THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA
SOCIAL STUDY SERIES

NEGRO WORKADAY SONGS

NEGRO WORKADAY SONGS

BY

HOWARD W. ODUM, Ph.D.

Kenan Professor of Sociology and Director of
the School of Public Welfare, University of
North Carolina

AND

GUY B. JOHNSON, A.M.

Institute for Research in Social Science,
University of North Carolina

CHAPEL HILL
THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA PRESS
LONDON: HUMPHREY MILFORD
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
1926

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Copyright, 1926, By
The University of North Carolina Press
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Presses of
Edwards & Broughton Company
RALEIGH

[viii]

Negro Workaday Songs is the third volume of a series of folk background studies of which The Negro and His Songs was the first and Folk-Beliefs of the Southern Negro was the second. The series will include a number of other volumes on the Negro and likewise a number presenting folk aspects of other groups. The reception which the first volumes have received gives evidence that the plan of the series to present scientific, descriptive, and objective studies in as interesting and readable form as possible may be successful in a substantial way. Since the data for background studies are, for the time being, practically unlimited, it is hoped that other volumes, appearing as they become available and timely, may glimpse the whole range—from the Negro “bad man” to the æsthetic in the folk urge.

In this volume, as in previous ones, the emphasis is primarily social, although this indicates no lack of appreciation of the inherent literary and artistic values of the specimens presented. Indeed, so far as possible, all examples of folk expression in this volume are left to tell their own story. The type melodies and musical notations are presented separately with the same descriptive purpose as the other chapters, and they are not offered as a substitute for effective harmonies and musical interpretation. For the purposes of this volume, however, the separate chapters on the melodies and phono-photographic records with musical notations are very important. It is also important that they be studied separately, but in the light of the preceding chapters, rather than inserted in the text to detract from both the social and artistic interpretation of the songs enumerated.

[xi]

The Seashore-Metfessel phono-photographic records and musical notations mark an important contribution to the whole field of interpretation of Negro music. There may be an outstanding contribution both to the musical world and to the whole interpretation of Negro backgrounds in the possible thesis that the Negro, in addition to his distinctive contribution to harmony, excels also in the vibrato quality of the individual voice. These studies were made at Chapel Hill and at Hampton by Dr. Carl E. Seashore and Dr. Milton Metfessel of the University of Iowa, under the auspices of the Institute for Research in Social Science at the University of North Carolina through a special grant of the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial. Full acknowledgment to them is here made.

It should be kept constantly in mind that this volume, like The Negro and His Songs, is in no sense an anthology or general collection, but represents the group of songs current in certain areas in North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Georgia, during the years 1924-25. Of course all of this collection cannot be included in this volume; and no doubt many of the most important or most attractive specimens extant have escaped us at this time. It is also important to note that in this volume, as in the previous one, all specimens listed, except lines or references otherwise designated, were taken directly from Negro singers and do not represent reports from memory of white individuals. So far as we know none of the songs in this collection has been published, although there are countless variations, adaptations and corruptions of the modern blues and jazz songs represented in the group. The songs, however, were all[xii] sung or repeated by actual Negro workers or singers, and much of their value lies in the exact transcription of natural lines, words, and mixtures. The collection is still growing by leaps and bounds. In this volume every type is represented except the “dirty dozen” popular models and the more formal and sophisticated creations.

Since this volume presents a series of pictures of the Negro as portrayed through his workaday songs it is important that all chapters be read before any final judgment is made. Even then the picture will not be complete. It has not been possible, of course, to make any complete or accurate classification of the songs. They overlap and repeat. They borrow sentiment and expression and repay freely. Free labor song becomes prison song, and chain gang melody turns to pick-and-shovel accompaniment. The chapter divisions, therefore, are made with the idea of approximating a usable classification and providing such mechanical divisions as will facilitate the best possible presentation.

The reader who approaches this volume from the point of view of the technical student of folk song will likely be disappointed at what he considers the lack of discrimination displayed by the authors in admitting so many songs which cannot be classed as strictly folk songs. We have frankly taken the position that these semi-folk songs, crude and fragmentary, and often having only local or individual significance, afford even more accurate pictures of Negro workaday life and art than the conventional folk songs. While we have spared no effort to make the collection valuable for folk song students, we have approached the work primarily as sociologists.

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For assistance in recording the type melodies in Chapter XIV we are specially indebted to Mr. Lee M. Brooks, and for many of the songs of women to Mrs. Henry Odum. We wish to thank Mr. Gerald W. Johnson for his goodness in going over much of the manuscript and making valuable suggestions. To Dr. L. R. Wilson, Director of the University of North Carolina Press, we are much indebted for coöperation and suggestions.

Chapel Hill H. W. O.
January, 1926 G. B. J.

To discover and present authentic pictures of the Negro’s folk background as found in his workaday songs is a large and promising task of which there are many phases. Here are spontaneous products of the Negro’s workaday experiences and conflicts. Here are reflections of his individual strivings and his group ways. Here are specimens of folk art and creative effort close to the soil. Here are new examples of the Negro’s contributions to the American scene. Here is important material for the newer scientific interest which is taking the place of the old sentimental viewpoint. And here is a mine of descriptive and objective data to substitute for the emotional and subjective attitudes of the older days.

It is a day of great promise in the United States when both races, North and South, enter upon a new era of the rediscovery of the Negro and face the future with an enthusiasm for facts, concerning both the newer creative urge and the earlier background sources. Concerning the former, Dr. Alain Locke recently has said:[1] “Whoever wishes to see the Negro in his essential traits, in the full perspective of his achievement and possibilities, must seek the enlightenment of that self-portraiture which the present development of the Negro culture offers.” One of the best examples of that self-portraiture is that of the old spirituals, long neglected, but now happily the subject of a new race dedication and appreciation. Now comes another[2] master index of race temperament and portrayal, as found in some of the Negro’s newer creations. No less important, from the viewpoint of sheer originality and poetic effort as well as of indices of traits and possibilities, are the seemingly unlimited mines of workaday songs, weary blues, and black man ballads. In a previous volume[2] we presented a sort of composite picture from two hundred songs gathered two decades ago and interpreted with something of prophetic evaluation. In this volume of Negro Workaday Songs is presented a deeper mine of source material, rich in self-portraiture and representative of the workaday Negro.

In his Peter the Czar, violent story of “lashed sentences,” perfectly suited to the depiction of primitive character, Klabund pictures vividly a certain Great Enemy about whose “shivering shoulders lay a rainbow like a silken shawl.” Digging to the syncopated rhythm of song and fast-whirling pick, a Negro workman sings of another rainbow, equally vivid and shoulder-draped, more concrete, personal, and real:

In addition to the poetic imagery in this seemingly unconscious motor-minded product, one may glimpse evidences of simple everyday experience, wishful thought, childlike faith, workaday stolidity, physical[3] satisfaction, and subtle humor. But he can find still more humor and experience, with a good bit of metaphor thrown in for good measure, in the “feet rollin’” stanza of another wanderer’s song of the road:

Resourcefulness, humor, defense mechanism, imagination, all might be found in the spectacle of a group of Negroes singing over and over again on a hot July day the refreshing lines,

With the thermometer around a hundred, and the work of digging at hand, this song of “parts,” with some of the singers using the words, “be so cold, be so cold” as an echo, undoubtedly had peculiar merit.

Perhaps there have been few, if any, lines of poetry more popular than Wordsworth’s “The light that never was on sea or land.” The Negro worker sings of a more earthly yet equally miraculous light to guide his pathway, when he complains,

How much of symbolism is to be found in the Negro’s workaday songs? How much subjective imagery, how much unconscious allegory? There are abundant examples of the free use of symbolism in his love songs and popular jazz appeals. But what does he mean when he sings,

Or contrast this simple individual song, with its humor and easy-going rhythm, with the power and appeal of group singing. Here is a goodly party of two-score white folk, seated at twilight under the trees in a grove, joyous guests at a turkey dinner near the old colonial home. There is merriment. Song and jest, toast and cheer abound. The waiters have gone. Then from the kitchen door comes the song of Negroes, beginning low, rising in volume, telling of the sinking of the Titanic. What is it in that final harmony of “God moved upon the waters,” sung by a Negro group, which silenced the merrymakers into willing recognition that here may be perfect art and perfect effect? Does this Negro minstrel type, rendered thus in native setting, become for the moment the perfect expression of folk spirit and folk art?

Hundreds of verses dedicated to the business of moving about give evidence that the trail of the black knight of the road is strewn with spontaneous[5] song, often turned into polished phrase. A favorite stanza has long been descriptive of being “on road here few days longer, then I’ll be going home.” Sung again and again, the song takes on a new form but loses nothing of its emphatic meaning:

For, says the worker, “If I feel tomorrow like I feel today, I’m gonna pack my suitcase and walk away,” and “reason I’m workin’ here so long, hot flambotia and coffee strong.”

Following the trail of the workaday Negro, therefore, one may get rare glimpses of common backgrounds of Negro life and experience in Southern communities. Here were the first real plantings of the modern blues, here songs of the lonesome road, here bad man ballads, here distinctive contributions in songs of jail and chain gang, here songs of white man and captain, here Negro Dr. Jekyls and Mr. Hydes. Here are found new expressions of the old spirituals and remnants still surviving. Here man’s song of woman is most varied and original, and woman’s song of man is best echoed from days and nights of other times. Here are reflected the epics of John Henry, Lazarus, Dupree, and the others. Here are folk fragments, cries and “hollers,” songs to help with work, physical satisfaction and solace, the “Lawdy-Lawdy” vibrato of evening melancholy and morning yodel. Here may be found the subliminal jazz, rare rhythm and movement, coöperative harmony as characteristic as ever the old spirituals revealed. Nevertheless, too much emphasis[6] cannot be placed upon the danger of over-interpretation, for while the workaday songs provide a seemingly exhaustive supply of mirror plate for the reflection of folk temperament and struggle, too much analysis must not obscure their vividness or the beauty and value of their intrinsic qualities.

It is important to note the extent to which the notable popular blues of today, more formal embodiment of the Negro’s workaday sorrow songs, have come from these workaday products. Here are true descendants of the old worshipers who sang so well of the Rock in a weary land. And echoing from Southern distances, from Memphis and Natchez, from New Orleans and Macon, from Charleston and Atlanta, and from wayside roads and camps, from jail and chain gang, come unmeasured volume of harmony, unnumbered outbursts of song, perfect technique of plaintive appeal. Many of the most plaintive lines of blues yet recorded were gathered decades ago from camp and road in Mississippi before the technique of the modern blues had ever been evolved. Eloquent successors to the old spirituals with their sorrow-feeling, these songs of the lonesome road have gathered power and numbers and artistic interpretation until they defy description and record. Today the laborer, the migrant, the black man offender constitute types as distinctive and inimitable as the old jubilee singers and those whom they represented. Wherever Negroes work, or loaf, or await judgment, there may be heard the weary and lonesome blues so strange and varied as to reveal a sort of superhuman evidence of the folk soul. No amount of ordinary study into race backgrounds, or historical annals of African folk, or elaborate anthropological excursions can give so simply and completely the story of this Negro quest for expression,[7] freedom, and solace as these low-keyed melancholy songs.

And what names and lines, words and melodies, records and improvisations of the new race blues! Plaintive blues, jolly blues, reckless blues, dirty dozen blues, mama blues, papa blues,—more than six hundred listed by one publisher and producer. Here they are—the workaday sorrow songs, the errant love songs, the jazz lyrics of a people and of an age—as clearly distinctive as the old spirituals. And how like the road songs and the gang lines, straight up from the soil again, straight from the folk as surely as ever came the old spirituals.

Samples of the growing list of blues, some less elegant, some more aggressive, will be found in Chapter II. And of course we must not forget the bad man blues: Dangerous Blues, Evil Blues, Don’t Mess With Me Blues, Mean Blues, Wicked Blues, and most of all the Chain Gang Blues, Jail Blues, and the Cell-bound Blues.

And the singer presents, as one of his standard versions of many songs, a regular weekly calendar:

[8]

Perhaps the most common concept found in the chain gang and road songs and appearing here and there in all manner of song is the concept of a letter from home, the inability to go home without “ready money,” the attempt to borrow from the captain, or to get a parole.

A constant source of song is the conflict between actual conditions and desirable ends, between life as it is and ideals of wishful dreaming. “I want to go home,” says the workman, but “I don’t want no trouble wid de walker.” The resulting product is absence from home, absence of trouble with the captain or walker, and abundance of song.

Again and again the Negro wanderer portrays home, parents, brothers and sisters, friends, as the most highly esteemed of life’s values—striking paradox to the realism of his practice. Idealism in song and dreams, in workaday songs as well as spirituals,[9] alongside sordidness in living conditions and physical surroundings, appear logical and direct developments from the type of habitation which the Negro common man has ever known.

The Negro “bad man” who sings sorrowfully of his mother’s admonitions and his own mistakes, glories also in the motor-imaged refrain:

A later chapter is devoted to this notable character, the “bad man,” whose varied pictures represent a separate Negro contribution. Here are new and worthy Negro exhibits to add to the American galaxy of folk portraits: Railroad Bill alongside Jesse James, the Negro “bad man” beside the Western frontiersman, and John Henry by Paul Bunyan. For from the millions of Negroes of yesterday and as many more today, with their oft-changing and widely varying economic and social conditions, has come a rare and varied heritage of folk tradition, folk character, and folk personality. Much of this might remain forever unknown and unsung were it not for the treasure-house of Negro song, the product of a happy facility for linking up the realities of actual life with wishful thinking and imaginative story.

Of the grand old “saints,” white haired “Uncles” and “Aunties,” we have viewed from near and far scores of inimitable examples. Of the thousands of musicianers, songsters and workers, and those who sing “down that lonesome road,” recent epochs have mirrored many. But what of the real and mythical jamboree breakers and bad men, or of Po’ Lazarus and[10] Stagolee, or of John Henry, “forehanded steel-drivin’ man” and ideal of the Negro worker?

Here are rare folk figures silhouetted against a sort of shifting race background with its millions of working folk and wanderers moving suddenly and swiftly across the scene. A brown-black army of ramblers, creepers, high flyers, standin’ men, all-night workers, polish men, “stick and ready” from the four corners of the States—Lazarus, Billy Bob Russel, Shootin’ Bill, Brady, Dupree, and the others. And then John Henry, stately and strong in contrast, noble exponent of sturdy courage and righteous struggle, faithful to death.

A chapter on “Man’s Song of Woman” will make but a small beginning of a large task. Its sequel must be deferred until the lover’s specialisms can be published with a liberal usage of the psychiatrists’ terminology. A chapter on “Woman’s Song of Man” ought also to have a companion sequel in the book of Negro symbolism. A chapter on “Workaday Religious Songs” can present only a small portion of those now being sung, but will be representative of the present heritage of the old spirituals. A chapter on the miscellaneous fragments, “hollers,” lines, incoherent and expressive “Lawdy-Lawd-Lawds” gives one of the best pictures of the Negro workaday character and habits. Some of these types make a very good safety valve for the Negro singer; in a different way their plainness may restrain the enthusiast from setting too much “store” by all the Negro’s songs. The characters of John Henry and[11] Left Wing represent two types, one the mythical and heroic, the other the real and commonplace, both typical of the Negro’s idealism and his actual life. The examples of “movement and imagery” are as characteristic of the Negro workaday experience as were the harmonies and swaying of the old spirituals. They are indices to guide judgment and interpretation of the Negro temperament. In each of these chapters, it will be understood, only enough material is presented to illustrate the case, including, however, always the most representative specimens which the authors have been able to collect within their field and time limit. Much that is similar will necessarily await publication in volumes in which the chief objective will be preservation and completeness rather than interpretation.

Many pictures of the workaday Negro are presented in this volume through the medium of his songs. They are silhouetted, as it were, at first against a complex background of Negro life and experience. The pictures are vivid, concrete, distinct, often complete. But most of all, perhaps, they have been moving pictures. From the first glimpse of the Negro singer with his “feet’s gone to rollin’ jes’ lak a wheel,” to the last great scene of John Henry dying with the “hammer in his hand,” there is marvelous movement alongside rare imagery. Sometimes rhythm and rhyme, but always movement, have dominated the Negro’s chief characterizations. And this movement in the workaday songs is as much a distinctive feature as were the swaying bodies, the soothing rhythm, and swelling harmony of the old spirituals. Picture the Negro workingman in his song and story life and you picture him on the move.

It is scarcely possible to describe this element of movement in the Negro workaday songs. And yet[12] the mere citation and classification of representative examples will suffice to point out the particular qualities of action which might justify the added element of epic style, if one remembers that the singer’s concept of the heroic, while very real, is not exalted in the Greek sense. There are those who do not feel that the Negro’s workaday songs are characterized by the qualities of poetry; yet do they not arouse the feelings and imagination in vivid and colorful language? The type of language used—that is the Negro’s own. In the same way there can be no doubt of his songs emphasizing the quality of action; his heroes and principal figures, like his language, reflect his concepts and tell his stories. Whether epic or heroic,

has plenty of action and imagery in it. And it is characteristic of much of the Negro workaday style of talk, imagination, and thought.

Many of the pictures are vivid because of the action concept and the rhyming metaphors.

There was also a woman, one Eliza Stone, from a bad, bad land, who threatened to break up the jamboree with her razor but who also “jumped in de flo’, an’ doubled up her fist, say ‘You wanter test yo’ nerve jes’ jump against this.’” Note further a varying reel of moving characters and scenes.

[13]

The continuous search after the workaday folk song will always provide one of the most important guides to the “discovery” of the Negro. The task of finding and recording accurately the folk expression is a difficult one under most circumstances. Under certain circumstances it is an easy task, and always an interesting one. If we keep a record of efforts, taken at random, as experimental endeavor, in a cross country visit through North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Georgia, about ten per cent, at best, of the requests for songs will be successful. There are other times, when setting and procedure are worked out well, when almost one hundred per cent success would be attained. In most instances the Negro is at his “best” when being urged to coöperate in the rendering of his folk songs. By his “best” is meant that he reveals a striking nature and strong personality, whether in affirming stoutly that he knows no songs now or that he has forgotten what he used to know. He protests vigorously that he does not sing well enough, that he cannot say the words of songs unless he can sing, that he cannot sing unless others are singing, that he has to be in the spirit of the song, or that he will get some songs together and bring them in, or that he will bring a quartet or a pal. Rarely ever does he “produce” if let alone with only a first approach. Nor can he be blamed. He is entirely within his own self-protecting domain, so that his attitude may be put[14] down, not only as a characteristic one but also as a commendable one. He has his own fun, too, in the situation. In general there are several types from which little success may be expected. The more educated and sophisticated Negro not only does not as a rule coöperate, but looks with considerable condescension upon those who seek his help. There are many who believe that all songs desired are for immediate transcription to printed music or phonograph record. These are of little assistance. Others feel that some hidden motive is back of the request. Still others for various reasons do not coöperate. Nor will the Negro student or musician himself find ready coöperation among his common folk who feel constrained to withhold their folk art from the learned of their own race.

Perhaps the most striking observation that comes from the whole experience is the seemingly inexhaustible supply of songs among the workaday Negroes of the South. We have yet to find a “bottom” or a limit in the work songs among the crowds of working men in one community. Just as often as there is opportunity to hear a group of Negroes singing at work, just so often have we found new songs and new fragments. There is so far no exception to this rule. Likewise we have yet to find an individual, whose efforts have been freely set forth in the offering of song, whose supply of songs has been exhausted. Time and time again the approach has been made, with the response, “Naw, sir, cap’n, I don’t know no songs much,” with an ultimate result of song after song, seemingly with no limit. Partly the singer is honest; he does not at the time, think of many songs nor does he consider himself a good singer; but when he turns himself “loose” his capacity for memory and singing is astonishing.

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The same general rule with reference to dialect is used in this volume as was the case in The Negro and His Songs.[4] There can be no consistency, except the consistency of recording the words as nearly as possible as rendered. Words may occur in two or three variations in a single stanza and sometimes in a single line. The attempt to make formal dialect out of natural speech renders the product artificial and less artistic. We have therefore followed the general practice of keeping the dialect as simple as possible. Dialect, after all, is a relative matter. It is the sort of speech which is not used in one’s own section of the country. As a matter of fact, much of what has passed as Negro dialect is good white Southern usage, and there is nothing to justify the attempt to set aside certain pronunciations as peculiar to the Negro simply because a Negro is being quoted. Consequently we have refrained from the use of dialect in all cases where the Negro pronunciation and the usual white pronunciation are the same or practically the same. If the reader will grasp the basic points of difference between Negro and white speech and will then keep in mind the principle of economy, he will have no difficulty in following the peculiarities of dialect.

The principle of economy will be found to operate at high efficiency in Negro speech. It will nearly always explain the apparent inconsistencies in dialect. For example, the Negro often says ’bout and ’roun’ for about and around. But he might vary these to about, aroun’, ’round, and around in a single song, depending upon the preceding and succeeding sounds. He would say, “I’ll go ’bout two o’clock,” but he[16] also would say, “I went about two o’clock,” because in the former case it is easier to say ’bout than about, while in the latter the reverse is true.

Rhythm is also related to dialect. In ordinary speech most Negroes would say broke for broken, but if the rhythm in singing called for a two-syllable sound they would say broken rather than broke.

Very few of the popular songs which we heard twenty years ago are found now in the same localities. The places that knew them will know them no more. The same disappearing process is going on now, only more rapidly than formerly because of the multitude of blues, jazz songs, and others being distributed throughout the land in millions of phonographic records. One of the first tasks of this volume is, therefore, to take cognizance of these formal blues, both in their relation to the workaday native creations and as an important segment of the Negro’s music and his contribution to the American scene. In the next chapter we shall proceed, therefore, to discuss the blues.

No story of the workaday song life of the Negro can proceed far without taking into account the kind of song known as the blues, for, next to the spirituals, the blues are probably the Negro’s most distinctive contribution to American art. They have not been taken seriously, because they have never been thoroughly understood. Their history needs to be written. The present chapter is not a complete statement. It merely presents some of the salient points in the story of the blues and offers some suggestions as to their rôle in Negro life.

Behind the popular blues songs of today lie the more spontaneous and naïve songs of the uncultured Negro. Long before the blues were formally introduced to the public, the Negro was creating them by expressing his gloomy moods in song. To be sure, the present use of the term “blues” to designate a particular kind of popular song is of recent origin, but the use of the term in Negro song goes much further back, and the blue or melancholy type of Negro secular song is as old as the spirituals themselves. The following song might be taken at first glance for one of the 1926 popular “hits,” but it dates back to the time of the Civil War.[5]

Very few of the Negro’s ante-bellum secular songs have been preserved, but there is every reason to suppose that he had numerous melancholy songs aside from the spirituals. At any rate, the earliest authentic secular collections abound in the kind of songs which have come to be known as the blues. The following expressions are typical of the early blues. They are taken from songs collected in Georgia and Mississippi between 1905 and 1908, and they were doubtless common property among the Negroes of the lower class long before that.[6]

[19]

Here are blues in the making. This is the stuff that the first published blues were made of, and some of it sounds strikingly like certain of the latest blues records issued by the phonograph companies. About 1910 the first published blues appeared, and since that time they have been exploited in every imaginable form by music publishers and phonograph companies.[7] The inter-relations between the formal blues and the native blues will be discussed later. At present it is necessary to take up certain questions concerning the nature of the blues.

What are the characteristics of the native blues, in so far as they can be spoken of as a type of song apart from other Negro songs? The original blues were so fragmentary and elusive—they were really little more than states of mind expressed in song—that it is difficult to characterize them definitely. The following points, then, are merely suggestive.

In the first place, blues are characterized by a tone of plaintiveness. Both words and music give the impression of loneliness and melancholy. In fact, it was this quality, combined with the Negro’s peculiar use of the word “blues,” which gave the songs their name. In the second place, the theme of most blues is that of the love relation between man and woman. There are many blues built around homesickness and hard luck in general, but the love theme is the principal one. Sometimes the dominant note is the complaint of the lover:

[20]

Sometimes it is a note of longing:

At other times the dominant note is one of disappointment:

A third characteristic of the blues is the expression of self pity.[14] Often this is the outstanding feature of the song. There seems to be a tendency for the despondent or blue singer to use the technique of the martyr to draw from others a reaction of sympathy. Psychologically speaking, the technique consists of rationalization, by which process the singer not only excuses his shortcomings, but attracts the attention and sympathy of others—in imagination, at least—to[21] his hard lot. The following expressions will make the point clear.[15]

Now it is apparent to any one familiar with the folk songs of various peoples that the blues type, as it has been described above, is not peculiar to the Negro, but is more or less common to all races and peoples. So far as subject matter and emotional expression are concerned, the lonesome songs of the Kentucky mountaineer, of the cowboy, of the sailor, or of any other group, are representative of the blues type. If this be so, then why was it that the Negro’s song alone became the basis for a nationally popular type of song? The answer to this question is, of course, far from simple. For one thing, the whole matter of the Negro’s cultural position in relation to the white man is involved. The Negro’s reputation for humor and good singing is also important. Perhaps, too, the psychology of fads would have to be considered. But, speaking in terms of the qualities of the songs themselves, what is there about them to account for the superior status enjoyed by the Negro’s melancholy songs?

[22]

To begin with, the Negro’s peculiar use of the word “blues” in his songs was a circumstance of no mean importance. Much more significant, however, was the music of the blues. The blues originated, of course, with Negroes who had access to few instruments other than the banjo and the guitar. But such music as they brought forth from these instruments to accompany their blues was suited to the indigo mood. It was syncopated, it was full of bizarre harmonies, sudden changes of key and plaintive slurs. It was something new to white America, and it needed only an introduction to insure its success.

But there is still another feature of the blues which is probably responsible more than any other one thing for their appeal and fascination, and that is their lack of conventionality, their naïveté of expression. The Negro wastes no time in roundabout or stilted modes of speech. His tale is brief, his metaphor striking, his imagery perfect, his humor plaintive. Expressions like the following have made the blues famous.

When the first published blues appeared, the problem for the student of Negro song began to become complicated. It is no longer possible to speak with certainty of the folk blues, so entangled are the relations[23] between them and the formal compositions. This inter-relation is itself of such interest and importance that it demands the careful attention of students of folk song. Only a few points can be touched upon in the present work, but an attempt will be made at least to indicate some of the ramifications of the subject.

There is no doubt that the first songs appearing in print under the name of blues were based directly upon actual songs already current among Negroes.[17] Soon after Handy began to issue his blues, white people as well as Negroes were singing them heartily. But a song was never sung long in its original version alone. The half-dozen stanzas of the original often grew to a hundred or more, for many singers took pride in creating new stanzas or adapting parts of other songs to the new one. Sometimes publishers would issue second and third editions, incorporating in them the best of the stanzas which had sprung up since the preceding edition. Thus, even before the phonograph became the popular instrument that it is today, the interplay between folk creations and formal compositions had become extremely complex.

In the last ten years the phonograph record has surpassed sheet music as a conveyor of blues to the public. Sheet music, however, is still important. In fact, practically every “hit” is issued in both the published and phonographed form. But the phonograph record obviously has certain advantages, and it is largely responsible for the present popularity of the blues. Most of the large phonograph companies now maintain special departments devoted to the recording[24] of “race blues.” They employ Negro artists, many of whom have already earned national reputations, and they advertise extensively, especially in the Negro press.

In spite of the extremes to which exploitation of the blues has gone in recent years, there is often an authentic folk element to be found in the present-day formal productions. Some of the phonograph artists are encouraged by their employers to sing blues of their own making. When the artist has had an intimate acquaintance with the life of his race and has grown up among the blues, so to speak, he is often able to produce a song which preserves faithfully the spirit of the folk blues. The folk productions of yesterday are likely to be found, albeit sometimes in versions scarcely recognizable, on the phonograph records of today. That this is the case is indicated by the following comparison of a few of the lines and titles of songs collected twenty years ago with lines and titles of recent popular blues songs.

When a blues record is issued it quickly becomes the property of a million Negro workers and adventurers who never bought it and perhaps never heard it played. Sometimes they do not even know that the song is from a record. They may recognize in it parts of songs long familiar to them and think that it is just another piece which some songster has put together. Their desire to invent a different version, their skill at adapting stanzas of old favorites to the new music, and sometimes their misunderstanding of the words of the new song, result in the transformation of the song into many local variants. In other words, the folk creative process operates upon a song, the origin of which may already be mixed, and produces in turn variations that may later become the bases of other formal blues. A thorough exposition of this process would take us far beyond the limits of this volume, but the following instances are cited to illustrate generally the interplay between the folk blues and the formal blues.

Here is a specimen captured from a Negro girl in Georgia who had just returned from a trip to “Troit,” Michigan.

Now this song is a mixture of several popular blues. The first stanza is from the House Rent Blues, and is sung practically the same as on the phonograph record. The second stanza is from the Salt Water Blues and is like the original except for the repetition in the original of the first two lines. The third stanza is also from the Salt Water Blues, but it is a combination and variation of two stanzas which go as follows:

This girl does not worry over the lack of consistent meaning in the third stanza of her song. Furthermore, as far as she is concerned, “soul” and “mule” rhyme about as well as “fool” and “mule.” The fourth[27] stanza of her song, finally, is taken from Any Woman’s Blues, there having been, however, a slight variation in the second line. The original is:

Thus in a single song we have examples of the processes of borrowing, combining, changing, and misunderstanding through which formal material often goes when it gets into the hands of the common folk. The composite of four stanzas presented above has no very clear meaning in its present form, but at that it is about as coherent as any of the blues from which it was assembled.

Left Wing Gordon, whose story is told in Chapter XII, is a good study in the relation of folk song and formal blues. Left Wing’s repertoire is practically unlimited, for he appears to have remembered everything that he has ever heard. One of his favorite expressions is

This comes from You Don’t Know My Mind Blues, a popular sheet music and phonograph piece today. Left Wing sings dozens of stanzas, some evidently from the published versions, some of his own making, ending each one with “You don’t know my mind,” etc. Nearly all of his songs showed this sort of mixture of formal and folk material.

As an example of the misunderstanding, deliberate twisting of the words of a phonograph blues, or lapse[28] of memory, the following instance may be cited. In the Chain Gang Blues this stanza occurs.

A Southern Negro on a chain gang recently sang it thus:

Examples of this kind might be multiplied indefinitely, but these will suffice. In the notes on the songs in the various chapters of this book will be found comments bearing upon the relation of formal blues and folk songs.

Thus it is clear that in many cases there is a complex inter-relation and interaction between the folk song and the formal production. But the tendency has been on the whole for the latter to get further and further away from folk sources. Few authors now attempt to do more than imitate certain features of the old-time blues. In order to understand more clearly the present situation, it is necessary to consider for a moment the blues as they are manufactured today.

There are at least three large phonograph companies which give special attention to Negro songs. They will be designated herein as “A,” “B,” and “C.” The following table, compiled from data obtained from the general “race record” catalogs of these three companies, gives an idea of the importance of the blues.

[29]

In this table only those titles including the word “blues” have been counted as blues. If the term were expanded to include all songs which are now popularly known as blues, it would be found that upwards of seventy-five per cent of the total number of secular songs listed in the catalogs would fall in this class. The “A” catalog bears the title, “A” Race Records—The Blue Book of Blues; the “B” catalog follows titles like Oh, Daddy, Brown Baby, Long Lost Mama, etc., with the explanation, “blues song” or “blues record”; and the “C” catalog bears the title, “C” Race Records—The Latest Blues by “C” Colored Artists. Certainly the popular notion among both whites and Negroes now is that practically every Negro song which is not classed as a spiritual is a blues. The term is now freely applied to instrumental pieces, especially to dance music of the jazz type, and to every vocal piece which, by any stretch of the imagination, can be thought of as having a bluish cast.

A survey of the titles in the three catalogs mentioned above yields some interesting data concerning the nature of the formal blues. For one thing, there are sixty or seventy titles of the place or locality type. Southern states and cities figure prominently in this[30] kind of blues, although the popularity of Northern localities is on the increase. The favorite states are Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Texas, and Virginia. The chief titles for these states are as follows:

• Alabama
• Alabama Blues
• Birmingham Blues
• Mobile Blues
• Selma Bama Blues
• Bama Bound Blues
• Georgia
• Atlanta Blues
• Decatur Blues
• Georgia Hunch
• Georgia Blues
• Louisiana
• Lake Pontchartrain Blues
• Lou’siana Low-down Blues
• New Orleans Hop Scop Blues
• New Orleans Wiggle
• Shreveport Blues
• Mississippi
• Mississippi Blues
• Ole Miss Blues
• Mississippi Delta Blues
• Texas
• Dallas Blues
• Houston Blues
• Red River Blues
• Waco Texas Blues
• Seawall Special Blues
• Virginia
• Virginia Blues
• Hampton Roads Blues
• Norfolk Blues

There are also, to name only a few others, Arkansas Blues, Florida Blues, California Blues, Carolina Blues, Omaha Blues, Michigan Water Blues, Memphis Blues, Tulsa Blues, St. Louis Blues, Salt Lake City Blues, Wabash Blues, and Blue Grass Blues. Finally there are foreign titles, such as London Blues and West Indies Blues. Titles, of course, are not to be taken as accurate indices of the contents of the songs. As a matter of fact, most of the songs bearing titles of the locality type really deal with the relation of man and woman.

Another feature of the formal blues is their tendency to specialize in certain slang expressions. “Sweet[31] mama,” “sweet papa,” “daddy,” “jelly roll,” and a few other expressions have been thoroughly popularized among certain classes, white and Negro, by the blues songs. By actual count, titles containing one or more of the words, “mama,” “daddy,” “papa,” “baby,” constitute twenty-five per cent of the total number of secular titles in the catalogs referred to above.

It is to be expected that a very large proportion of these present-day blues (using the term now in the broad sense as it is popularly used) deals with the relation of man and woman. In fact, if the locality types, most of which are based on the love relation, and the “mama-papa” type were eliminated from the count, there would be a mere handful left. The following titles will give some impression of the nature of the songs which deal with the man-woman relation.[21]

• Leave My Sweet Papa Alone
• I’ve Got a Do-right Daddy Now
• Mistreated Mama
• Slow Down, Sweet Papa, Mama’s Catching up With You
• Sweet Smellin’ Mama
• Black but Sweet, O God
• How Do You Expect to Get My Lovin’?[32]
• He May Be Your Man, but He Comes to See Me Sometimes
• Changeable Daddy
• Go Back Where You Stayed Last Night
• How Can I Be Your Sweet “Mama” When You’re “Daddy” to Some One Else?
• You Can Have My Man if He Comes to See You Too
• That Free and Easy Papa of Mine
• You Can’t Do What My Last Man Did
• Mistreatin’ Daddy
• If I Let You Get Away With It Once You’ll Do It All the Time
• Daddy, You’ve Done Put That Thing on Me
• I’m Tired of Begging You to Treat Me Right
• My Man Rocks Me With One Steady Roll
• Do It a Long Time, Papa
• No Second Handed Lovin’ for Mine
• I Want a Jazzy Kiss
• I’m Gonna Tear Your Playhouse Down
• Beale Street Mama
• Big Fat Mama
• Lonesome Mama
• You’ve Got Everything a Sweet Mama Needs but Me
• If You Don’t Give Me What I Want I’m Gonna Get It Somewhere Else
• Mama Don’t Want Sweet Man Any More
• If You Sheik on Your Mama
• Mean Papa, Turn in Your Key
• Take It, Daddy, It’s All Yours
• How Long, Sweet Daddy, How Long?
• You Can Take My Man but You Can’t Keep Him Long
• Can Anybody Take Sweet Mama’s Place?[33]
• You Don’t Know My Mind
• Baby, Won’t You Please Come Home?

Then there are innumerable miscellaneous titles and sentiments. One may have the Poor Man Blues, Red Hot Blues, Through Train Blues, Railroad Blues, Crazy Blues, Stranger Blues, Don’t Care Blues, Goin’ ’Way Blues, Bleedin’ Hearted Blues, Cryin’ Blues, Salt Water Blues, Mountain Top Blues, Thunderstorm Blues, Sinful Blues, Basement Blues, House Rent Blues, Reckless Blues, and even the A to Z Blues. Here again however, titles are misleading, for practically all songs bearing such titles really deal with the man-woman theme.

It may be worth mentioning that the majority of these formal blues are sung from the point of view of woman. A survey of titles in the “A,” “B,” and “C” catalogs shows that upwards of seventy-five per cent of the songs are written from the woman’s point of view. Among the blues singers who have gained a more or less national recognition there is scarcely a man’s name to be found.

It is doubtful whether the history of song affords a parallel to the American situation with regard to the blues. Here we have the phenomenon of a type of folk song becoming a great fad and being exploited in every conceivable form; of hundreds of blues, some of which are based directly upon folk productions, being distributed literally by the million among the American people; and the Negro’s assimilation of these blues into his everyday song life. What the effects of these processes are going to be, one can only surmise. One thing is certain, however, and that is that the student of Negro song tomorrow will have to know what was[34] on the phonograph records of today before he may dare to speak of origins.

Whether the formal blues have come to stay or not, it is impossible to tell at present. Possibly they will undergo considerable modification as the public becomes satiated and the Negro takes on more and more of the refinements of civilization. That their present form, however, is acceptable to a large section of Negro America is indicated by the fact that the combined sales of “A,” “B,” and “C” blues records alone amount to five or six millions annually.

The folk blues will also undergo modification, but they will always reflect Negro life in its lower strata much more accurately than the formal blues can. For it must be remembered that these folk blues were the Negro’s melancholy song long before the phonograph was invented. Yet the formal songs are important. In their own way they are vastly superior to the cruder folk productions, since they have all of the advantages of the artificial over the natural. They may replace some of the simpler songs and thus dull the creative impulse of the common Negro folk to some extent, but there is every reason to suppose that there will be real folk blues as long as there are Negro toilers and adventurers whose naïveté has not been worn off by what the white man calls culture.

The plaintiveness of the blues will be encountered in most of the songs of this volume. It is present because most of the songs were collected from the class of Negro folk who are most likely to create blues. In the next chapter certain general songs of the blues type have been brought together but the note of lonesomeness and melancholy will be struck in the songs of the other chapters as well, especially in those dealing with jail and chain gang, construction camp, and the relation of man and woman.

The blues par excellence are, of course, to be found in those songs of sorrow and disappointment and longing which center around the love relation.[22] But the song of the “po’ boy long ways from home” who wanders “down that lonesome road” is rich in pathos and plaintiveness. The wanderer is not unlike the old singer who sang,

Typical of the lonesome note in the present-day songs of the wanderer are the following lines:

In the “Annals and Blues of Left Wing Gordon”[23] will be found something of the story of one representative of all those black folk who sing down the lonesome road. Left Wing had traveled the lonesome road in at least thirty-eight states of the union. His type is legion. Here is another whose parents died before he was eight years of age. Thence to Texas, and Louisiana, across Mississippi to Georgia, then down to Florida, back through South Carolina to his home state, North Carolina. Abiding there shortly, thence to Maryland and Washington, to St. Louis, thence to Ohio, thence to New York, back to Philadelphia, across again to Ohio, then the war and camp, and armistice and more travels, with periods of “doing time.” Then back again to the lonesome road.

Nowhere is self-pity in the plaintive song better expressed than in the forlorn Negro’s vision of himself, the last actor in the wanderer drama, folks mourning his death, hacks in line, funeral well provided for.[37] Sometimes reflecting on his hard life, he pictures his own funeral!

Perhaps he will jump into the sea or off the mountain or lay his head on a railroad track. Then folks will miss him and mourn his tragic end. He feels that he has more than his share of trouble and hard luck. Sometimes he sings that he cannot keep from crying:

The following songs show this note of hard luck, weeping, and self-pity:

[38]

[40]

The old line, “po’ boy ’long way from home,” is still a favorite. In the Negro’s songs and stories of wanderings, home and father and mother are themes of constant appeal, apparently much in contrast to the[42] Negro’s actual home-abiding experiences. The old spirituals sang mostly of the heavenly home of dreams and ideals as opposed to the experience in which “this ol’ world been a hell to me.” In his wanderer song of today the Negro’s wish-dream to be back home appears an equally striking contrast. Nowhere in the workaday songs is childlike and wishful yearning so marked as in these constant songs of homesickness and of the desire for something that is not.

Always accompanying the singer’s dreams of home is his contrasting forlorn condition in the present hour. It would be difficult to find better description of situations than that in which he pictures himself as tired and forsaken on the lonesome road. Parts of this picture may be gathered from the following lines taken here and there from his songs:

[43]

A variety of songs of home or home-folk, of surcease from work, will be found wherever Negroes sing. This fact is recognized by the publishers of blues when they advertise, “These blues will make every Negro want to hurry back home.” The plaintive longing for home, alongside expressions of weeping and self-pity, is the theme of most of the following songs of the road:

[45]

There is this fortunate circumstance which contributes to the completeness and vividness of the Negro portraits as found in workaday songs: the whole picture is often epitomized in each of several characters or types of singers and their songs. Thus the picture may be viewed from all sides and from different angles, with such leisure and repetition as will insure accurate impressions. One of these types is the “po’ boy long way from home” singing down “that lonesome road,” as represented in the previous chapter. Whether in his ordinary daily task, or on his pilgrimages afar, or in the meshes of the law, this singer approaches perfection in the delineation of his type. Another type is that to be found in the story of Left Wing Gordon as presented in Chapter XII, and of John Henry in Chapter XIII. Likewise, the songs of jail and chain gang, the songs of women and love, and the specialized road songs all embody that fine quality of full and complete reflection of the folk spirit in the Negro’s workaday life and experience.

There is perhaps no type, however, which comes more nearly summarizing certain situations, experiences, and backgrounds than the Negro “bad man,” whose story will make an heroic tale of considerable proportions. In many ways the “bad man from bad man’s land” is a favorite. He is eulogized by the youngsters and sung by the worker by the side of the road. One preacher even described Christ as a man who would “stand no foolin’ wid.” “Jesus such great man, no one lak him. Lord, he could pop lion’s head[48] off jes’ lak he wus fryin’-size chicken an’ could take piece o’ mountain top and throw it across the world.” And as for that other bad man, “Nicotemus,” why Jesus, when he got through with him, had him following behind a donkey like any other slave.[27] There was that other young Negro who “was no comfort to preacher, but was a hawk like pizen. Mens like him and wimmin belonged to him wid his winnin’ ways.” In a previous volume[28] we pointed out some of the characteristic experiences and modes of the Negro bum, “bully of this town,” Railroad Bill, Stagolee, Brady, and the others, of twenty years ago. Since that time the tribe has apparently not diminished and flourishes well in the atmosphere of modern life, migration, and the changing conditions of race relations. Of the statistical and environmental aspects of the Negro criminal much will be reported in another study.[29] In this chapter we are concerned with the portrait of a type, perhaps inexorably drawn into the maelstrom of his day and turned into an inevitable product. He is no less an artist than the wanderer, the “travelin’ man,” or Left Wing Gordon. He is the personification of badness mixed with humor, of the bad man and the champion of exploits. We have already referred to the Negro who “wus so mean wus skeered of hisself,” competitor to that other one whose

There were still other companions to these in Slippery Jim, Slewfoot Pete, and Ann-Eliza Stone, “mean wid[49] her habbits on” and breaking up the “jamboree.”[30] A common phrase, indeed, threatened always to “break up dis jamboree” in exchange for slighting one’s “repertation.”

Many are the bad men, and vivid the descriptions. Said one, “Lawd, cap’n, take me till tomorrow night to tell ’bout dat boy. Eve’ybody skeered uv him. John Wilson jes nachelly bully, double j’inted, awful big man, didn’t fear ’roun’ nobody. Would break up ev’y do he ’tended. Go to picnic, take all money off’n table. Couldn’t do nothin’ wid him. Seen feller shoot at him nine times once an’ didn’t do nothin’ to him, an’ he run an’ caught up wid feller an’ bit chunk meat out o’ his back, ... but one man got him wid britch loader an’ stop ’im from suckin’ eggs.”

We have found no black bad-man ballads superior to the old ones, Railroad Bill, Stagolee, That Bully of this Town, Desperado Bill, Eddy Jones, Joe Turner, Brady,[31] and the others. And yet, the current stories sung on the road are more accurate portrayals of actual characters and experiences, and perhaps less finished songs, less formal rhyme. Take Lazarus, for instance, a hard luck story, portraying something of Negro sympathy, burial custom, general reaction. Here is a character more to be pitied than censured, according to his companions. Listen to three pick-and-shovel men, tracing “po’ Lazarus” from the work camp where he, poor foolish fellow, robbed the commissary camp and then took to his heels. Thence between the mountains where the high sheriff shot him down, back to the camp and burying ground, with mother, wife,[50] brothers, sisters, comrades weeping, attending the funeral, where they “put po’ Lazarus away at half pas’ nine.”

It would be difficult to find a scene and setting more appealing than this ballad being sung by a group of workingmen in unison, with remarkable harmony, fine voices, inimitable manner. “Doesn’t this singing[53] hinder you in your work?” we asked one of the pick-and-shovel men, just to see what type of reply he would make. With first a slow look of surprise, then a sort of pity for the man who would ask such a question, then a “Lawdy-Lawd-Cap’n” outburst of laughter, “Cap’n dat’s whut makes us work so much better, an’ it nuthin’ else but.” And one of the group acted the part of the “shouter” very much like the hearers in the church. He would sing a while, then dig away in silence, then burst out with some exhorter’s exclamation about the song, giving zest to the singing, contrast to the imagery, authority to the story. Once as the singers recorded the shooting of Lazarus, he shouted, “Yes, yes, Lawd, Lawd, I seed ’em, I wus dere”; and again when they sang of his mother weeping, “Yes, Lawd, I wus right dere when she come a-runnin’. I know it’s true.” Taken all in all, the sorrowful story of Lazarus, with its painstaking sequence and its melody as sung on this occasion, it is doubtful if ever Negro spiritual surpassed it in beauty and poignancy.

The above version was heard at Danielsville, Georgia. A similar but shorter one, current in North Carolina, is called Billy Bob Russell. “Reason why dey calls it dat is Billy Bob Russell an’ Lazarus been buddies for years, pretty mean boys til dey gits grown. Billy Bob Russell, he’s from Georgia an’ I think Lazarus act sorta like robber or highway robber or somethin’, follow road camp all time.”[32]

[54]

In contrast to the more finished rhyming stanzas of Railroad Bill and the earlier heroic epics, note the simple, vivid ballad-in-the-making type of unrhymed song so common as a type of pick-and-shovel melody. Note the accuracy of the picture, its trueness to actual workaday experience, the phrase description. Such a song in the making and in the rendering defies description or competition as a folk-mirror. Differing somewhat and yet of the same general sort of characterization is the current story of Dupree, versions of which have been taken from Asheville, North Carolina, and various other places in Georgia and North Carolina. One of the most interesting aspects of this Dupree song is that it may be compared with the Atlanta ballad of the white Frank Dupree as popularly sung on the phonograph records. The story of the white culprit warns his young friends in the usual way and asks them to meet him in heaven. His crime was, first, snatching a diamond ring for his sweetheart, then shooting the policeman to death, then fleeing but coming back because he could not stay away from his “Betty.” There is little similarity of expression between the white version and the Negro one. Here is the more finished of the Negro songs.

In striking contrast to the Dupree just given is one sung by a young Negro who had been in the chain gang[57] a number of times and whose major repertoire consisted of the plaintive chain gang songs. Here the singer has translated the version into his own vernacular, varying lines, eschewing rhyme, carrying his story through the regular channels of the prison type. The lines are given exactly as sung, repetitions and irregularities constituting their chief distinction. And yet something of the same story runs through it. It is perhaps a little nearer the Atlanta version, and the singer adds still another interpretation that Dupree and Betty had quarreled and as a result Dupree had killed her and hidden her body in the sawdust. An interesting local color is that Dupree was sent to Milledgeville, Georgia, where as a matter of fact is situated the combined state prison and hospital. Here, then, is the song with its mixed imagery and reflection of a certain mentality.

A popular bad man song of many versions is the Travelin’ Man. No one has ever outdistanced him. A long story, rapidly moving, miraculously achieving, triumphantly ending, it represents jazz song, phonograph record, banjo ballad, quartet favorite, although it is not easy to capture. Three versions have been found in the actual singing, one by a quartet which came to Dayton, Tennessee, to help entertain the evolution mongers; another by Kid Ellis, of Spartanburg, South Carolina, himself a professed traveling man; a third by a North Carolina Negro youth who had, however, migrated to Pennsylvania and returned after traveling in seven or eight other states of the union. The South Carolina version, which is given here, is of the Ain’t Gonna Rain No Mo’ type of vaudeville and ballad mixture.

For the rest of this picture of the bad man the simple presentation of songs and fragments in sufficient numbers to illustrate main types will suffice. His name is legion, and he ranks all the way from the “polish man” to the “boll-weevil nigger,” much despised of the common man of the better sort. Bad men come into peaceful and industrious communities and disturb the peace. They flow in from other states to add to the number of offenders, yet in spite of their numbers and character, the church throng, the picnic, the funeral and other social occasions seem to have much fewer murders and fracases than formerly. If the bad man can be turned into song and verse, with the picture of adventure and romance becoming more and more mythical, the Negro will profit by the evolution. For the present, however, here are samples of the portrayals most commonly sung, with apologies to all improvisators, minstrel artists, and white-folk imitators of Negro verse.

[62]

[67]

[68]

[69]

Not all Negro “bad men” achieve an abiding place in jail or chain gang. Not all Negroes in jail or chain gang are “bad men”—not by long odds. And yet the prison population of the South contains abundant representations of both major and minor Negro offenders, although the indications are that the ratio of Negroes to whites is decreasing rapidly. And if one wishes to obtain anything like an adequate or accurate picture of the workaday Negro he will surely find much of his best setting in the chain gang, prison, or in the situations of the ever-fleeing fugitive from “chain-gang houn’,” high sheriff or policeman. “I ain’t free, Lawd, I ain’t free,” sings the prisoner who bemoans the bad luck in which he had “nobody to pay my fine.” Never did the old spiritual, as in “Go down, Moses, tell ol’ Pharaoh, let my people go,” express more determined call for freedom than the Negro singer behind the bars. Yet the Negro prisoner combines admirable humor with his wailing song:

This chapter makes no approach to the study of the Negro criminal. That will be done in the scientific inquiries which are now being made at length and in later studies of the Negro bad man. What the chapter attempts is simply to give further pictures of the Negro workaday singer as he is found behind prison bars, or with ball and chain, or in humorous workaday retrospect or prospect of experiences what time he pays the penalty for his misdoings. For these prison and road songs, policeman and sheriff epics, jail and chain[73] gang ballads constitute an eloquent cross-section of the whole field of Negro songs. Many are sung even as the ordinary work songs; others are improvised and varied. One may listen to high-pitched voices, plaintive and wailing, until the haunting melody will abide for days. The prisoners sing of every known experience from childhood and home to “hard luck in the family, sho’ God, fell on me.” One youngster about twenty-one years of age, periodic offender with experience on the chain gang and in jail, sang more than one hundred songs or fragments and the end was not yet. They cannot be described; selections are not representative. And yet, listen for a while:

Once on the gang or in the jail continuous song is not unusual. Waking folk with song in early morning, chanting after meal time, plaintive in the evening, the Negro lives over his past life, gives expression to his feelings, and plans the new day, “standin’ on rock pile with ball an’ chain,” or “standin’ on rock pile, with hammer in my hand.” He sings of past days, sorrows that some other man will get his girl, boasts a woman in the white man’s yard—

Sometimes he is more cheerful and sings, “cawn pone, fat meat, all I gits to eat, better’n I git at home,” “Rings on my arms, bracelets on my feet, stronger’n I has at home!” And with bunk for a bed and straw for his head, he sings, “baby, baby, let me be.” How could he help falling into the hands of the officers anyway?

[75]

The songs that follow will illustrate further the Negro’s story of his prison life, his desire for freedom, his efforts to escape, his attitude toward the policeman, jailer and sheriff, and his humorous interpretation of various situations in which he finds himself. Vivid pictures they are.

[78]

[82]

In the Negro’s prison songs is revealed again that dual nature which sings of sorrowful limitations alongside humorous and philosophical resignation. Here are scenes of the lonesome road illuminated by entertainment of rare quality. “I’m in jail now,” he sings,[85] “but jes’ fer a day.” “I ain’t got no parole, but I’m a-comin’ back.” It is true that he has only corn bread and fat meat to eat but that’s “better’n I has at home.” And then with genuine humor he sings also of the iron cuffs about his hands which also are “stronger’n I has at home.”

[87]

In the old days—and sometimes in more recent years—there were characteristic and unforgettable scenes of groups of Negroes singing in the fields. Here was a picture of late afternoon in the cotton field, the friendly setting sun a challenge to reviving energies; rows of cotton clean picked, rivalry and cheerful banter, faster picking to the row’s end, sacks and baskets full for weighing time; group singing, now joyous, then the melancholy tinge of eventide, Swing Low, Sweet Chariot, Since I Laid My Burden Down or Keep Inchin’ Erlong. Another picture is vivid: A spring morning, a few Negroes following mule and plow, many chopping cotton to the accompaniment of song, all making rhythm of song, movement, and clink of hoe resound in rare harmony, duly interspersed with shouts and laughter. Or the morning yodel or “cornfield holler,” with its penetrating vibrato, Ya-a-ee-ah—oo-a-ee-ou—indescribable either in words, sound, or musical notation.[41] Or wagons lumbering on cold mornings, drivers and workers on the way to field or mill, songs echoing across the hills. And there were the other group scenes: the roustabouts on the levee, the singers around the cabins, the groups in the kitchen. Many of these scenes, of course, in modified form may yet be found and songs of their setting are still to be heard, but they do not constitute the most commonly abounding characteristic workaday songs of the present.

[89]

Modern scenes, however different, are no less impressive. Whoever has seen a railroad section gang of five score Negroes working with pick and shovel and hammer and bars and other tools, and has heard them singing together will scarcely question the effectiveness of the scene. Likewise steel drivers and pick-and-shovel men sing down a road that is anything but “lonesome” now. Four pickmen of the road sing, swinging pick up, whirling it now round and round and now down again, movement well punctuated with nasal grunt and swelling song. Another group unloading coal, another asphalt, another lime, or sand, sing unnumbered songs and improvisations. Another group sings as workers rush wheelbarrows loaded with stone or sand or dirt or concrete, or still again line up on the roadside with picks and shovels. And of course there are the songs of the chain gangs already described, but nevertheless gang songs of the first importance. All these singers constitute the great body of workers and singers who sing apparently with unlimited repertoire. The selections in this chapter, as in the others, are representative in that they were taken directly from Negro singers and workers in the South during 1924 and 1925.

Among the most attractive of all the Negro workaday songs are those sometimes called “free labor gang songs,”[42] of which there are many. Some of these are reserved for Chapter VII in which many miscellaneous examples of songs to help with work are given. Other samples have been included in the “Songs of the Lonesome Road.” Examples of the melodies are given in Chapter XV. It will be understood, of course, that other songs such as John Henry,[90] Jerry on the Mountain, Lazarus, are sung in this capacity, although classified primarily in other groups for the sake of better illustration.

[94]

The mind of the worker and wanderer is perhaps reflected better in his annals of the day’s work as expressed in his “captain” songs than anywhere else. Some of the “captain” songs have been sung until they are on the verge of folk songs; some approach the haven of the blues, and many more are in the formative stage. The examples immediately following in this chapter are combinations of all three, with the predominating mode that of combination and improvisation. Some of them are clearly songs of the chain gang as well as of free labor construction work. That they are fairly accurate portrayals of the worker and his task, of the captain and his ways, of the thoughts and customs of the worker and singer will be evident to any one who knows the field. To the uninitiated the laborer is merely a laborer, silent, reserved, certainly keeping back from the white man his innermost thoughts, wishes, and feelings. But hear him sing—hear him repeat the formal songs, hear him make new ones.

But after all there are no workaday songs superior to the gang songs, heave-a-horas, steel-driving songs, short pick-and-shovel songs, and the scores of other short specimens which accompany special tasks requiring hard work, team unison, or continuous effort. There is, of course, no attempt here to present even an approach to exhaustive lists. We have so far found no intimation of where the number of such songs will stop. But the examples which follow are adequate to continue the portraiture of the Negro as he works and as he sings.

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Turning from the songs of construction or railroad gangs, some of the mixed songs, partly remnants of former years, partly products of sophistication, may be cited. There are many songs about the white man and the captain, excellent samples of which have already been cited in this chapter. Some were given in The Negro and His Songs and many more are to be found. Indeed, songs about the white man may well constitute a separate chapter in a later volume. A stock joke among the older Negroes used to be that of telling how the white man always brought “nigger out behind.” The modern singer, albeit not always in joking mood, still thrusts “at” his “captain” or “boss” or “white man.” “Captain,” he sings, “you look mo’ lak farmer than railroad man,” and with considerable glee asks, “Captain, captain, where’d you come frum?” On the other hand, reminiscent of farm days and echoing current life, he still sings:

In another song the Negro complained that no matter if he worked all the time, “Boss sho’ bring nigger out behin’.” So now in some Georgia scenes he sings:

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In some respects it is unfortunate that classification of the Negro workaday songs must be attempted, for, strictly speaking, accurate classification is not possible. There is much overlapping apparent in most of the best types. There are mixed pictures in the majority and a cross index would be necessary for any sort of complete analysis. And yet the total picture is clearer when the songs are grouped according to prevailing themes, as has been done in other chapters on the wanderer songs, the bad man ballads, chain gang and jail songs, favorites of the construction gang, songs of woman, songs of man, and religious remnants. In each of these classes it is readily seen that there is abundance of new material of great value. And yet, after these attempts at classification, there are scores of songs, some the favorites of the present day, some among the most attractive, which appear best as simple work songs, sung as an integral physical part of the Negro’s workaday efforts. These songs are not simply the “miscellaneous” and “all others” group. They are more than that; they are the songs for song’s sake, expression for expression’s sake, and “hollerin’ jes’ to he’p me wid my work.”

This chapter, therefore, presents a varied group of songs, many of which, for simple spontaneity, imagery, and creative art might well represent the choice of the collection. Among these are the lyric types like those quoted in Chapter I, figures of a “rainbow ’round my[119] shoulders,” the “feet rollin’ lak a wheel,” the winter song in summer, and many other fragments of similar quality. There are fragments, pick-and-shovel songs, driving songs, mostly short, which are sung perhaps more often than any others by the group of workers. This chapter will present, first, some of the miscellaneous and more artistic songs that are most difficult to classify except as “just songs to help with work.” Then will follow certain types, corruptions from blues, jazz and minstrel, but sung on any and all occasions, one as well as another, in the kitchen, on the road, in the field, in the alley, in the barber shop, or on the street. Then, finally, there will be the group of incoherent words and lines, senseless for the most part and merely expressive of feeling and effort. In addition to these there are still more than one hundred miscellaneous songs, improvisations, fragments and other collected items which must await a special collection of this sort.

One of the most attractive of all the work songs is Mule on the Mountain, in which the title constitutes the bulk of the song. It is a pick-and-shovel favorite repeated over and over with variations and exclamations. The simplest form of this song is as follows:

In the following version this simple stanza has taken seven others for companions, thus making a lengthy pick song.

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Very much after the same manner and type is the pick-and-shovel song, Lookin’ over in Georgia, which apparently has nothing specific as its historical base and no more sense to it than Mule on the Mountain. And yet it is one of the prettiest of Negro songs when accompanied by group movement, rhythm, and harmony.

For sheer artistry, however, one would have to search a long time to find a superior to the following verses, sung by a young Negro workingman, on platform and swing, washing the brick walls of a newly constructed university building.

Scarcely less mixed and informal is the delightful song Shoot that Buffalo sung in low undertone suitable to any sort of work such as digging, cutting, laying rock, unloading coal or gravel, or doing domestic duties. The melody of this “song just to help with work” is presented in Chapter XIV.

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One of the bad man songs listed in Chapter IV was Dupree, of which two versions were presented. The following song was sung by a young Negro recently from the chain gang. It purports to be a song made up by Dupree while in prison. As a matter of fact it is a composite jumble composed largely while being sung. It illustrates well the general situation in which any song of any sort will do just as well as any other.

Another illustration of the common promiscuity of these current songs adapted as a part of the physical effort of work is the following mongrel song of the self-styled bad man who mixes metaphors and lines to his own satisfaction.

The selections that follow are typical of the large number of miscellaneous songs of almost every imaginable mixture and variety. They are examples of corruptions and also of the song-making process and of the insignificance of words and meaning in the workaday song.

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There is probably no theme which comes nearer being common to all types of Negro songs than the theme of the relation of man and woman. It is the heart and soul of the blues. The Negro bad man is often pictured as being bad because of a woman. The jail and chain gang songs abound in plaintive references to woman and sweetheart, and the worker in railroad gang and construction camp often sings to his “cap’n” about his woman. Likewise, in the songs of woman, man plays the leading rôle. These man and woman songs are of such significance that special attention must be given to them as a type of Negro song in order to round out the picture of Negro workaday life which this volume is trying to present. In this chapter and the one following, therefore, there have been brought together examples of songs which deal primarily with the relation of the sexes.

Conflicts, disagreements, jealousies and disappointments in the love relation have ever been productive of song. They are the chief source of “hard luck” songs or blues, and the Negro’s naïve way of singing of his failure and disappointments in love is what has made the blues famous. Sometimes his songs portray vividly, often with a sort of martyr-like satisfaction, his difficulties with women. At times his song is defiant. At other times it is merely a complaint. Again, it is despondent, in which case he is going “to jump in the rivuh an’ drown” or “drink some pizen down” or do[136] something else calculated to make the woman sorry that she mistreated him. Some of the “hard luck” stories of the Negro man are told in the following group of songs.

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The Negro man runs true to masculine style when he philosophizes upon the subject of woman. Needless to say, his philosophy is often the result of his failure to get along with the other sex. When he is “down” on womankind the burden of his song is that woman is the cause of most of the trouble in the world. He avows that

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Or he declares that he will never again have anything to do with women:

One of his strong points is giving advice to others in order that they may avoid his mistakes. “Listen to me, buddy,” he says, “let me tell you what a woman’ll do.”

De Woman Am De Cause of It All and the songs immediately following it are typical of the songs of the woman-hater. Dey Got Each and de Other’s Man is as clever a bit of cynicism as one could want.

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The Negro man is at his best when he sings of his “gal” or his “baby.” Sometimes his song is boastful of the qualities of his “gal.” Sometimes he compares the merits of the brown girl and the yellow girl or of the black and the yellow and casts his vote for his favorite color. Again, he sings the story of his courtship, and he counts it a never-to-be-too-much-talked-about experience to have been driven away from his sweetheart’s house by an irate father. In My Jane the lover characterizes his “gal” with enviable terseness and humor.

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Unfaithfulness in love is another great source of song. “Somebody stole my gal” is a common tale, and the sequel, “I’m gonna git dat man,” is equally common. The “creeper,” the man who “fools wid another man’s woman,” is the most despised of all Negro characters. Says the Negro man,

In the following group of songs the man pays his respects to the unfaithful woman and to the “creeper.”

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Woman’s song of man is in most respects parallel to man’s song of woman. Her themes are about the same. She sings of her “man” or “daddy,” of her disappointments and failures in love, of her unfaithful lover, and of her own secret amours.

It will be noticed that woman’s song conforms quite closely to the blues type as it is popularly known today. In Chapter I examples of the “mama” blues titles were given and in Chapter II it was pointed out that the majority of the formal blues of today deal with the sex theme. Furthermore, most of these blues are sung from the point of view of woman. Consequently, as songs that may be remembered and sung from day to day, they appear more acceptable to woman than to man. Perhaps this explains why the influence of the formal blues is encountered so frequently in the kind of songs with which this chapter is concerned. At any rate, it is becoming increasingly difficult to find a song of woman on the man theme which does not show the influence of the popular blues.[70]

Woman’s song of man frequently concerns itself with “the other woman,” the rival in the case. The first two songs given here are only indirectly concerned with man, but they are of interest because they[153] touch upon the “conflict of color” within the Negro community. They are only samples of a voluminous literature of “chocolate” versus “yellow,” or “black” versus “brown,” which is to be found in the songs of the Negro.

Songs like those just given are varied to suit the color of the singer. If the black girl has an off-color rival, she sings that it is the yellow girl who “steals an’ lies,” who “cries an’ begs,” who “can cuss an’ rare,” and so on.

In the next few songs woman sings of her “man.” Her appellations, “my man,” “my daddy,” “sweet papa,” “chocolate drop,” “Black Jack,” and others, are an interesting study in themselves. I’s Dreamin’ of You has simplicity and a note of tenderness which approaches the better type of love song. The other songs are quite crude, but it should be remembered that they are characteristic only of the Negro woman of the lower class.

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But the chief theme in woman’s song, as in man’s, is trouble. Sometimes the dominant note is disappointment:

Sometimes it is regret:

Again the key-note is one of despondency:

And it is usually the “other woman” who is at the bottom of the trouble.

These “hard luck” songs of woman are presented in the next group. It is here that one finds the closest relation between folk songs and the formal blues.

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One of the most interesting of all the Negro’s secular songs is the folk minstrel type. This minstrel song is similar to the original minstrel, in which one or more wandering musicians and songsters travel from place to place rendering song and music with varied accompaniments. Sometimes one singer goes alone, sometimes two, sometimes a quartette. They are entertainers in the real sense that they exhibit themselves and their art with all the naturalness and spontaneity possible. Furthermore, such minstrels are not infrequently ingenious in composing new verses and adapting them to old tunes or to newly discovered ones. Such songs are also well adapted to social gatherings and to various special occasions. They should be distinguished from the black-face type of vaudeville song and the minstrel show, although of course the song of the traveling show must inevitably influence the minstrel type a great deal. For sheer type-portraiture, however, the minstrel Negro and his song must undoubtedly be presented if the whole picture is to be complete.

Typical scenes are the singing on special gala occasions, such as fairs, holidays, and picnics, at resorts of the whites, on the road or on street corners. Such singers also accompany many a patent-medicine man or other street-corner vender of wares. Sung in this way, of course, are many of the ordinary secular creations, but in general the minstrel type is[167] more finished and formal, with more of rhyme and something of the ballad technique, with much of the humor and entertaining qualities implied in its kind. Most of these songs would repay special study on the part of the student of folk songs and ballads who wishes to trace origins and developments. While all the songs we have listed are Negro songs in the sense that they are sung much and regularly by Negroes, with the special artistic expression and manner common to them, they are, of course, often much mixed with similar songs originating elsewhere. In the case of It Ain’t Gonna Rain No Mo’,[77] for instance, the origin of course is a common one, and many of the scores of verses are sung alike by white and Negro minstrels, with only minor distinctions due to manner and situation. And yet of the several hundred verses which are even now extant, some are very clearly of Negro origin, exhibiting something of the Negro’s traditional phrases and his blues. A Negro quartette singing It Ain’t Gonna Rain No Mo’ is undoubtedly singing a Negro song. Among the songs in the previous volume which are adapted to the minstrel type of singing are Railroad Bill, Lilly, Stagolee, Eddy Jones,[78] and some of the more recently composed religious types.

One of the most attractive of all the Negro songs we have heard was That Liar, sung by two elderly Negro men at Columbia, South Carolina, through the courtesy of Dr. E. L. C. Adams. The main part of the song is always chanted by the leader in recitative sing-song very much after the fashion of a sermon when the minister has reached his emotional climax. Then upon reaching the chorus, he suddenly turns into rapid[168] song, accompanied by his companion. They sing the chorus with the usual accompaniment of “Oh” or “Lawd” or “Let me tell you.” The song, with some variations and repetitions, is good for almost an hour’s entertainment. It is also a very good shouting song.

Sung in very much the same way is the War Jubilee Song, itself a type of popular traveling song. It was the favorite of the same two singers, both noted songsters of the Columbia environs, and they claimed to have learned it from a traveling Negro secretary of the Y. W. C. A., who came from Florida immediately after the World War. Here again the chorus was sung with effective variations, “Now I’m so glad,” or “You know I’m so glad,” or “I declare I’m so glad,” and many others.

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One of the most entertaining songs in all the repertoire of the Negro’s aggregate creations is Mr. Epting, sung by four Negro pick-and-shovel men with such zest and harmony as we have rarely heard. It is apparently a parody on the war song Good Morning, Mr. Zip, and with this particular quartette of workers would make a hit on any stage. In the singing, the largest member of the group dances a jig and exclaims in his big bass voice, “Lawd, Lawd, I feels funny when I sings this song. Lawd, Lawd, I can’t keep still, it gives me such a funny feelin’. Whoopee! Singin’ ’bout white man gives me funny feelin’.” In addition to the verses sung here the singer may substitute for whiskey and cocaine such words as gun, woman, policeman, work, and other forces which may be calculated to lead to the demise of these slanderers of Mr. Epting.

The old song Raise a Rukus Tonight is now a popular one in various forms, those given here representing Georgia, Tennessee and North Carolina. There are many other versions and fragments, but these will suffice to indicate the type and mixture so common at present. One may easily see the similarity to the old song but also its corruption by such modern types[173] as It Ain’t Gonna Rain No Mo’. Wring Jing, while not a “rukus” chorus, is so much of the same sort as to make its comparison of value. The other much varied and corrupted types are also valuable for comparative purposes.

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There are many songs of the mule, some of which are old and being revived, some of which have been made new by the phonograph records. The first illustration here was sung with remarkable effect at the Dayton, Tennessee, Scopes trial, with hundreds of whites and Negroes standing around the quartette of Negroes[177] who came for the occasion. Most of their songs were of the stereotyped sort, such as Ain’t Gonna Rain No Mo’. The mule song is the best illustration of the minstrel type given in this volume. The other mule songs are presented largely for comparison, and are not particularly valuable. One of these, exhorting Miss Liza to keep her seat, is similar to the version collected twenty years ago in Mississippi.[80]

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Other songs which are current through the singing of the minstrel type, or distributed widely on printed sheets in much the same way as the “mule” songs, are No Coon But You, De Co’t House in De Sky, and[183] Hi-Jenny-Ho, sent us by Mr. J. D. Arthur of Tennessee. The Pullman Porter is a little more sophisticated, but represents a type of humor and easy-going vaudeville style.

Many a laborer, although singing his full quota of secular songs, still finds his workaday solace best in his favorite heritage of church and religious melodies. There is surcease of sorrow in the plaintive

And the appeal for relief from present difficulties, so eloquently expressed in the previous chapters, finds its counterpart in this favorite of many workers of the present day.

There seems to be an impression abroad to the effect that the making of Negro spirituals stopped long ago. On the contrary, it is quite probable that more spirituals are being made today than during the days of slavery. As a matter of fact the old spirituals have never been[189] static. It is no longer possible to speak of the “pure” or “original” version of Swing Low, Sweet Chariot, of Roll, Jordan, Roll, or any other of the old favorites. If any one is in doubt of this, let him compare the words and music of the spirituals as they were recorded by Allen and others in 1867 with the records of the same songs later made by Fenner and Work and with the recent versions in James Weldon Johnson’s Book of American Negro Spirituals. Or let him compare the songs as they are sung at Hampton with the same songs as they are sung at Tuskegee or at Fisk. The spirituals, like all other folk songs, are dynamic. Sometimes in the process of constant change there appear variations which are so unlike the parent songs as to constitute virtually new songs. In this way the old spirituals have been the inspiration for untold numbers of new religious songs.

Among the lowly Negro folk of the South the making of spirituals is still a reality. Every community has its “composers.” Often they are supposed to possess some special gift of the “spirit.” From sermon, prayer, and crude folk wisdom they draw ideas and inspiration for their compositions. Sometimes the results are pathetic, but not infrequently there springs up a song which would compare favorably with the old spirituals.

It is not the purpose of this chapter to present the old spirituals or merely their newer variations, but rather to give some of the more unsophisticated religious songs of the workaday Negro as they are sung today in the South, by the same groups and individuals whose songs and verbal pictures this volume presents. They are not the kind of songs which are usually sung in the Negro churches, for many of them have only individual or local significance, while others show distinct secular touches.

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Biblical themes continue to find a place in the Negro’s religious songs. Moses and Pharaoh and Noah and the ark are still the favorites. Here are a few of the workaday religious songs now current in the South. Pharaoh’s Army Got Drownded is a favorite with children, and is often sung by them as a sort of reel. The three songs following it were sung by a woman in Georgia who is known locally as Sanctified Mary Harris. She claims that they are her own compositions and says that she composes only when she in “under de spirit.”

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