Wald, Elijah. In 1920, Okeh Records released the first blues recording by an African American singer. Many African American men traveled from town to town in search of employment. Crossroads: How the Blues Shaped Rock ’n’ Roll. Two of the primary figures responsible for popularizing it are William Christopher “W.C.” Handy and Gertrude “Ma” Rainey. Southern, Eileen. Review by Bob Joseph ★★½ This is a boring quasi-biopic about the birth of Jazz (not the blues, as the title confusingly states), or better yet, about the moment when Jazz became popular with white musicians and audiences. It was W. C. Handy, as much as anybody, who was responsible for gifting us with the mythology of Mississippi as ground zero for the blues. Palmer, Robert. The blues that emerged as popular music built on earlier folk forms, but it was new and different. Rhythmic inventiveness is central to blues and other African American musical forms, including ragtime, jazz, gospel, rhythm and blues, and hip hop. As the term for a type of music, blues probably came into use around the turn of the twentieth century. He had fallen asleep while waiting for a train and awoke to hear music. His clothes were rags; his feet peeped out of his shoes. Jones, Leroi. New York: Oxford University Press, 2010. Durham: Duke University Press, 2010. "The Saint Louis Blues" was written with a chord structure that became very common in blues music. His song, too, struck me instantly. This Spanish rhythm was popular in Cuba in the nineteenth century. Many compositions included both words blues and ragtime, or rag, in the title or description. These techniques produce microtones and effects that standard musical notation is insufficient to represent. The Birth of the Blues A7 Bridge: C C/B E7 Dm6 E7 From a whippoorwill, out on a hill, Dm6 Bm7/5- E7 Bm7/5- They took a new note, E7 A7 A7sus4 A7 Pushed it through a … The Rat Pack were playing Vegas but visited Carson for this wonderfully entertaining performance. New York: Amistad, 2004. Twelfth Street Rag 17. “Livery Stable Blues,” recorded by the Original Dixieland Jass Band in 1917, is widely regarded as the first jazz recording to be released commercially. All the blues recordings of this period were performed by white vaudeville singers and dance orchestras with varied repertoires. Golden River 13. Blues and early jazz were inextricably linked as they developed concurrently late in the nineteenth century. White performers in blackface makeup dominated minstrelsy, but an increasing number of black minstrel troupes, also in blackface, toured after the Civil War. In the example below, listen specifically to the chord changes that occur in bars 5, 7, 9, 10, and 11. White Southerners severely limited African Americans’ abilities to participate in the political process through discriminatory voting laws and terror organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan, the White League, and the Pale Faces. The song was so strange and poignant that it attracted much attention. The plot loosely follows the origins and breakthrough success of the Original Dixieland Jass Band in New Orleans. This video of “Birth of the Blues” is supposedly the only time Johnny Carson sang in public. Become A Better Singer In Only 30 Days, With Easy Video Lessons! Spirituals are generally sung as a community, whereas blues is the expression of an individual. Handy and Rainey were creating something new and different from the folk forms they heard. ( Shout out the wonderful news! ) Their popularity increased dramatically during the 1890s when companies, including Sears Roebuck and Montgomery Ward, started making inexpensive models available by mail order. In the 1910s, blues became a sensation throughout the United States. It was recorded in its debut year by Paul Whiteman (with vocals by Jack Fulton, Charles Gaylord and Austin "Skin" Young), Harry Richman, and The Revelers. Rhythmic, melodic, and stylistic characteristics of blues are evident in the music of plantation workers of the antebellum South. Starting in the mid-1890s, he toured extensively as a professional entertainer, singing with minstrel troupes, playing cornet and trumpet, leading choruses, and directing black dance bands. Milward, John. Several of the songs referenced in this article are not available from Apple Music. In West Africa, people sang group work songs as they carried out jobs and tasks. Blues emerged as an embodiment of and response to these unique circumstances. It was recorded in its debut year by Paul Whiteman (with vocals by Jack Fulton, Charles Gaylord and Austin "Skin" Young), Harry Richman, and The Revelers. Drumming was strictly limited or outlawed in America by white governments and overseers who were fearful of the potential use of drums to communicate and coordinate slave revolts. Please Be Kind #8. Wald, Elijah. Personal statements by individuals superseded the communal music that was dominant during slavery. In addition to the lone songsters, troupes of performers toured professionally in minstrel shows and circuses, as well as smaller medicine shows. Through spirituals, enslaved African Americans applied call and response and other West African musical practices to Christian hymn singing. With her husband, William “Pa” Rainey, they appeared in vaudeville theaters, circuses, and tent shows throughout the southeastern United States. You watch this film for the song and dance numbers. Sings the Complete 'Dr. While emancipation meant new freedoms for African American people, it also brought challenges, hardships, isolation, and sorrow. Neither the singer in Handy’s story, nor in Rainey’s, identified the music they were singing as blues. Both spirituals and blues often convey feelings of struggle or sorrow. Birth of the Blues (1941) cast and crew credits, including actors, actresses, directors, writers and more. Really funny and amazing! Blues became widely-known in the 1910s when it emerged as a modern trend in popular music. Blind Lemon Jefferson “Black Snake Moan” (1926). Morton Harvey’s recording of the song in 1915 was the first blues sung on record. "The Birth of the Blues" is a popular 1926 song composed by Ray Henderson, with lyrics by Buddy DeSylva and Lew Brown. Professional songwriters and musicians composed and performed the music, and it reflected up-to-date trends in theater and vaudeville. So while I've only heard half of the tracks that are on this set, I can at least contribute a little info. Victor Recording Company’s house band, Victor Military Band, made the first recording of “The Memphis Blues,” an instrumental, in 1914. Bing Crosby founds the first white Dixieland band in Birth of the Blues, a tuneful turn-of-the-century tale--if highly suspect as musical history.Borrowing hot licks from black musicians (Eddie "Rochester" Anderson comments, "Our music sure has gone highbrow"), Bing and his players struggle to invade the straight-laced clubs, succeeding only after songbird Mary Martin joins … Gave birth to the blues! “The Memphis Blues” started a national craze for blues music. The music industry marketed and sold records and sheet music primarily to mainstream, middle-class, white consumers. She began performing as a teenager in the first decade of the twentieth century. The painting is in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, Italy. They also employed the West African-derived vocal, rhythmic, and melodic devices that would become common to blues. These songsters, or musicianers, played a wide variety of music, including fiddle tunes, minstrel songs, spirituals, and narrative ballads. The promise that African Americans might farm their own land was supplanted by a system of sharecropping and tenant farming, which kept them beholden to white landowners and in constant debt. The rat pack - Birth of the blues full comedy act and song. I hate to see the evening sun go downI hate to see the evening sun go downIt makes me think I'm on my last go 'round, Bessie Smith, with Louis Armstrong: "The Saint Louis Blues" (1925). Many times she was asked what kind of song it was, and one day she replied, in a moment of inspiration, "It's the blues...". W. W. Norton & Company, 1997. Loosely based on real events, Bing Crosby plays someone who, despite his classical training, has jazz in his veins and insists on playing a new kind of music. Amazon.com. [1] For the music and not much else, except Bing Crosby seemingly very proud to present the Birth of the Blues (1941). The singing often incorporated call and response, a technique in which a leader sings or chants a line, and the group echoes or answers it with a reply. They were both professional entertainers who adapted music they heard in informal settings to the performance stage and published compositions. It incorporated elements of West African music that they retained during their American experience. New York: Penguin Books, 1982. preserving and celebrating music from America's diverse cultural history. Louis Blues,” has since become a standard. So while I've only heard half of the tracks that are on this set, I can at least contribute a little info. Ma Rainey told folklorist John W. Work about encountering blues music for the first time in a small town in Missouri in 1902. The withdrawal of federal troops from the South in 1877 marked the end of Reconstruction and the beginning of white Redemption. Birth of the Blues was a labor of love for Bing Crosby and it showed. Although rooted in African American folk forms, white, professional songwriters wrote most of the published blues compositions of the 1910s. Bing Crosby founds the first white Dixieland band in Birth of the Blues, a tuneful turn-of-the-century tale--if highly suspect as musical history. They did not view African Americans as potential customers, so they marketed records by black artists to white audiences. Lyrics to Birth Of The Blues by Frank Sinatra from the Ultimate Sinatra [Four-Disc] album - including song video, artist biography, translations and more! As Work told her story: A girl from town... came to the tent one morning and began to sing about the man who had left her. In 1908, New Orleans produced the first published blues composition - "I Got the Blues," written by an Italian American named Antonio Maggio. Birth Of The Blues is a musical vehicle for the great Bing Crosby. Deep Blues: A Musical and Cultural History of the Mississippi Delta. Medley: Volare/On an Evening in Roma #4. In the absence of drums, enslaved African Americans created complex rhythms through singing, hand-clapping, foot-stomping, as well as instrumental techniques used in playing banjo, fiddle, bones, spoons, piano, and other instruments. The term “blues” as a description for melancholia is rooted in the “blue devils” of sixteenth-century British literature. Professional songwriters and musicians composed and performed the music, and it reflected up-to-date trends in theater and vaudeville. It launched black performers to new levels of success, finally singing music that was their own. There is no precise moment when blues music was born. Sure, some of this plot may be rather fictionalized; but that's not what really matters. ‘Goin' where the Southern cross' the Dog.’ The singer repeated the line three times, accompanying himself on the guitar with the weirdest music I had ever heard. Among My Souvenirs 11. Sings Mel Tormé's "California Suite", Sammy Davis Jr. Though minstrelsy reinforced negative racial stereotypes, it offered professional performance opportunities for African American entertainers in an era of limited options. "The Saint Louis Blues" also features a lyric pattern that is frequently employed in twelve-bar blues songs. Borrowing hot licks from black musicians (Eddie "Rochester" Anderson comments, "Our music sure has gone highbrow"), Bing and his players struggle to invade the straight-laced clubs, succeeding only after songbird Mary Martin joins the band. Jazz lovers, go out and rent Birth of the Blues; even if you don't like old movies, it might become one of your favorites. Morton Harvey: "The Memphis Blues" (1915). "The Birth of the Blues" is a popular 1926 song composed by Ray Henderson, with lyrics by Buddy DeSylva and Lew Brown. Blues ballads were similar in structure to the narrative ballads that British colonists brought to the New World, but they told stories relevant to contemporary African American life. The Birth of the Blues has apparently been released in a few versions: this 4-CD box set, a single disc CD that's also available here, and the 2-CD set that I just came across at a discount store. This article focuses on the early development of blues and its emergence as popular music in the 1910s. Miller, Karl Hagstrom. Hilo March 12. It was well-received by critics on its release. It resulted from the intermingling of many social factors and musical precursors. Coming up with Paul Whiteman, Bing met and worked with some of the greatest musicians in history. Writer(s): desylva/brown/henderson Oh, they say some people long ago Were searching for a diff'rent tune One that they could croon Frank Sinatra - Birth Of The Blues Lyrics | MetroLyrics Blue devils were evil spirits thought to cause depression. Call and response is evident between Robert Johnson's vocal and guitar in "Cross Road Blues" (1936). Goody Goody #5. Countless artists have performed and recorded it, including Bessie Smith, Louis Armstrong, Bing Crosby, Glenn Miller, and the Boston Pops Orchestra. It became integrated into the African American music of New Orleans, as musicians regularly ferried between the city and Havana. African Americans continued singing call and response work songs on American plantations and other group work environments, including railroad and levee building. Abolition and emancipation offered three things that were essential to the development of blues: mobility, time alone to ponder, and the freedom to express grievances. African drumming features polyrhythms, in which musicians play two or more rhythms simultaneously. W.C. Prince's Orchestra: "St. Louis Blues" (1915). The Music of Black Americans: A History. W. W. Norton & Company, 2005. Gioia, Ted. Gave birth to the blues! Original Dixieland Jass Band: "Livery Stable Blues" (1917). Among them were black musicians. She added that the blues were not so named then, and that she frequently heard similar songs in her travels. Banjo expert Bill Knopf plays his interpretation of the Ray Henderson jazz classic. 1965 in St. Louis Crawford, Richard. This gestation period birthed forms of American music that would take the national stage in the first decades of the twentieth century, including blues and country. Black and white musicians freely borrowed songs and musical ideas from each other, resulting in a shared common stock repertoire. Some were professionals, and others were plantation workers who made extra money playing for tips on street corners. Reconstruction governments offered political power, access to public schools, and jobs building railroads and roads. Southern African Americans developed blues music in the decades that followed the end of slavery. The Birth of Venus (Italian: Nascita di Venere [ˈnaʃʃita di ˈvɛːnere]) is a painting by the Italian artist Sandro Botticelli, probably made in the mid 1480s.It depicts the goddess Venus arriving at the shore after her birth, when she had emerged from the sea fully-grown (called Venus Anadyomene and often depicted in art). Gradually, blues songs gained more and more prominence in Rainey’s repertoire. Blues ballads include “John Henry,” “Frankie and Albert,” and “Stackolee.” Another type of song, the jump-up, strung together common phrases and verses, often unrelated, over simple guitar accompaniment of one or two chords. It was even more successful than “The Memphis Blues,” and it carried blues music around the world. This show is at Kiel Opera House in St Louis in June 1965 when Johnny Carson hosted the Tonight Show. African music is notable, and distinct from European music, for its rhythmic complexity and diversity. The success of Handy's compositions prompted other composers to jump on the blues bandwagon, and the music grew in popularity throughout the decade. It also revealed the symbiotic relationship between blues and another burgeoning form of American music: jazz. Dolittle', The Ultimate Rat Pack Collection: Live & Swingin', https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Birth_of_the_Blues&oldid=1009666373, Wikipedia articles with MusicBrainz work identifiers, Wikipedia articles with WorldCat-VIAF identifiers, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, This page was last edited on 1 March 2021, at 18:43. Among the earliest references were in New Orleans, where it indicated a slow, sexy dance rhythm. The sheet music for “The Memphis Blues” indicated that it was “A Southern Rag,” referring to ragtime music, which had been very popular since the mid-1890s. They retained these practices from West African musical traditions, where song accompanied everyday activities of work, worship, courtship, and leisure. Emancipation brought new hope for African American people in the South. African and African American singers and instrumentalists slide, glide, and quiver between pitches. 23,854. However, it was a highly contentious time, as Southern whites did everything they could to preserve the power structure from which they had benefited for centuries. Field hands working long hours in the sun sometimes let out a long, musical moan, known as a shout or holler. The song is in the twelve-bar form. Forced into segregated “separate but equal” public accommodations, African Americans were more isolated from mainstream American society than they had been under slavery. Alan Lomax recorded this example of a holler by Walter “Tangle Eye” Jackson at Mississippi State Penitentiary (1947). Blues People: Negro Music in White America. The first recording of "The Saint Louis Blues," by Prince's Orchestra, the house band at Columbia Records, includes this habanera section. The many languages and customs Africans brought to the New World coalesced over generations into relatively cohesive bodies of African American music and culture. 234 4. more tracks from the album Rat Pack: Members Edition #1. Handy published his next blues, “The Saint Louis Blues,” in 1914. New York: Harper Perennial, 1999. Segregating Sound: Inventing Folk and Pop Music in the Age of Jim Crow. The song elicited such a response from the audience that it won a special place in her act. The Birth of the Blues Chords by Frank Sinatra. The slow time and mournful nature of the hollers bear a close resemblance to blues, though blues songs are more structured. Lyrics to 'Birth of The Blues' by Frank Sinatra. While spirituals find solace in God and the promise of salvation, blues songs remain focused on the earthly realm. I Left My Heart in San Francisco #3. Handy was living in Memphis, Tennessee in 1912 when he published the sheet music for his composition “The Memphis Blues.” It was one of the first published blues songs, and sales of the sheet music soared. His face had on it some of the sadness of the ages. San Antonio Rose 16. Both were essential ingredients in jazz. Minstrel and coon songs performed by black singers sold to white record buyers because the material supported the dominant racial stereotypes and did not threaten the prevailing power structure. Blues music employs a range of melodic practices from West Africa. You're Nobody Till Somebody Loves You #9. Birth Of The Blues. I Was Sorta Wonderin' 10. A single line is repeated, followed by a rhyming third line. The Blues: A Very Short Introduction. Handy's original composition, as well as several of his other pieces, includes a section with a habanera rhythm. Sings and Laurindo Almeida Plays, Sammy Davis Jr. “The Saint Louis Blues,” or “St. The effect was unforgettable. Chicago #6. In the 1910s, blues became a sensation throughout the United States. A lean, loose-jointed negro had commenced plunking a guitar beside me while I slept. Confused with the Blues 18. The practice of creating spirituals and blues includes drawing upon phrases or verses that are common to multiple songs. The Development of Blues in the Postwar South, Blues Queens and Race Records in the 1920s. When You and I Were Young, Maggie 08. Learn to play guitar by chord / tabs using chord diagrams, transpose the key, watch video lessons and much more. Others wandered due to restlessness. Birth of the Blues is a 1941 American musical film directed by Victor Schertzinger and starring Bing Crosby, Mary Martin and Brian Donlevy. For a general overview that follows the evolution of blues music from its origins through its contemporary forms, see Blues: About the Genre. Their distinctive vocal textures are evident in the style of many blues singers, including Blind Lemon Jefferson, Skip James, Ma Rainey, Bessie Smith, and Tommy Johnson. Oh, the breeze from the trees, A wail from the jail, A buzz from the cousin of a nightin'gale, And "Southland" ( hello, hello! ) Handy picked up musical ideas and styles from the locales he visited. It was used in the Broadway revue George White's Scandals of 1926. Handy was an African American bandleader, songwriter, and music teacher who became known as “Father of the Blues” for his role in making blues a popular music sensation. Blue Rose of the Rio 14. Sharecroppers and laborers on prison chain gangs, railroads, and levees continued this practice after the end of slavery. Escaping the Delta: Robert Johnson and the Invention of the Blues. He enjoyed their company, he enjoyed working with them, just couldn't get enough. He told the following story about a song he heard at a train station in the Delta hamlet of Tutwiler, Mississippi, in 1903. Music Makin' Mama from Memphis 09. While African Americans had been singing on sound recordings since the start of the recording industry in 1890, they mainly performed self-deprecating “coon songs” (see Ragtime: About the Genre) and minstrel show material. As he played, he pressed a knife on the strings of the guitar in a manner popularized by Hawaiian guitarists who used steel bars. Delta Blues: The Life and Times of the Mississippi Masters Who Revolutionized American Music, 2009. The Birth of the Blues 07. Regional songs and styles emerged, though traveling musicians picked up and spread influences throughout the South. The blues that emerged as popular music built on earlier folk forms, but it was new and different. 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