of one who was the evil of his heart's choice the victim of chagrin in beholding a female rival wearing those vestments of extra quality that could only be the favors which both women had courted from the hand of some proud master whence alone such favors could come.'[76] Another, 'Caroline,' reveals the romance and the tragedy of the dramatic life of the young creole slaves. We quote it here, as our one example of creole tunes:
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Aine, dé, trois, Ca-ro-line, ça, ça, yé comme ça, ma chère!
Aine, dé, trois, Ca-ro-line, ça, ça, yé comme ça, ma chère!
Pa-pa di non, man-man di oui, C'est li‿mo ou-lé, c'est li ma pren. Ya
pas lar-zan pou‿a-cheté cabanne, C'est li‿mo-oulé, c'est li ma pren.
In general, the love song of the black Creole is more distinctive than that of other Afro-Americans. A famous example is 'Layotte,' utilized by Louis Moreau Gottschalk (b. New Orleans, 1829, of French and English parentage), who achieved international fame both as pianist and composer. Gottschalk did much to make the charm of Creole melodies known to the world. The themes of his piano pieces perpetuate many of these melodies, among them Avant, grenadier, which forms the theme of one of his earliest compositions, Bananier. The popularity of Gottschalk and the general interest which his music aroused in Paris and elsewhere was one of the sensations of the musical world of that day.
Another class of lyrics peculiar to the Creoles were the satirical songs which may be a survival of a primitive practice brought by their ancestors from America. At carnival times scores of these songs make their appearance—or reappearance,—new and topical words being applied to the old tunes, and public as well as personal grudges are taken out in this manner. Such songs are Musieu Bainjo, a mild bit of pleasantry leveled at a darkey who 'put on airs,' and Michié Préval, of which Mr. Cable says that for generations the man of municipal politics was fortunate who escaped entirely a lampooning set to its air. 'Its swinging and incisive rhythm made it the most effective vehicle for satire which the Creole folk-song has ever known.' (Krehbiel.) In Martinique these satirical songs, or pillards, are more malicious in intent and often cruel in the relentless public castigation they inflict upon the objects of their makers' hate.
Other creole songs are of a historical nature, recording events or episodes of importance to the community. The invasion of Louisiana by the British in 1814, and the capture of New Orleans by the Union forces in 1862, for instance, were thus chronicled.
The musical value and the charm of negro songs were little appreciated until the Jubilee Singers of Fisk University, Tenn., made their famous tour, which began in October, 1871. George L. White, the treasurer of the school—one of the institutions for the education of the blacks that came under the patronage of the American Missionary Association—desirous of raising funds for its maintenance, was struck with the artistic possibilities of the little choir of students which he had organized and trained. After several successful concerts held in nearby towns he embarked upon a grand tour of the country, with the object of raising a fund of $20,000. The little company of emancipated slaves—at no time more than fourteen strong—gave the world so remarkable a demonstration of the musical qualities of their race that the matter has hardly been called into question since. In less than three years, moreover, they brought back to Fisk University nearly $100,000. Their adventures are told in detail by J. B. T. Marsh, who, in his 'Story of the Jubilee Singers,' says in part: 'They were turned away from hotels and driven out of railroad waiting rooms because of their color. But they had been received with honor by the President of the United States, they had sung their slave songs before the Queen of Great Britain, and they had gathered as invited guests about the breakfast-table of her Prime Minister. Their success was as remarkable as their mission was unique!
The climax of their tour was the participation in the World's Peace Jubilee held in Boston in June-July, 1872. There, before an audience of 40,000 people gathered from all parts of the country, they sang themselves into the hearts of the nation, in spite of a recurrence of race prejudice. Their singing of Julia Ward Howe's 'Battle Hymn of the Republic' to the tune of 'John Brown' was, according to Mr. Marsh, 'as if inspired.' 'When the grand old chorus "Glory, Hallelujah" followed with a swelling volume of music from the great orchestra, the thunder of the bands and the roar of artillery, the scene was indescribable. Twenty thousand people were on their feet. Ladies waved their handkerchiefs, men threw their hats in the air and the Coliseum rang with the cheers and shouts of "the Jubilees, the Jubilees, forever!"'
The fame of the 'Jubilees' soon spread abroad, and, responding to a demand, they appeared in England, Scotland, and Ireland, with extraordinary success. Their appeal was direct to the hearts of the people, and an echo of it is preserved to this day in the adoption of at least one melody as an English Sunday-school hymn. A second tour took the colored singers into Holland, Switzerland, and Germany as well, and everywhere they met with the deepest appreciation. Received by the sovereigns of both Holland and Germany, they were given the use of the Dutch cathedrals and the Berlin Domkirche for their concerts. The Berlin Musikzeitung indulged in a long laudatory article concerning their music and the artistic finish of their singing, and Franz Abt, the composer, acknowledged their work in the following remark: 'We could not even take our German peasant and reach in generations of culture such results in art, conduct, and character as appear in these freed slaves.'
Other musicians have from time to time called the world's attention to the value of negro music. Most prominent among them being Dr. Antonin Dvořák, who, during his stay in America, voiced his admiration of it and made use of the material in several of his best known compositions, notably the 'New World Symphony' and the 'American Quartet.' It will be appropriate to add in conclusion the well-known passage from Dr. Dvořák's article in the 'Century Magazine' of February, 1895, which has caused so much comment:
'A while ago I suggested that inspiration for truly national music might be derived from the negro melodies or Indian chants. I was led to take the view partly by the fact that the so-called plantation songs are indeed the most striking and appealing melodies that have been found on this side of the water, but largely by observation that this seems to be recognized, though often unconsciously, by most Americans. All races have their distinctive national songs which they at once recognize as their own, even if they have never heard them before. It is a proper question to ask, what songs, then, belong to the American and appeal more strikingly to him than any others? What melody will stop him on the street, if he were in a strange land, and make the home feeling well up within him, no matter how hardened he might be, or how wretchedly the tunes were played? Their number, to be sure, seems to be limited. The most potent, as well as the most beautiful among them, according to my estimation, are certain of the so-called plantation melodies and slave songs, all of which are distinguished by unusual and subtle harmonies, the thing which I have found in no other songs but those of Scotland and Ireland.'
Many American composers have, since these lines were written, acted upon the suggestion contained in them. We need but mention George W. Chadwick, Henry Schoenefeld, E. R. Kroeger, Henry F. Gilbert, Arthur Farwell, and W. H. Humiston among those who have drawn upon this fertile treasure of thematic material. It is but the beginning, however. American music is becoming more and more distinctive. Whether intentionally or spontaneously, our musical literature is bound to absorb some of the color of so potent an element of national lore.