Figure XXXIV.
The Angels Done Changed My Name. From "Jubilee Songs."
I went to the hillside, I went to pray, I
know the angels done changed my name, Done
changed my name for the coming day, Thank
God the angels done changed my name.
You May Bury Me in the East.
You may bury me in the East, You may
bury me in the West, But I'll hear the trumpet sound in that
morning. In that morning, my Lord
How I long to go for, For to hear the trumpet sound, In that morning.
It is often stated that the chief rhythmic characteristic of the negro music is the so-called "Scotch jerk," the jump away from the normally accented note to another, thrice exemplified in the third line of "The Angels Done Changed My Name," and imitated in ragtime. A more typical instance of it is "Didn't My Lord Deliver Daniel" (Figure XXXV), which also further illustrates major-minor idiom in its constant see-saw between G minor and B-flat major. It is pointed out that the slaves had a strong sense of time, that the overwhelming majority of their songs are in duple or march time, with very few in the more graceful but less vehement triple measure, and that in their "shouts" or religious dances they rocked themselves into paroxysms of rhythmic excitement, one group clapping the meter while the others sang and scuffled with a "jerking, twitching motion which agitated the entire shouter and soon brought out streams of perspiration."[66] No doubt the jerk evidences their love of strong accentuation; but it must be noted that accentuation is a purely local thing, affects the meter rather than the rhythm, and may be assumed and put off by a tune (as in the "ragging" of a standard melody) without changing its essential curve.