Cecelia Conway's African Banjo Echoes
John Garst
it does, part of which is to analyze a lot of factors to reach the
conclusion that white banjo players in certain mountain areas belong to a
continous tradition reaching back to pre-minstrel blacks of the piedmont
and coastal plain. This thesis contrasts with the suppositions that the
mountain whites learned banjo from minstrel shows, from post-minstrel
black railroad laborers, or from post-minstrel traveling medicine shows.
I think that Cece's arguments are sound, and I understand that Joe Wilson
has even more data pointing to the same conclusion, which I independently
favor from much more cursory considerations.
Earlier, I had posted what I thought were 3 weak areas of the
Africa-America banjo link (as far as I knew about it):
(1) No American instruments with round necks and tension loops.
(2) No African instruments with flat fingerboards and peg-heads.
(3) No African clawhammer playing.
Item 1: Cece reproduces a detail from the painting Liberty Displaying the
Arts and Sciences, Samuel Jennings, 1792, which may show a round-necked
banjo. This has been reproduced also in earlier works (e.g., Epstein).
Cece also mentions a couple of minstrel drawings (apparently not in her
book) in this connection. Perhaps there *are* American examples of
round-necked instruments.
Item 2: Not addressed in Cece's book.
Item 3: Not addressed adequately in Cece's book, IMHO. There are modern
African players of banjo-like instruments with round necks and tension
loops for tuning, and these players use the backs of nails in something
like the clawhammer style, but the ones that I have seen and heard don't
play with the "beating" hand motion of clawhammer and their music lacks
the characteristic rhythm of clawhammer banjo, being more nearly formless
(or having a much more complex form) rhythmically. My impressions of
African playing of proto-banjoes are gained from the Tennessee Banjo
Institute (TBI; the 2nd, I think), where 2 griots performed, and from one
or two sound recordings that I have. One of the griots at the TBI
accompanied his recitals of history with a proto-banjo, and the other
played intricate, complex pieces, including a piece especially composed
for the TBI. Neither of these men produced music that I would consider to
be similar to American clawhammer banjo playing, and neither used hand
motions that resemble clawhammer either. My impression of their
downstroking was that it was a downward flick of a finder, not a motion of
the hand. I also think that they mixed in up-picking and used two fingers
(and thumb) (I could easily be wrong on both of these latter points).
Cece's remarks on African playing are limited and seem to be based largely
on an article that I have not yet read (M. T. Coolen, Western Folklore 43,
1984, 117-134). "Beating" is said to be a term used today by Wolof
musicians to describe their playing of the halam (a proto-banjo), and it
is also used in American as a name for clawhammer playing, but nothing
I've seen or heard of African playing justifies that description very well
for me. Cece's discussion of African tunings give no detailed examples at
all, but it does mention that the "black" tuning is preferred by many
Braknas musicians because it "allows 'for more spectacular effects while
[the white tuning] is closer to the Arab tradition.'" The recognition of
separate musical traditions, Arab (Muslim?) and other (central Africa?)
makes me wonder whether or not what I have heard reflects the "Arab"
tradition and whether or not there are other African proto-banjo-playing
traditions that I've not heard but that are closer to American clawhammer
banjo playing.
Plausible (?) hypotheses:
(1) Flat fingerboard/peg-head instruments first appeared in the New World,
inspired (possibly) by guitar construction.
(2) The thumping clawhammer technique developed in the New World as a
method for accompanying rhythmic dancing with flat-fingerboard banjoes.
*********************************************************************
John Garst ga...@sunchem.chem.uga.edu
*********************************************************************
Laws of Tradition: (1) Nothing is ever lost.
(2) Nothing ever stays the same.
Dmarts
Galfridus Viridus
ga...@sunchem.chem.uga.edu (John Garst) wrote:
> <4fodcu$5...@agate.berkeley.edu>s...@hera.EECS.Berkeley.EDU (Steve Goldfield)
> ...
> > Just wanted to add that it seems unlikely to me that the guitar
> > is the source of the flat fingerboard since guitars were not
> > common, to my knowledge, until much later. Bob Flesher's
> > 1850s banjo has a flat fingerboard, and I wonder if anybody
> > had seen a guitar in those days.
>
> The flat fingerboard was already present in "strum-strumps" in Jamaica by
> 1701 (drawing given by Sir Hans Sloan, illustrated in Conway, p 172, and
> many other places). Cece also shows a "Creole-bania" from Dutch Guyana
> (now Surinam) from before 1772. This instrument appears to have a flat
> fingerboard, but I'm not absolutely certain from the picture. It is
> interesting that it is called a "Creole" instrument. Nowadays, at least,
> "Creole" denotes an established cultural mix. Is the implication that
> this is an instrument of Creole people or that the instrument itself is
> "Creole"?
>
> Why do you think that slaves didn't have guitars to look at in the
> Carribean and South America in the 17th and 18th centuries?
Certainly likely. Guitars were much more popular in Spain and her colonies
at the time than in the English-speaking world. Guitars moved into U.S.
popular culture in the 19th and 20th century due to contact with European
and Latin American culture. It's likely that slaves, many of whom were
coming from the Carribean by the late 17th to 18th centuries, would have
had earlier contact with guitars than most in the U.S., especially the
Celts and other North Europeans that settled in Appalachia.
John Garst
> In article <garst-12029...@garst.chem.uga.edu>,
> ga...@sunchem.chem.uga.edu says...
...
> >(3) No African clawhammer playing.
> [snip]
> >Item 3: Not addressed adequately in Cece's book, IMHO. There are modern
> >African players of banjo-like instruments with round necks and tension
> >loops for tuning, and these players use the backs of nails in something
> >like the clawhammer style, but the ones that I have seen and heard don't
> >play with the "beating" hand motion of clawhammer and their music lacks
> >the characteristic rhythm of clawhammer banjo, being more nearly formless
> >(or having a much more complex form) rhythmically. My impressions of
>
> A well-reasoned argument, John. I am a little troubled by some underlying
> assumptions (or what I assume to be assumptions). Are you suggesting that
> because we can't make an direct African-American connection, that the
> banjo's origins must lie elsewhere, say with white folks?
No, but I would like to see certain areas of the chain of evidence strengthened.
From Steve Goldfield's post about Bill Evans' work, it sounds as if Evans
has done extensive relevant work with African proto-banjo techniques.
Paul Mitchell
from her text, (and signing copies!), tomorrow at 4PM in the Bulls Head
Bookstore at the Univ.
Paul
==============================================================================
Paul Mitchell email: pa...@thing.oit.unc.edu
Office of Information Technology phone: (919) 962-5259
University of North Carolina
==============================================================================
John Garst
...
> Just wanted to add that it seems unlikely to me that the guitar
> is the source of the flat fingerboard since guitars were not
> common, to my knowledge, until much later. Bob Flesher's
> 1850s banjo has a flat fingerboard, and I wonder if anybody
> had seen a guitar in those days.
The flat fingerboard was already present in "strum-strumps" in Jamaica by
1701 (drawing given by Sir Hans Sloan, illustrated in Conway, p 172, and
many other places). Cece also shows a "Creole-bania" from Dutch Guyana
(now Surinam) from before 1772. This instrument appears to have a flat
fingerboard, but I'm not absolutely certain from the picture. It is
interesting that it is called a "Creole" instrument. Nowadays, at least,
"Creole" denotes an established cultural mix. Is the implication that
this is an instrument of Creole people or that the instrument itself is
"Creole"?
Why do you think that slaves didn't have guitars to look at in the
Carribean and South America in the 17th and 18th centuries?
*********************************************************************
73770.1500@compuserve.com@compuserve.com
>In article <garst-12029...@garst.chem.uga.edu>,
>John Garst <ga...@sunchem.chem.uga.edu> wrote:
>#>My copy of Cece's book *finally* came in. I love it. It's great for what
>#>it does, part of which is to analyze a lot of factors to reach the
>#>conclusion that white banjo players in certain mountain areas belong to a
>#>continous tradition reaching back to pre-minstrel blacks of the piedmont
>#>and coastal plain. This thesis contrasts with the suppositions that the
>#>mountain whites learned banjo from minstrel shows, from post-minstrel
>#>black railroad laborers, or from post-minstrel traveling medicine shows.
>#>I think that Cece's arguments are sound, and I understand that Joe Wilson
>#>has even more data pointing to the same conclusion, which I independently
>#>favor from much more cursory considerations.
>#>
>#>Earlier, I had posted what I thought were 3 weak areas of the
>#>Africa-America banjo link (as far as I knew about it):
>#>
>#>(1) No American instruments with round necks and tension loops.
>#>(2) No African instruments with flat fingerboards and peg-heads.
>#>(3) No African clawhammer playing.
>#>
>#>Item 1: Cece reproduces a detail from the painting Liberty Displaying the
>#>Arts and Sciences, Samuel Jennings, 1792, which may show a round-necked
>#>banjo. This has been reproduced also in earlier works (e.g., Epstein).
>#>Cece also mentions a couple of minstrel drawings (apparently not in her
>#>book) in this connection. Perhaps there *are* American examples of
>#>round-necked instruments.
>#>
>#>Item 2: Not addressed in Cece's book.
>#>
>#>Item 3: Not addressed adequately in Cece's book, IMHO. There are modern
>#>African players of banjo-like instruments with round necks and tension
>#>loops for tuning, and these players use the backs of nails in something
>#>like the clawhammer style, but the ones that I have seen and heard don't
>#>play with the "beating" hand motion of clawhammer and their music lacks
>#>the characteristic rhythm of clawhammer banjo, being more nearly formless
>#>(or having a much more complex form) rhythmically. My impressions of
>#>African playing of proto-banjoes are gained from the Tennessee Banjo
>#>Institute (TBI; the 2nd, I think), where 2 griots performed, and from one
>#>or two sound recordings that I have. One of the griots at the TBI
>#>accompanied his recitals of history with a proto-banjo, and the other
>#>played intricate, complex pieces, including a piece especially composed
>#>for the TBI. Neither of these men produced music that I would consider to
>#>be similar to American clawhammer banjo playing, and neither used hand
>#>motions that resemble clawhammer either. My impression of their
>#>downstroking was that it was a downward flick of a finder, not a motion of
>#>the hand. I also think that they mixed in up-picking and used two fingers
>#>(and thumb) (I could easily be wrong on both of these latter points).
>#>
>#>Cece's remarks on African playing are limited and seem to be based largely
>#>on an article that I have not yet read (M. T. Coolen, Western Folklore 43,
>#>1984, 117-134). "Beating" is said to be a term used today by Wolof
>#>musicians to describe their playing of the halam (a proto-banjo), and it
>#>is also used in American as a name for clawhammer playing, but nothing
>#>I've seen or heard of African playing justifies that description very well
>#>for me. Cece's discussion of African tunings give no detailed examples at
>#>all, but it does mention that the "black" tuning is preferred by many
>
>I had an interesting talk with Bill Evans last night. Bill's
>dissertation focuses precisely on this kind of link with a lot
>of emphasis on African playing. Unfortunately, Bill, who is
>playing banjo with Dry Branch Fire Squad and undoubtedly has
>other irons in the fire, doesn't know when or whether he's
>going to finish it. Bill, incidentally, is working toward a
>Ph.D. in ethnomusicology from UC Berkeley. If and when Bill
>does finish, maybe we'll have more information on another link
>in the historical banjo chain.
>
>Just wanted to add that it seems unlikely to me that the guitar
>is the source of the flat fingerboard since guitars were not
>common, to my knowledge, until much later. Bob Flesher's
>1850s banjo has a flat fingerboard, and I wonder if anybody
>had seen a guitar in those days.
>Steve Goldfield :-{ {-: s...@coe.berkeley.edu
>University of California at Berkeley Richmond Field Station
What I know about this comes from Robert Palmer's book "Deep Blues",
where he cites African connections with some references - particularly
notes Senegal, as I recall. But to expect any consistent line of development
in a situation of this sort is optimistic at best, given the variety of personal
tastes and sensibilities that must have operated as things happened, I
suspect eventually taken over by the higher technology and more effective
design (in some ways) of commercial instruments.
Dave Sanderson
Jeff Titon
> Are there any recordings of her subjects(Dink Roberts,etc) to be released?
Hmm. A student of mine did some fieldwork with Dink about 20 years ago
and made a field tape, which I have somewhere. I think, also, that there
were some recordings available on LPs, but I can't recall just where.
Rounder? Ferrum College? Will check and see. Why didn't Tennessee release
a tape with the book, I wonder. Bet Cece could have supplied a tape if
they'd been willing.
Best to all,
Jeff Titon
John Garst
> Are there any recordings of her subjects(Dink Roberts,etc) to be released?
In the preface to her book, Cece writes (p xxii)
"...From the beginning I have always thought of the film of Dink, the
tapes, and the forthcoming CD - almost entirely black voices and music -
as an indispensable part of this scholarly project...."
This is annotated by a note, which reads, in part
"The CD will be available from Flyright Records and from Appalshop,
Whitesburg, Kentucky. The film and video are available from the author at
1720 Allard Road, Chapel Hill, NC 27514...."
Mrs. Helga Verhoef
and guitar player reports playing with musicians from the Gnoua (sp)
sect. The three stringed instrument played is the Gimbre, a relative to
the primitive pre-banjo.
"They played it just like frailing pr clawhammer banjo, but all down
strokes with the index fingernail, no thumb upstroke. And they played in
the 5 note blues scale, at one point I was able to play unison stuff with
them, I was doing fragmented blues licks.."
--
InHome Health Services For information:
Cost-effective
cognitive enhancement/life extension http://www2.smart.net/~inhome
medications sent directly from Europe. Fax: +31-20-682-4441
Jim Nelson
book that there is a forth coming CD...
Jim
John Garst
(Galfridus Viridus) wrote:
> ...Guitars were much more popular in Spain and her colonies
> at the time than in the English-speaking world. Guitars moved into U.S.
> popular culture in the 19th and 20th century due to contact with European
> and Latin American culture. It's likely that slaves, many of whom were
> coming from the Carribean by the late 17th to 18th centuries, would have
> had earlier contact with guitars than most in the U.S., especially the
> Celts and other North Europeans that settled in Appalachia.
So, is it reasonable to suppose that flat-fingerboard/peg-head instruments
(banjoes), otherwise patterned after round-necked African proto-banjoes,
were first made in the Carribean, and that the Carribean (not Africa) is
the direct source of these instruments in what is now the U.S.?
There seems to be evidence supporting this hypothesis in the chronology of
instruments discussed in Cece's and others' works. Is there any evidence
that tends to refute it?
Lynn Chirps
See (and listen to) Rounder LP 2016 entitled "Ain't Gonna Rain No More: An
Historical Survey of Pre-Blues and Blues in Piedmont NC".
Artists on this recording are: John Snipes (vocal/banjo), Dink Roberts (vocal/
banjo), Jamie Alston (vocal/guitar/banjo), Wilbert Atwater (vocal/guitar),
Guitar Slim (vocal/guitar), Joe Thompson (vocal/fiddle), & Odell Thompson
(vocal/banjo).
Dink Roberts plays "Little Brown Jug" & "Roustabout". The project was done by
Kip Lornell. The recordings were made in 1974 & 1976.
On another note, does anyone have an address for Flyright? Thanks!
Later,
Chirps Smith
Dmarts
Steve Goldfield
Mrs. Helga Verhoef <inh...@knoware.nl> wrote:
#>A collegue of ours who has spent some time in North Africa and is a banjo
#>and guitar player reports playing with musicians from the Gnoua (sp)
#>sect. The three stringed instrument played is the Gimbre, a relative to
#>the primitive pre-banjo.
#>"They played it just like frailing pr clawhammer banjo, but all down
#>strokes with the index fingernail, no thumb upstroke. And they played in
#>the 5 note blues scale, at one point I was able to play unison stuff with
#>them, I was doing fragmented blues licks.."
#>
#>--
#> InHome Health Services For information:
#> Cost-effective
#> cognitive enhancement/life extension http://www2.smart.net/~inhome
#>medications sent directly from Europe. Fax: +31-20-682-4441
Ken Perlman, in his showcase at the Folk Alliance, introduced
"Reuben's Train" by saying that a friend of his had heard what
he was sure was an ancestor of Reuben in Africa; I think in Mali.
Ken said you have three choices: either 78s made their way from
the US to Africa, space aliens landed and taught the tune both
to Africans and Americans, or the tune came from Africa to
the USA.
ghost
>Ken Perlman, in his showcase at the Folk Alliance, introduced
>"Reuben's Train" by saying that a friend of his had heard what
>he was sure was an ancestor of Reuben in Africa; I think in Mali.
>Ken said you have three choices: either 78s made their way from
>the US to Africa, space aliens landed and taught the tune both
>to Africans and Americans, or the tune came from Africa to
>the USA.
(Yeah, its true, I've got something to say about just about everything.
I just can`t help myself. Somebody stop me before its too laaa...aaate....)
My sister, who is very interested in North & Northwest African music
(an ex-SO is a serious on-site collector, she's been to Senegal on one such
trip, she has a lot of friends in the German Senegalese & other German West &
North African emigree communities) says she was playing a tape of some
West African music & said "That's 'Pretty Saro'". I honestly can't
remember "Pretty Saro" from the name, although I might if I heard the tune,
but she used to play on the northern Ohio/southern Michian informal
folk circuit 25 years ago (what there was of one; probably people's
livingrooms) & "Pretty Saro" was one of the songs she played.
She knows the song, & says there is no doubt that it is the
same song on her tape. She always was told it was an American cowboy song.
Well, the only thing we can figure out is that there were a lot of Black
cowboys (there were, too, I've been told about 18% of the cowboys were
newly freed Black men) & that that's how the song got to the American West.
Either that, or they listen to a lot of old American folk records in
West Africa (a check will show much more influence by American blues &
rock&roll).
[Another song that turns up regularily, North African this time, is one with
familiar words to me but an unfamiliar tune. She played a tape & pointed out
the words, which, though in an unfamiliar language, sounded very familiar.
It turned out to be the same text, in a form of Arabic, as a popular Klezmer
song about a big party they're throwing in Heaven, where
"King David will play the harp, Deborah the Judge will be the Dancing Girl
(sexist pigs!!) etc". A long list of familiar names.
The travel of this one is obviously through a shared musical Moslem/Jewish
tradition, & doesn't have any American counterparts that I know of.]
ghost
->(Yeah, its true, I've got something to say about just about everything.
->I just can`t help myself. Somebody stop me before its too laaa...aaate....)
and I even answer my own messages!
->My sister, who is very interested in North & Northwest African music
->but she used to play on the northern Ohio/southern Michian informal
->folk circuit 25 years ago (what there was of one; probably people's
->livingrooms) & "Pretty Saro" was one of the songs she played.
Make that "35 years ago". Dates us both, kinda.
John Garst
(Steve Goldfield) wrote:
> Ken Perlman, in his showcase at the Folk Alliance, introduced
> "Reuben's Train" by saying that a friend of his had heard what
> he was sure was an ancestor of Reuben in Africa; I think in Mali.
> Ken said you have three choices: either 78s made their way from
> the US to Africa, space aliens landed and taught the tune both
> to Africans and Americans, or the tune came from Africa to
> the USA.
I think that there are other quite reasonable choices.
First, this is hearsay. Ken's friend regards the African tune as an
"ancestor" of Reuben, implying that it was noticeably different from
Reuben. Ken's friend needs to provide us with the data, a recording,
perhaps, so that the rest of us can judge the kinship. Recognizing
variants is a peculiarly tough assignment, one where reasonable people
often disagree. Therefore the data are questionable.
Second, kin to Ken's second choice, is the possibility that variants of
this tune were devised independently in both Africa and the west. Reuben
is such a simple tune that I regard this as highly probable.
Dagaertner
maker Lowell Jacobs writing in Banjo Newsletter--maybe ten years ago--
about hearing a variant of the "500 Miles" tune family in Africa. Isn't
Reuben one of this bunch?
Dave Gardner
John Garst
Peter Shenkin
Steve Goldfield <s...@hera.EECS.Berkeley.EDU> wrote:
>Ken said you have three choices: either 78s made their way from
>the US to Africa, space aliens landed and taught the tune both
>to Africans and Americans, or the tune came from Africa to
>the USA.
Here's another possibility: any resemblance is coincidental.
After all, any two songs with only one note in them are bound
to sound fairly similar. :-)
-P.
--
**************** In Memorium, Chubby Wise, 1916-1996, RIP ******************
*** Peter S. Shenkin, Box 768 Havemeyer Hall, Chemistry, Columbia Univ., ***
*** NY, NY 10027; she...@columbia.edu; (212)854-5143; FAX: 678-9039 ***
*** MacroModel home page: www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/chemistry/mmod/mmod.html***
Oldtime1
on the 78 assumptions: some oldtime 78s and minstrelsy influences did
make their way to Africa, Asia and other places far distant from the
source. Jimmie Rodgers was hugely popular in several areas of Africa.
Some twenty years ago Hugh Tracy recorded a stunning praise song for 'ol
Jimmie, two women singing "Chemiroga" behind a dry-style guitar. Hugh met
them walking down a dusty road in Kenya. It was issued here on an
"Original Music" LP, not sure it has made it to CD. The African "high
life" style is based, in part, on imported minstrelsy and this is very
obvious in 1930s recordings made in Africa. In 1980 I was in India with
Southern Music USA (The Whites, Ricky Skaggs, John Jackson and D. L.
Menard's Louisiana Aces). In Madras and Bangalore we met collectors with
oldtime recordings. I knew some 1920s 78s had been issued on the India
Twin label, but assumed they had been pressed there for purchase by
British expatriates in the colonial government. But the label on the
first 78 I saw was in Sanskrit and the music was by Grayson and Whitter!
The point I'm making is that one should not automatically assume that
everything shared with other places and from long ago came here from
there. We can call this "the Irish mistake" because of the common error
of assuming that shared tunes from the last century came here from there.
Yes, some did. But more went there from here and the Irish Celi band is
largely derived from the Virginia Minstrels and the fad that arose after
their 1842 tour of Ireland. Joe Wilson
Peter Shenkin
Oldtime1 <oldt...@aol.com> wrote:
>...But the label on the
>first 78 I saw was in Sanskrit and the music was by Grayson and Whitter!
Then it must have been produced especially for purchase by Brahmin
priests, since Sanskrit is not a spoken language. Sure it wasn't Hindi
or something? If you're referring to the alphabet used (as opposed to
the words spelled out), the term is "Devanagari", which is the name
of the script used for many (but not all) of the Indian languages.
On the other hand, the idea of a pressing of Grayson and Whittier
made especially for Brahmin priests has its appeal. But if the
Brahmins listened to Grayson & Whittier, I wonder what the
untouchables listened to. :-)
Oldtime1
Devanagari. We'd been in Sri Lanka, Thailand and Burma during the four
weeks preceding, places well blessed with alphabets, so my alphabet
learning skills may have been used up. The name is Whitter, not Whittier.
And Grayson's name was Gilliam Banmon, not George as you may have heard.
A dork bootlegging a LP in the 60s guessed his name was "George" and some
of the great scholars of country music adopted his error. My expert on
his name is his mother who wrote letters to the Pension Bureau. Grayson
was the handicapped son of a deceased "Mountain Yankee" Civil War vet and
named for Col. Gilliam of the 13th Tenn. (US) Calvary. Joe Wilson
John Garst
Hubbard) wrote:
> I've been following this thread for a while and haven't seen any
> mention of "Sinful Tunes and Spirituals - Black Folk Music to the
> Civil War" by Dena J. Epstein (University of Illinos Press, 1981).
I think that all of the discussants here are familiar with Epstein's
work. She dug out an enormous amount of useful primary information. This
thread, however, started with Conway's book, which addresses issues not
addressed by Epstein and which integrates much of the earlier work.
Ed Williams
hsitory of the bano or banjar from colonial days to today. The author does a
nice job of working in the psycho-social ramifications of the black minstril
(sp) shows of the 19th century, how whites dealt with the african heritiage of
the banjo, and the relationship of mainstream america to the southern banjo
player. Soory cannot remeber the author's name, check books in print. Epstein
has also published several articles on the history of the banjo and the song
"Dixie". Sorry my file folder on Banjo is at home so I am typing off the top
of my head. I play a tenor banjo to make a racket with!
Ed
In article <Jeff_Titon-05...@cis-ts4-slip9.cis.brown.edu>, Jeff_...@brown.edu (Jeff Titon) writes:
> Eric Hubbard wrote:
>
>> I've been following this thread for a while and haven't seen any
>> mention of "Sinful Tunes and Spirituals - Black Folk Music to the
>> Civil War" by Dena J. Epstein (University of Illinos Press, 1981).
>> The book appears to be well researched, with a fairly long list of
>> banjo-related references dating from 1621-1851, and absent any data to
>> the contrary, presents a pretty clear path from Africa to the Americas
>> for the banjo. However, I'm just a clawhammer-playing geologist by
>> training, not an ethnomusicologist. I'd be interested in hearing the
>> opinions of others regarding this book.
>
> It was the first in-depth assemblage of written evidence on African
> American music in the new world, and it opened the way for much of the
> scholarship that followed. Dena Epstein is a librarian at the University
> of Chicago and I'm sure she'd welcome correspondence on the subject.
>
> Joe, as you say, Asia and Africa are still ethnomusicology's glamour
> spots, but more research is being done in the USA. I'm sure you know the
> work of Portia Maultsby, Melonnee Burnim, et al in African American
> musics. If they haven't dealt much with the banjo it's probably because it
> carries such racist connotations from minstrel days. And I know at least
> three other card-carrying ethnomusicologists besides me who play old-time
> banjo, and next time we get together at a conference we'll make an
> orchestra!
>
> Best to all,
> Jeff Titon
>
> Box 1924 College Station
> Brown University
> Providence, RI 02912, USA
> Phone (401) 863-3234
> FAX (401) 863-1256