Stack O'Lee and 12-bar folk songs before the blues
Joseph Scott
the song that's known under various titles similar to "Stack O'Lee."
Some thoughts:
I think this song about the killing of a Billy Lyons by someone named
Stack O'Lee or similar, over a hat, was initially inspired by the
actual murder of William Lyons by "Stag" Lee over a hat in 1895, as
described in the now well-known 1895 newspaper article about the
murder. That article was only discovered circa the 1970s, after a lot
of colorful speculation had already been invented about this song,
based, I believe, on little real evidence.
I would be very surprised if anyone could present any concrete
evidence that this song existed in any form as of 1894 or earlier, or
that the 19th century individual who happened to be named Stacker Lee
who had a boat named after him, or any other individual whose name
happened to be Stacker Lee, was any inspiration at all to the lyrics
of this song as the first generation of artists to record it sang it.
I know of plenty of evidence that 12-bar chord progressions were
already popular in folk music during about 1895-1902 ("Railroad Bill,"
"The Bully," "Frankie"...), whereas I know of virtually zero evidence
supporting the proposition that so-called "blues" songs were already
known as of about 1895-1902. I think the so-called "blues" songs as
such arose for the first time during the 1900s decade (probably around
the middle of the decade), and I think that, as far as studying 1890s
music is concerned, it is misleading and anachronistic to refer to
"Stack O'Lee" (or "Railroad Bill" or "The Bully" or "Frankie" or...)
as a so-called "blues" song. (Of course, as the decades went by during
the early 20th century, many pre-blues-era songs had the word "Blues"
tagged on to them some of the time by some people, including this
song.)
I think the variation in texts and music for "Stack O'Lee" has been
exaggerated by some writers. Consider these recordings:
"Stagolee" by Blind Jesse Harris (born circa 1880s)
"Original Stack O'Lee Blues" by Harvey Hull (prob. born 1889) and Long
"Cleve" Reed
"That Bad Man Stackolee" by David Miller (born 1893)
"Stack O'Lee Blues" by John Hurt (born circa 1893)
"Stagolee" by Jesse Fuller (born 1896)
"Stackalee" by Frank Hutchison (born 1897)
"Billy Lyons And Stackolee" by Furry Lewis (prob. born 1899)
None of these are what could roughly be called an "8 bar blues." All
of these are variations on basically the same _12-bar_ song, a song
that is not lyrically about "having the blues." Basically the song as
Hurt and Lewis did it, would be the gist of it. (If I remember
correctly, Lewis recalled that he learned the song from a considerably
older local guitarist.) I know of no reason to believe that Jesse
Harris and Jesse Fuller ever even knew of each other's existence, and
if you take the individual touches out of each of their performances,
look at what their performances have in common, what you get them both
boiled down to is the same basic 12-bar "Railroad Bill"-ish ballad
about a bad man named Stack O'Lee that Miller, Hurt, etc. knew.
We'll probably never know how any unrecorded ragtime pianist was
playing this tune in 1897, but to the extent that it's worth
speculating about the matter at all, I would suggest that a person
playing this song in 1897 would most likely have been using a 12-bar
progression similar to I-I-I-I-I-I-IV-IV-I-V-I-I or
I-I-I-I-III-III-IV-IV-I-V-I-I, or either of those with ...V-V-I-I
rather than I-V-I-I -- similar to the way "Railroad Bill" was usually
played by the earliest-born musicians -- and a melody similar to the
recordings above.
Best wishes to all,
Joseph Scott
Mike Knudsen
(Joseph Scott) writes:
>At his new website, Ed Berlin raises some interesting questions about
>the song that's known under various titles similar to "Stack O'Lee."
>Some thoughts:
Would this song be related to the modern "Stagger Lee" (Stag-O-Lee?), an 8-bar
song by Ray Charles or someone who sounded a lot like him?
The chords go I-I-IV-IV-I-I-V-V-I-I/V.
The lyrics concern two guys shooting dice in an alley, who get into a near (?)
fatal argument.
"....when I heard my bulldog bark / He was barking at two men who were gambling
/
In the dark."
and later
" ... oh please don't take my life! / I've got three little children and a very
sickly wife."
I never thought of this as a blues, but it may have evolved from the old song.
--Mike K.
Oscar loves trash, but hates Spam! Delete him to reply to me.
Joseph Scott
There were a number of versions of the song done in a general
8-bar-blues vein during the 1950s and 1960s. The R&B pianist
Archibald, aka Leon Gross, was reportedly the first to record the song
using that approach, in 1950. His version preserves the III chord
leading into the IV that was common in old 12-bar folk versions of the
song, which makes me think his is more closely related to the old folk
versions than some of the other R&B versions, because III was
apparently never at all popular in the "blues-as-such" tradition,
rural or urban, and III had fallen from popularity in "black"
I-IV-V-related music more generally long before 1950, was very much a
ragtime-era/bad-man-ballad-era chord.
I don't think the notion of "8 bar blues" as such became very popular
until roughly 1930. (Chord progressions similar to I-I-IV-IV-I-V-I-I
go well back into the 19th century in "black" music, but they seem not
to have become closely associated with "blues" songs as such until
roughly 1930.) Archibald was born in 1912, and I think his approach to
the song probably represents a chordal _"compromise"_ between the old
12-bar approaches to this song that included III, such as Hull-Reed's,
and the stereotypical and crowd-pleasing 8-bar blues approach as
pianists knew it during the 1930s-1950s. That is, roughly, I think
it's likely that
I-I-I-I-III-III-IV-IV-I-V-I-I (closely associated with bad man ballads
about events that happened during the 1890s-1910s)
was, some time during roughly the late 1930s-late 1940s period,
"compromised" by someone with
I-I-IV-IV-I-V-I-I (long a fairly popular progression, e.g. used in old
"field hollers," but apparently became closely associated with urban
blues, and thus well-known to urban blues pianists, only during the
1930s, and was very familiar to "R&B" musicians of the 1940s-1950s)
to create the
I-III-IV-IV-I-V-I-I
underlying approach that Archibald took.
Can anyone think of any 8-bar recordings of "Stack O'Lee" made before
1950 (using any progression)? Even the more town-associated versions
-- Ma Rainey's, Johnny Dodds', and so on -- seem to have been 12-bar
back in the 1920s and 1930s.
Can anyone think of any uses of the exact 8-bar progression
I-III-IV-IV-I-V-I-I (with or without little substitutions such as IV7)
dating back to the 1890s-1920s? Not just as part of a longer
progression, e.g. a 16-bar progression that ends with those particular
8 chords, but a tune that uses just those 8 chords to make up a
strain. If anyone can, that will provide an interesting counterexample
to my speculative "compromise" theory about the 8-bar "Stack O'Lee"s
of circa the 1950s.
Best,
Joseph Scott
ggeorge
Mike Knudsen
writes:
>The "someone who sounded like Ray Charles" was Wilson Pickett.
OK. About when did he record that, and how did he spell the title on the
label?
Stagger Lee, Stag-o-Lee, or what? Thanks, Mike K.
Mike Knudsen
>Can anyone think of any uses of the exact 8-bar progression
>I-III-IV-IV-I-V-I-I (with or without little substitutions such as IV7)
>dating back to the 1890s-1920s?
The only song that comes to my limited mind with a III-IV change is "Freight
Train, freight train, going so fast". In the section "Don't you tell which /
train I'm on." No idea how old that is, though I'm sure Peter, Paul and Mary
didn't originate it :-)
In G, the III chord is B or B7, a relaly great chord on a guitar...
I can think of more songs where the IV drops to the III, as in "Workin on the
Railroad."
Anyway, thanks for a serious answer to my question.
--Mike K.
Joseph Scott
> Train, freight train, going so fast". In the section "Don't you tell which /
> train I'm on." No idea how old that is, though I'm sure Peter, Paul and Mary
> didn't originate it :-)
The '50s-'60s folkies learned "Freight Train" from Elizabeth Cotten;
she said she wrote it when she was young, that is around 1910 or a
little earlier.
Joseph Scott
ggeorge
Ed Berlin
variations on "Stack-a-Lee”, my intention was to document early
ragtime’s participation in the long line of musical treatments
of that frequently-told story; that ragtime might, in fact, represent
its earliest documented treatment. Reader comments focus mostly on
the story's origins, which is understandable; our chances of learning
something of Charles Lee's music are exceedingly slim, whereas there
seems to be much available information about the story.
However, having done no original research on the story and little
reading, I have no insights to share; I have simply directed readers
to websites of possible interest. (Unfortunately, the site that
contains the _St. Louis Globe-Democrat_ story is frequently off line
because it exceeds its allocated bandwidth.) Peter Muir, an
outstanding blues scholar, suggested that I look at George M.
Eberhart’s "Stack Lee: The Man, the Music, and the Myth" in
_Popular Music and Society_, 1997. I have not yet consulted that
article, but anyone interested in the story might check it out; it may
address some of the very issues that have been posted and discussed
here. (It's always wise to check out what others have written before
starting on new research.)
Another writer, Guillaume de Lyons, points to a flaw in the essay that
follows the reprint of the 1895 Globe-Democrat article: he finds
implausible the suggestion that Lee Sheldon might have assumed the
name "Stag" in order to identify himself with an earlier, legendary
villain of that name. The coincidence is too great that Sheldon and
his supposed historical prototype "Stag" should both kill men named
"Billy Lyons". Guillaume de Lyons writes: "Est-ce que possible
d’accepter sans question que les deux hommes ont les mêmes noms
dans la légende et dans l’incident à St. Louis? C’est un
ensemble des élèments—une conjoncture--très difficile à
croire!"
I cannot fault de Lyons' logic, but still wonder how such a
non-exceptional incident in 1895 could have spawned a legend and
musical treatment in such a short time, a mere 20 months later.
Perhaps the Eberhart article has some answers.
Mike Knudsen
EdBe...@optonline.net (Ed Berlin) writes:
>The coincidence is too great that Sheldon and
>his supposed historical prototype "Stag" should both kill men named
>"Billy Lyons". Guillaume de Lyons writes: "Est-ce que possible
>d'accepter sans question que les deux hommes ont les mêmes noms
>dans la légende et dans l'incident à St. Louis? C'est un
>ensemble des élèments une conjoncture--très difficile à croire!"
I agree, but since "Guillaume" means "William" hence "Billy", why didn't Mr. de
Lyons comment on both dead men bearing *his* name as well? I would expect that
to get him somewhat excited, and informing distant friends and relatives that
despite the song, he was still alive and writing!
Perhaps that's why Mr. de Lyons wrote his article in the first place. --Mike
Don Kirkman
<5b1c85b6.02120...@posting.google.com>:
I'm probably not adding much if anything to the knowledge of the music
itself, but B. A. Botkin, _A Treasury of American Folklore_, [Crown
Publishers, New York, 1944], pp. 122 - 130, has a lot on the Stackalee
legend/myth, including the words and the lead line of an undated and
uncredited song. There are over two pages of lyric variations; the
first run through follows.
[Begin]
It was in the year of eighteen hundred and sixty-one
In St. Louis on Market St. where Stackalee was born.
Everybody's talkin 'bout Stackalee.
It was one cold and frosty night
When Stackalee and Billy Lyons had one awful fight
All about an old Stetson hat.
Stackalee got his gun; Boy, he got it fast!
He shot poor Billy through and through; the bullet broke a lookin
glass.
Oh, oh, Lord, Lord, Lord
Stackalee shot Billy once; his body fell to the floor.
He cried out, "Oh, please, Stack, please don't shoot me no more.
Oh, oh, Lord, Lord, Lord.
"Have mercy," Billy groaned. "Oh, please spare my life;
I've got two little babies and an innocent wife."
Oh, oh, Lord, Lord, Lord.
[End]
The tune, in Eb, looks like a simple rag song to me, with little
syncopation and not much chord movement, but then I'm not a musician.
Maybe someone with access to the book can compare the music to the known
versions and come up with some clues. Unfortunately, I have the book
but not the other versions.
FWIW, IIUC Edna Ferber named a steamboat "Stackalee" in _Showboat_;
whether that's the source of the story about a steamboat, or if she
based her fiction on a real circumstance I know not.
--
Don
don...@covad.net
Joseph Scott
In the context of 1890s-1900s "black" folk music, in which ballads
about murderers and bad men and women in general were very popular, I
think the appeal of Sheldon's story would have been that he was such a
bad man that he would kill a man over refusing to hand him back his
hat -- that's pretty bad!
Imo more important than which variant of "Stack O'Lee" a ragtime
pianist would have been playing in the 1890s (although I enjoyed
speculating about it) is the fact that the newspaper accounts seem to
treat improvising variations on a fairly well-known folk song
(well-known enough that readers are assumed to know the song) as not
particularly unusual as of the 1890s. This is interesting given that
so many jazz fans assume that improvising was uncommon prior to the
rise of so-called "jazz" (whatever that quite is) during the
'00s-'10s. I believe that improvising was fairly common in U.S. folk
music of the late 1800s, and it was a particular _approach_ to
collective improvisation that became increasingly popular in New
Orleans and some other cities during the '00s-'10s and well-known to
the nation as a whole during the late '10s and early '20s as "jazz." I
think if we had a recording from say 1916 of a ragtime pianist
improvising variations on "Stack O'Lee," the jazz enthusiasts would
accept it (rightly or wrongly) as so-called "jazz" recorded before the
ODJB!
Best,
Joseph Scott
Ed Berlin
> Hi Ed and all,
> <snip>
> Imo more important than which variant of "Stack O'Lee" a ragtime
> pianist would have been playing in the 1890s (although I enjoyed
> speculating about it) is the fact that the newspaper accounts seem to
> treat improvising variations on a fairly well-known folk song
> (well-known enough that readers are assumed to know the song) as not
> particularly unusual as of the 1890s. This is interesting given that
> so many jazz fans assume that improvising was uncommon prior to the
> rise of so-called "jazz" (whatever that quite is) during the
> '00s-'10s. I believe that improvising was fairly common in U.S. folk
Of course. Anyone who thinks improvisation began with jazz knows
little about music history. In the case of ragtime, since many
players were non-readers, improvisation would have been the reasonable
approach.
As for variations on a well-known folk song -- part of the appeal of
the variations process is in hearing familiar music taken through a
variety of different settings.
Ed Berlin
Ed Berlin
are not all equally valuable. Although I haven't seen the source you
cite, I have problems with it because it is both too old (from 1944)
and yet not old enough (not from the 1890s, or thereabouts). The
version you quote has come after many recordings have made the folk
song common, yet we don't know what the date of that version is. If
it could be dated as very early, then it would be interesting. But do
we know when Billy Lyons enters the Stack-a-Lee story? Was it before
1895, or after?
If I were seriously researching this story, I would go to the latest
*scholarly* treatment. Though being recent is no guarantee that a
study is good, a current study that *is* good would take into
consideration all that preceded it. Reading it, then, could save hours
. . . maybe years . . . of stepping in someone else's footsteps.
Ed Berlin
Don Kirkman <spamb...@covad.net> wrote in message news:<lg82vu0vgj3gebl8t...@4ax.com>...
> It seems to me I heard somewhere that Ed Berlin wrote in article
> <5b1c85b6.02120...@posting.google.com>:
>
>
Joseph Scott
> we know when Billy Lyons enters the Stack-a-Lee story? Was it before
> 1895, or after?
What evidence supports the notion that there was any "Stack-a-Lee
story" in existence at all before Lee Sheldon aka Stag Lee killed
Billy Lyons in 1895?
Joseph Scott
Sue Attalla
summer I read another of Benjamin Botkin's books, _Lay My Burden Down:
A Folk History of Slavery_, in which he compiled approximately 300
first-person narratives collected from former slaves during the
1930s--about as recently as one would have the opportunity to do so
since the majority of interviewees were 80+. Botkin was a pro, an
eminent scholar who revolutionized folklore studies.
Slave narratives aren't uncommon today, but we owe much of the thanks
to Benjamin Botkin. For instance, if you haven't done so, take a look
at the extraordinary collection of slave narratives on the Library of
Congress' American Memory website. These were gathered under his
Federal Writers' Project directorship. Consider, too, the caliber of
some members of Botkin's staff, including Sterling Brown, Negro
Affairs Editor, and field researchers Zora Neale Hurston, Dorothy
West, Ralph Ellison, Richard Wright, Studs Terkel, and Saul Bellow.
One could dream of having "flunky" staff like that. In a review of
_Lay My Burden Down_ (published in _Nation_, May 11, 1946), Brown
characterized Botkin's book as a radical departure from past writings
on slavery, which had consistently overlooked black primary sources.
You've seen parallels in ragtime research. Much like you, Botkin
played a major role in correcting this glaring oversight.
Most likely, _A Treasury of American Folklore_ grew either out of the
seminal work accomplished during Botkin's years directing the Federal
Writers' Project or during his stint as curator of the Library of
Congress' Archive of American Folk Song (1942-44). Given the book's
1944 publication date, my hunch would be the former. As a folklorist,
Botkin was committed to gathering material from the field rather than
to drawing it from commercially recorded songs or echoing previous
folklore studies. Considering the range and scope of his numerous
books, he must have frequently edited materials his field researchers
gathered, as is the case with _Lay My Burden Down_. Whoever the
researchers, the likelihood that this is primary source material
counts in its favor. Since he has the book, Don Kirkman can probably
validate or correct my guess about the source of this particular
material.
Those interviewed by Botkin or Federal Writers' Project staff,
admittedly, could have been influenced by years of having heard
variations on "Stack-a-Lee"/"Stagger Lee"/"Stagolee." Furthermore,
Botkin was an innovator, regarding folklore as still in the making,
rather than stagnant and confined to the past. Consequently, even if
the material in the Stack-a-Lee section came from field interviews, we
can't assume interviewers sought out sources uncontaminated by more
modern influences. These interviewers would have been trained to view
the song as a living entity. There's the possible drawback, which you
have pointed out, *perhaps* without being familiar with Botkin's
definition of folklore. On the other hand, some of the elderly (as
yet, hypothetical)interviewees might have heard very early versions of
the song and been blessed with good memories.
I'd vote for pursuing the most recent scholarly studies, as you
suggest, and then judging if those writers have truly done their
homework. However, particularly if Botkin's treatment of the legend
is based on original field research, as is _Lay My Burden Down_, I'd
look at those few pages, too. What are the odds that musicologists
writing about the song haven't read folklorist Botkin?
Sue Attalla
EdBe...@optonline.net (Ed Berlin) wrote in message news:<5b1c85b6.02120...@posting.google.com>...
Ed Berlin
Of course. So let's stop groping in the dark & go read what some
recent scholars have written on the subject. (I hope someone else
does the reading as I don't expect to get a research library any time
soon.)
Ed
Don Kirkman
<4a5469f8.02120...@posting.google.com>:
Sorry, but I couldn't find any place that seemed appropriate to snip
from the above. As you guessed, Botkin at the time of _Folklore_ was
"in charge of the Archives of American Folk Song of the Library of
Congress." The "Stackalee" material is attributed to Onah L. Spencer,
from "Direction," Vol. IV (Summer, 1941), No. 5, pp. 14-17: Spencer and
"Direction" are unfamiliar to me.
Botkin acknowledges the following for their assistance during the four
years of preparation: Paul R. ("Febold Feboldson") Beath, Gertrude
Botkin, Hugo V. Buonagurio, Edmund Fuller, Bertha Kranz, and Charles
Seeger, as well as his publisher, Crown Publishers, and the Library of
Congress.
>Those interviewed by Botkin or Federal Writers' Project staff,
>admittedly, could have been influenced by years of having heard
>variations on "Stack-a-Lee"/"Stagger Lee"/"Stagolee." Furthermore,
>Botkin was an innovator, regarding folklore as still in the making,
>rather than stagnant and confined to the past. Consequently, even if
>the material in the Stack-a-Lee section came from field interviews, we
>can't assume interviewers sought out sources uncontaminated by more
>modern influences. These interviewers would have been trained to view
>the song as a living entity. There's the possible drawback, which you
>have pointed out, *perhaps* without being familiar with Botkin's
>definition of folklore. On the other hand, some of the elderly (as
>yet, hypothetical)interviewees might have heard very early versions of
>the song and been blessed with good memories.
It appears, from the Spencer attribution, that the field work was done
by Spencer prior to 1941, and not by Botkin as part of his collecting.
>I'd vote for pursuing the most recent scholarly studies, as you
>suggest, and then judging if those writers have truly done their
>homework. However, particularly if Botkin's treatment of the legend
>is based on original field research, as is _Lay My Burden Down_, I'd
>look at those few pages, too. What are the odds that musicologists
>writing about the song haven't read folklorist Botkin?
I think Ed Berlin's response to my post was to the point; my thought was
that, perhaps, the Botkin material might elicit comparisons or provide
clues to better-validated materials, or at the very least provide some
enjoyable reading for anyone so inclined.
As a matter of fact I had intended my response to be rather more general
than it seemed from my adding it to Ed Berlin's message; it certainly
was not intended to apply directly to what he had written but to the
thread topic in general.
On the other hand, Sue, you have added some meat to the bones and
provided food for thought. :-)
>EdBe...@optonline.net (Ed Berlin) wrote in message news:<5b1c85b6.02120...@posting.google.com>...
>> I expect there are many dozens of writings on Stack-a-Lee, and they
>> are not all equally valuable. Although I haven't seen the source you
>> cite, I have problems with it because it is both too old (from 1944)
>> and yet not old enough (not from the 1890s, or thereabouts). The
>> version you quote has come after many recordings have made the folk
>> song common, yet we don't know what the date of that version is. If
>> it could be dated as very early, then it would be interesting. But do
>> we know when Billy Lyons enters the Stack-a-Lee story? Was it before
>> 1895, or after?
>> If I were seriously researching this story, I would go to the latest
>> *scholarly* treatment. Though being recent is no guarantee that a
>> study is good, a current study that *is* good would take into
>> consideration all that preceded it. Reading it, then, could save hours
>> . . . maybe years . . . of stepping in someone else's footsteps.
--
Don
don...@covad.net
Sue Attalla
> It seems to me I heard somewhere that Sue Attalla wrote in article
> <4a5469f8.02120...@posting.google.com>:
>
>>
> from the above. As you guessed, Botkin at the time of _Folklore_ was
> "in charge of the Archives of American Folk Song of the Library of
> Congress." The "Stackalee" material is attributed to Onah L. Spencer,
> from "Direction," Vol. IV (Summer, 1941), No. 5, pp. 14-17: Spencer and
> "Direction" are unfamiliar to me.
Yesterday I tried a cursory search of Union Lists of Serials and had
more than 2300 hits--every serial title containing the word
"direction." I'm not *that* patient. Today following my last final
exam, I'll try again. Perhaps I'll figure out a way to limit the
search. Unfortunately, I didn't see an "exact title" option.
> Botkin acknowledges the following for their assistance during the four
> years of preparation: Paul R. ("Febold Feboldson") Beath, Gertrude
> Botkin, Hugo V. Buonagurio, Edmund Fuller, Bertha Kranz, and Charles
> Seeger, as well as his publisher, Crown Publishers, and the Library of
> Congress.
Thanks, but those names don't help me except to confirm that we have
no major Federal Writers' Project figures here.
> It appears, from the Spencer attribution, that the field work was done
> by Spencer prior to 1941, and not by Botkin as part of his collecting.
Based on Botkin's citation, you're probably right. An alternative
might be that Spenser lifted her information from an earlier printed
source.
> I think Ed Berlin's response to my post was to the point; my thought was
> that, perhaps, the Botkin material might elicit comparisons or provide
> clues to better-validated materials, or at the very least provide some
> enjoyable reading for anyone so inclined.
I recall earning a C+ on my first critical essay in grad. school
because my sources, several years old, were "too outdated." On the
next paper, I remedied the problem. The professor that irritated me so
much soon became my favorite and eventually my dissertation director.
I, too, agree with Ed's advice but also with your thoughts. If
nothing else, we see the path research has taken.
> As a matter of fact I had intended my response to be rather more general
> than it seemed from my adding it to Ed Berlin's message; it certainly
> was not intended to apply directly to what he had written but to the
> thread topic in general.
Always a potential problem with threaded discussions. One must add
somewhere.
>
> On the other hand, Sue, you have added some meat to the bones and
> provided food for thought. :-)
My guesses were wrong, but my intended point was we shouldn't ignore
Botkin.
To start gnawing away at those bones, I'll try the _Popular Music and
Society article_. I've located the needed date and confirmed that the
issue is available in a library where I'll spend next week. I
probably won't be on the Internet except to communicate with my family
while I'm away; when I return, I'll post a summary of my findings.
Hunting for recent scholarship, I've found a 1976 dissertation that
allegedly presented the information in the _Popular Music and Society_
article, perhaps without knowedge of the author of that article. The
person mentioning the article seems to think the more recent writer
made his discoveries independently, perhaps no more than an assumption
based on not citing the dissertation. Next, it will be interesting
to see if the 1976 study appears in a 1993 dissertation. *Those*
sources are available now. If they're not recent enough, an April
2003 book (a revisiting of the 1993 dissertation) from a major
academic press should do the trick when available. ;-)
Sue Attalla
Sue Attalla
read the _Popular Music and Society_ article on Stackalee/Stagolee,
etc. Beginning late, I intended to read only 5-10 pages, just enough
to get a taste of the 70-page study. "Just another page or two," I
kept telling myself.
As a hint of things to come, the article explains why a seemingly
trivial event prompted a song/or songs, theorizes about the
discrepancy in characterization from one variation to another(Who was
the bad guy, Sheldon or Lyons?), implicates Tom Turpin in an
incredibly complex story, and leads to newspaper accounts that, when
examined shed light on the Stag/Stack confusion.
Btw, the article includes an extensive bibliography, but most
significant are the 1895-1912 newspaper accounts in three St. Louis
newspapers. More later although no summary will do justice to the
detail in the article.
Sue Attalla
Carl Baron
Sue Attalla wrote:
> read the _Popular Music and Society_ article on Stackalee/Stagolee,
> etc. Beginning late, I intended to read only 5-10 pages, just enough
> to get a taste of the 70-page study.
Appreciate if you could give the author, vol, issue, year and page
reference. Thanks.
Carl
Sue Attalla
Apologies for not providing a fuller citatation. I don't have a volume
number handy, but you shouldn't need one. Author, title, journal,
and year appeared elsewhere in the thread and led me to the article.
However, readers don't necessarily retrace the many postings. Also, I
ran into a small problem with the posted year. Here's what you'll
need:
George M. Eberhart. "Stack Lee: The Man, the Music, and the Myth."
_Popular Music and Society_ (Spring 1996) 1-71.
Sue Attalla
Carl Baron
carl
Sue Attalla
related item not directly mentioned in the article. I'll include it
when posting the summary for other newsgroup readers--a task I'll
probably get to Sunday.
Enjoy the article. If I omit anything you regard as important, please
add.
Sue
Carl Baron <cba...@mail.med.upenn.edu> wrote in message news:<3E01F928...@mail.med.upenn.edu>...
Sue Attalla
George M. Eberhart's "Stack Lee: The Man, the Music, and the Myth"
(Popular Music and Society, Spring 1996, pages 1-71). At the end,
I'll add two new items not included by Eberhart.
To set the stage, I'll provide a complete copy of the St. Louis
Globe-Democrat article, appearing on December 26, 1895, not on
December 28, 1895, as reported at
http://blueslyrics.tripod.com/dictionary/stagolee.htm. The shooting
occurred on Christmas.
"Shot in Curtis' Place"
William Lyons, 25, colored, a levee hand, living at 1410 Morgan
street, was shot in the abdomen yesterday evening at 10 o'clock in the
saloon of Bill Curtis, at Eleventh and Morgan streets, by Lee Sheldon,
also colored. Both parties, it seems, had been drinking and were
feeling in exuberant spirits. Lyons and Sheldon were friends and were
talking together. The discussion drifted to politics and an argument
was started, the conclusion of which was that Lyons snatched Sheldon's
hat from his head. The latter indignantly demanded its return. Lyons
refused, and Sheldon drew his revolver and shot Lyons in the abdomen.
Lyons was taken to the Dispensary, where his wounds were pronounced
serious. He was removed to the City Hospital. At the time of the
shooting the saloon was crowded with negroes. Sheldon is a carriage
driver and lives at 914 North Twelfth street. When his victim fell to
the floor Sheldon took his hat from the hand of the wounded man and
coolly walked away. He was subsequently arrested and locked up at the
Chestnut Street Station. Sheldon is also known as "Stag" Lee.
December 26 articles in the Chronicle and Post-Dispatch are similar,
except that the Chronicle is the first to report Lyons' death. On
Dec. 27, the Globe-Dispatch reports that Sheldon had died at 4:00 a.m.
on December 26: The bullet passed entirely through his left side and
so lacerated the left kidney that the organ had to be removed. The
operation was completed at 2 o'clock yesterday morning, and Lyons was
in such an exhausted condition that he was unable to speak, though
partially conscious. He also suffered greatly from loss of blood."
Eberhart opens by quoting from a "Stagger Lee" lyric and telling of
his discovery in the 1980s of a St. Louis newspaper account describing
the shooting--a discovery occurring serendipitously while he
researched another topic. Curious about what he'd found, he turned to
books on popular and folk music and quickly realized other writers
knew nothing of the historic event that apparently inspired the famous
song. Thus, noting that six other murders occurred in St. Louis the
same evening, Eberhart raises questions similar to Ed Berlin's
questions in his online ragtime research forum, which sparked this
thread. Eberhart writes, "But what made this particular murder so
special? Why was it commemorated in a folk song?" As he began
looking for answers, answers led to new questions as they so often do:
Who wrote the music and the lyrics? How did the real Lee Shelton
come to be an archetype of the 'bad' Stacker Lee who kills wantonly
and mercilessly? Why was the incident forgotten? And, most
intriguing, why did so many prominent individuals—including ten
Missouri senators, the attorney who secured his conviction, the judge
who sentenced him, and ten of the twelve jurors who found him
guilty—write letters to the governor of Missouri asking for his
release from prison. With these questions, alone, I think we start to
see the mythic potential of these events.
Eberhart begins with a "The Murder," a section in which he describes
the St. Louis neighborhood known as "the bloody Third District," with
its "saloons, small shops, cheap apartments, and music halls." Using
the St. Louis newspaper reports, Eberhart recounts the events
surrounding the murder, beginning with the arrival of William Lyons
and Henry Crump at Bill Curtis' Elite Club, 11th & Morgan, before
10:00 p.m. Christmas night. The Elite Club, he reports, served as the
headquarters of the Colored 400 Club, and according to a 1901 letter
to Governor Dockery, Lyons had feared getting into trouble there and
had pocketed Crump's knife. Both men had been drinking. Lee Shelton
had arrived earlier. [Newspaper accounts vary considerably in their
reporting of the murderer's name. Sometimes he's Shelton, other times
Sheldon. Sometimes his nickname is Stag, other times Stack.]
News stories disagree about what happened between Lyons and Shelton.
Were they gambling or just talking? Whatever the case, they are said
to have begun striking each other's hats. Lyons is said to have been
wearing a derby, but no account Eberhart found identified Shelton's
hat. If it was a Stetson, the fact wasn't reported. Shelton
allegedly snatched Lyon's derby and "broke it," at which point Lyons
took Shelton's hat. Shelton demanded his hat's return, but Lyons
reached for his pocket (where he had concealed the knife) and replied,
"You cock-eyed son-of-a bitch, I am going to make you kill me."
Seeing the on-coming trouble, many patrons quickly departed, but
Eberhart provides a list of those known to have been present when the
shooting occurred, including Lyons' friend Henry Crump. Following the
shooting, Crump and another man, Arthur McCoy, took Lyons to the
doctor. First, however, Crump retrieved his knife.
Police found Shelton at his girlfriend's place, a "disreputable
resort" at 513 S. Sixth Street. His Smith and Wesson was later
retrieved from the "woman of the house" where it had been hidden in a
drawer.
The bullet had penetrated Lyons' kidney, colon, and stomach. Despite
"a perhaps hasty operation," Lyons died.
Eberhart opens the next section ("Who Were These People?"), by
discussing myths of the song's origin. For instance, John and Alan
Lomax expressed their belief that the event inspiring the song
probably occurred in Memphis." However, in 1973, John Russell David,
a St. Louis University doctoral student, interviewed an elderly black
man who remembered Lee Shelton. This interview prompted David to
search for the newspaper accounts. Eberhart uses these same accounts
and lists them in his references, enabling me to locate them quickly.
As he continues, Eberhart explains the confusion of "Stack" Lee
Shelton with Stack Lee, a Tennessee riverboat captain, for whom a boat
was named Stacker Lee. [Since I'm omitting that interesting story,
anyone wanting to read it will need to look up the complete article in
the Spring 1996 issue of Popular Music and Society.]
Following that explanation, Eberhart turns to what can be proven about
Stack Lee Shelton's background, among other things citing a likely
birth date (March 16, 1865) on his death certificate, a birthplace
(Texas) in his prison record, and an 1887 city directory entry for
"Stack L. Shelton," living at 1314 Morgan Street [This was the same
street, now Delmar, on which we now find the Joplin house museum—2658A
Morgan; in fact, a look at the map on page 90 of Ed Berlin's King of
Ragime will quickly help everyone spot the approximate location of
Shelton's 1887 residence.] Four other directories include entries for
"Lee Shelton." Eberhart devotes a page to Shelton's parents, whom I'm
again largely omitting. One interesting feature of this discussion,
however, is the elderly interviewee's recollection of attending Mrs.
Shelton's funeral with his mother, who had attended the same church.
Shelton was brought from the penitentiary in Jefferson City for the
service.
After discussing possible origins of Stack/Stagger Lee's nickname,
both common on the docks with their smokestacks, stacks of cotton, and
"staggering" (or "rocking") the carried load to lighten it, Eberhart
turns to Lyons, whose death certificate indicates he was born
somewhere in Missouri in 1864. "The key fact of Lyons' life," says
Eberhart, is that his sister Elizabeth was married to Henry
Bridgewater, a prominent saloonkeeper and apparently the rival of
saloonkeeper Bill Curtis both commercially and politically. Lyons was
buried in the Bridgewater plot in St. Peter's Cemetery. The
importance of this family connection between Lyons and Bridgewater
will become clear later.
In a section titled "The Mob," Eberhart discusses a lynch party that
attempted to get its hands on Shelton following Lyons' death. (Again,
this account appears in a local paper.) The members of this group
were identified as part of the "Henry Bridgewater faction," while
Shelton belonged to the Colored 400 Club meeting at Bill Curtis'
saloon where the shooting occurred. These faction names were more
than a means of identifying the regular patrons of the two saloons or
members of two social clubs. The groups were political rivals.
[Recall Lyons' suspicions that he might get into trouble if he entered
Curtis' saloon and the Globe-Democrat article included at the
beginning of this posting: "The discussion drifted to politics and an
argument was started, the conclusion of which was that Lyons snatched
Sheldon's hat from his head."] One newspaper identifies Shelton as "a
negro politician." Another of John Russell David's dissertation
interviewees described Shelton as "a damned Democrat—a worthless
nigger who never did anything for the Negro people." The Republicans,
the party of Lincoln, met at Bridgewater's saloon, and Bridgewater,
himself, is said to have been a social activist and one of the
wealthiest African Americans in St. Louis.
Responding to his brother-in-law's murder, the influential Bridgewater
painted the darkest portrait he could of Shelton, accusing him of
having sworn to avenge a friend's 1892 murder at Bridgewater's
saloon. In that case, the murderer had been William Lyon's
stepbrother. Bridgewater's accusation established a motive for
premeditated murder. [The Globe-Democrat had also reported the
earlier murder.]
The financial secretary wrote a letter to the St. Louis Star in which
he denied Bridgewater's allegations and argued that the 400 Club "was
organized December 6, 1895, for the moral and physical culture of
young colored men" and that members of the group "contemplate no acts
of violence, and as law-abiding citizens and voters . . . stand ready
and willing to protect the laws of our city, State, and the United
States. " Included in the letter is a list of club officers, which
includes "Mr. Lee" as captain. (The St. Louis Star mistakenly lists
Shelton as president.)
Some witnesses claimed Lyons and Shelton were friends, and more than
one newspaper referred to the political nature of their argument. If
they were friends, Eberhart argues, Bridgewater's claim of
premeditated murder seems unfounded, but he thinks that the
politically charged climate in St. Louis could have sparked the
shooting and "also been one reason why this particular murder was
commemorated in song."
Eberhart next discusses Shelton's trials. Shelton was charged with
first-degree murder. Seven months later, still awaiting trial, he was
released on $3,000 bond. Although he was released to a pawnbroker who
put up bond and although one version of the song declared that Stack's
girlfriend raised the money ("'There ain't no trick in the world that
I wouldn't turn to get my Stack out of jail.' Oh, how she loved her
Stack O'Lee."), Eberhart suggests the possibility that the 400 Club
might have raised it during the past seven months and that the verse
about the girlfriend might have been political propaganda intended to
prove that Shelton was a "bad man" with bad friends.
The first trial began in May 1896. Eberhart has found no surviving
trial transcripts, but a hung jury resulted—"seven for murder in the
second degree, two for manslaughter, and three for acquittal." One
version of the song referred to Shelton's lawyer:
Next Monday morning preliminary was tried—
Don't be afraid, Stack, Nat Dryden's by your side.
(The Ballad of Stacker Lee," in Reedy's Mirror, 1919)
Shelton was then released on the same bond, working in saloons until
the second trial. Between trials, his defense attorney died, due to
complications of heavy drinking.
In May 1897, the second trial began in the court of Judge James E.
Withrow, a Civil War Union veteran, a part of Sherman's famous March
to the Sea. Withrow was also regarded as an extremely fair person.
Nat Dryden's friend and associate, Charles P. Johnson, took over the
defense. Lyons' brother-in-law, Bridgewater, hired C. Orrick Bishop
as prosecuting attorney. The most important testimony of the second
trial appears to have come from Henry Crump, the friend who has
accompanied Lyons to Curtis' saloon the night of the shooting. After
the shooting Crump had taken his knife back from Lyons and given a
signed statement to police interrogators that Lyons had not threatened
Shelton with any weapon. From that statement, Shelton appeared to
have acted without just cause. Now the story changed; Crump testified
that Lyons had drawn a knife. C. Orrick Bishop, the prosecuting
attorney, argued against the admission of this testimony, saying that
a witness' testimony shouldn't differ from his statement during
pre-trial questioning. Shelton's defense attorney, Johnson,
countered, arguing that the signed statement wasn't made under oath,
and accused "sneaking detectives" of obtaining "statements by fraud."
Great debate broke out between the attorneys, forcing the sheriff to
step forward, anticipating the need to break up a fight. Judge
Winthrop managed to call the court to order. He overruled Johnson's
objection, stated his opinion that a witness should always tell the
truth, and forbade any further testimony from Henry Crump. Then he
instructed the jury. Two hours and three votes later, the jury
returned its verdict: guilty of second-degree murder. Given the
conflicting testimonies, the jury apparently couldn't agree to a
first-degree murder conviction.
In October 1897, Shelton began his 25-year sentence to the Missouri
State Penitentiary in Jefferson City. In 1899, a series of petitions
and letters requesting pardon began arriving at the Governor's office.
(Eberhart notes that the prison "had a long-standing practice of
recommending for pardon two model convicts, one black and one white"
twice annually. A hundred and thirty nine St. Louisians had signed
such petition, including members of the 400 Club, George N. Vashon
(first black graduate of Oberlin College), Vashon's son (a St. Louis
public schools principal), and Tom Turpin. The second petition was
signed by Shelton's second defense attorney, Charles P. Johnson, two
other attorneys, ten of the twelve members of the second jury, and
several other prominent St. Louis residents. The jury foreman sent a
letter to the governor saying that the jury had reached an agreement
only because he was suffering from a medical condition that kept him
from continuing and that he never considered the verdict just. He
added, "I firmly believe that Shelton was fully justified for shooting
Lyons under the circumstances, and it has been a question in my mind
ever since the trial as to whether Lyons died from the effects of the
shot, or from the operation by unskilled surgeons at the hospital."
Eberhart points out that a trial today would likely have ended with a
very different verdict and that it would probably have ended
differently in 1897 had the accused not been black: "Suppression of
relevant testimony, allegations of malpractice, political motivations
for conviction, a juror who should have been excused for medical
reasons--if the defendant had been a white man, the outcome would
certainly have been different."
Letters to the governor from Bridgewater and Shelton's mother
protested the release, and the governor denied parole. Then, in June
1901, Judge Winthrop, who had sentenced Shelton to 25 years, appealed
to Governor Dockery for a commutation of Shelton's sentence, pointing
out Crump's testimony that Lyons had drawn a knife and threatened
Shelton and arguing that the 6 years Shelton had already served should
suffice. In November 1901, a petition on Shelton's behalf reached
the governor's office from ten Missouri senators and representatives,
and in December 1902 another petition came in from the Negro Jefferson
Club, a revival of the earlier 400 Club. A St. Louis city jailor sent
a letter declaring Lyons the bully, not Shelton. Further pleas
reached Governor Dockery and Governor Folk, Dockery's successor,
claiming that both Shelton and Lyons were normally peaceful, but that
Lyons, not Shelton, had a history of violence when drinking.
Meanwhile, Bridgewater had died, and his wife (Lyons' sister) dropped
the fight against Shelton.
In 1909, C. Bishop Orrick, the prosecuting attorney hired by
Bridgewater, wrote to Governor Herbert S. Hadley, Folk's successor.
Bishop now admitted he would have been content with a 10-year, rather
than 25-year, sentence. (By this time, Shelton had served 12 years
and contracted tuberculosis in prison.) On Thanksgiving, 1909, Hadley
paroled Lee Shelton, ordering him to abide by the laws and get "some
honorable employment."
In January, 1911, Shelton broke the skull of a homeowner during a
break-in. Police apprehended him and returned him to the
penitentiary. His actions were treated as a parole violation, meaning
no need existed for a trial.
On February 8, 1912, Governor Hadley paroled Shelton a second time.
Shelton was in the final stages of tuberculosis, and Hadley knew
Shelton couldn't survive much longer. Shelton died, a month later
(March 12), without having left the prison hospital. Eberhart
reports, "No notice of his death appeared in the St. Louis
newspapers." Society seemed to have forgotten him.
Having told Lee Shelton's story, Eberhart turns to the music,
theorizing that the ballad originated in St. Louis in 1896 or 1897—in
other words, during the trial years. He cites evidence of people who
claim to have learned sung or heard it as early as the late 1890s.
Because lyrics are quite accurate up to the first trial, he guesses
that the first lyrics were written "in the summer of 1896, shortly
before or after the first trial." He points out that he knows of no
variants mentioning a second trial, a second-degree murder conviction,
or parole.
"One possible candidate for the original lyricist" he says, "is some
unknown songwriter who was a member of the Henry Bridgewater faction.
The verses almost unfailingly portray Stack Lee as a bad man who
mercilessly cut down an innocent victim. The words seem designed to
sway popular opinion and ensure See Shelton's conviction at a second
trial." Eberhart supports this opinion with lyrics negative lyrics
gathered by Odum and Lomax and one sung by Ma Rainey.
However, Eberhart also points out versions favorable to Stack Lee, for
instance one cited in David's dissertation:
Stack-o-lee was a good man.
One every body did love,
Everybody swore by Stack,
Just like the lovin' stars above.
Oh, that Stack—That Stack-o-lee.
Similarly, he points out that another lyric cited by Odum depicts
Stack appealing to the judge to spare his life because "I have only
three little children an' one little lovin' wife"—the family
attributed to Lyons in other versions of the song (Journal of American
Folk-Lore, 1911). Interestingly, neither man was known to have been
married, so this must have been a ploy to gain sympathy for one of the
other. Eberhart guesses that the conflicting depictions may have been
created by the rival political factions.
Further, Eberhart suggests the possibility that Bill Dooley, "an
African American lyricist with a knack for writing catch tunes who
flourished in St. Louis in the 1890s." These lyrics are said to
include "Frankie and Johnny, according to Nathan Young—although which
of Young's three sources listed in Eberhart's references one must
guess. Similarly, he suggests that the music probably began as
ragtime. He discusses Babe Connors' Castle Club, a music hall and
bordello that served as a center of ragtime music. He quotes from
Babe's 1899 obituary:
Originality is always praiseworthy, and it should be credited
to the dead woman that many of the songs, the so-called "popular
songs," which are sung to-day in the theaters allover the country,
some of them going so far as the music halls of Europe and even played
as up-to-date selections in the exclusive parlors and music-rooms of
the United States, first were sung in "Babe" Connors's concert hall.
The writer of these songs—could hardly be called the composer—is not
and never will be known. Indeed, the songs were never "written," nor
were they "composed". . . These songs, a tenfold more than the
exponents who rendered them, made Babe Connors's place famous; the
place was not notorious; it was not infamous; it was famous.
Babe Connors' Castle Club, says Eberhart, began "Ta-Ra-Ra-Boom-De-Ay."
Headliner Mammy Lou is also said to have been one of the first to
sing "Frankie and Johnny." Eberhart goes on to make a case for
"Stackolee's origin at Babe Connors'. I'll quote this portion,
substituting numbers for bullets in the original and inserting
bracketed comments:
1. The song has long been associated with "Frankie and Johnny" (based
on another real-life incident that occurred in St. Louis), which
definitely points to Mammy Lou and Babe Connors. At least two of the
extant versions of "Stack O'Lee Blues," by Ma Rainey (1925) and Johnny
Dodds (1938), employ the "Frankie and Johnny" melody to accompany the
Stackolee lyrics.
2. Before he opened his first saloon at 9 Targee Street in 1892, Tom
Turpin played piano at the Castle Club. He was an energetic performer
and an innovative composer of rags whose Harlem Rag (composed 1892;
published 1897) was one of the earliest written specifically for piano
(Berlin, King, 8, 47; Jasen and Tichenor, 29-30). The year before he
opened his soon-to-be-famous Rosebud Bar at 2220-2222 Market Street in
1900, he and his father ("Honest John" Turpin) were signers of a
petition to release Lee Shelton from the penitentiary. An outspoken
Republican on African American affairs whose brother was the first
black man to hold public office in St. Louis ("Chas. H. Turpin";
Berlin, King, 194), Turpin would have had no political motivation for
the Democratic Shelton's pardon (Jasen and Tichenor 28-29; Blesh and
Janis 54-55). It's tempting to speculate that Turpin knew Shelton and
had a hand in popularizing the ballad. [My note: Looking at both
Rags and Ragtime and They All Played Ragtime, I see no clear
connection between the books and Eberhart's political comment.
Nonetheless, his point that Republicans had no political motivation to
support Shelton makes some sense. Why support the opposition party?
On the other hand, might a reason exist? Governor Hadley, who
pardoned Shelton twice, was also a Republican. In Hadley's case, I'm
left wondering if his pardon might, in part, have been an effort to
use the highly publicized legal case to garner Democratic votes. He
was in Roosevelt's camp at the time and was identified very early as a
front-runner for the vice-presidential slot if Roosevelt captured the
nomination at the Republican National Convention in 1912. Hadley was
known for his frequent pardons but was often accused by political
opponents of using these to his political advantage—as using them to
align himself with the Progressives in a state that also had a
candidate seeking the Democratic Presidential nomination the same
year.]
3. Henry Bridgewater was close friends with Babe Connors and was
instrumental in her conversion to Catholicism right before her death
in 1899 (David, 2l "A Notorious Woman"). This relationship alone
points a suspicious finger at Bridgewater as a source for the ballad;
his fulminations about "that bad man, Stack Lee" might well have
inspired one of Babe's songwriters in 1896.
From there, Eberhart goes on to discuss the ballad's spread into New
Orleans and Chicago jazz and its continuing history as part of
Mississippi River and rural Southern African American folk music. He
ends with an extensive reference list and discography (10 pages each)
and three variant lyrics (5 pages).
I'm uncertain of Eberhart's academic background, but he's identified
as "associate editor of American Libraries, the official news magazine
of the American Library Association, in Chicago." He's also credited
as "author of several books and bibliographies, most recently The
Whole Library Handbook 2 (ALA, 1991).
How much of his information was gleaned from David's dissertation is
also unclear. He acknowledges that David located the newspaper
articles, but doesn't say who located the many other marvelous primary
sources, including petitions, letters, and pardon papers, most of
which are housed at the Missouri State Archives.
This summary has become far longer than I intended, but one can only
cut so much from an engrossing article. Despite the length, I can't
resist adding two other items I came across this week. The first is
an excerpt from an extensive mid-1896 article I spotted in a St. Louis
paper. The full article describes life on lower Morgan Street "where
'the best meal on earth' costs a dime and beer is cheap":
If there is anything that Morgan street dislikes it is
conventionality. . . . It scorns imitation. It is original or
nothing, and has formulated an unwritten social law of its own.
Is it not the home of the famous Four Hundred Social Club, and the
habitat of the Hon. Bill Curtis, who runs the most extensive chance
emporium in North St. Louis?
What the late Al McWardister and his followers were to Gotham the
Hon. Bill Curtis and the colored 400 are to St. Louis.
Happy is this city in the fact that death has withheld its destroying
hand from his headquarters and spared to us William and his cohorts.
Though the Morgue and the City Hospital are regularly supplied with
subjects from his headquarters, his popularity never declines, for it
is generally conceded that he is acting as a public benefactor in
allowing undesirable members of colored society to be dispatched in
his place of business.
Not every gentleman would be so accommodating in this respect as the
Hon. Bill.
Would he permit his floors to be stained with the blood of these
social drones if it were not that his great heart is fairly bursting
with magnanimity and unselfish zeal in the cause of good government?
We trow not.
Finally, you may recall that Eberhart points out that St. Louis papers
failed to cover Shelton's death. Jefferson City, state capital and
home of the Missouri State Penitentiary, remembered Shelton:
Lee Shelton, alias Stacker Lee, the negro murderer and
highwayman, who died in the penitentiary Sunday, was twice pardoned by
Governor Hadley, and the state records here show that he was at
liberty at the time of his death in the prison hospital.
Shelton, alias Lee, was convicted in St. Louis of murder in the
second degree and sentenced to a term of twenty-five years in the
penitentiary.
On November 25, 1909, he was made the recipient of a "Thanksgiving
pardon" by Governor Hadley, and his sentence commuted to expire upon
that date, with parole conditions. This commutation was revoked April
3, 1911, and Shelton, alias Lee, was returned to the penitentiary for
highway robbery.
In February 1912, Governor Hadley issued another commutation to the
negro, because he was then reported by the prison physician to be
incurably afflicted with tuberculosis. After the order was issued,
signed and recorded by the secretary of state and delivered back to
the governor, no more was heard of it until the convict's death.
The pardon attorney, Judge Denton, stated at the time, that
another medical examination would be made before the release papers
were delivered to the warden. The governor never issued an order
revoking the communication and so far as the official records are
concerned, the negro has been officially at liberty since February 8,
the date the governor ordered his release to a negro junk dealer in
St. Louis.
The statement in a Republican newspaper that Attorney General
Major refused to recommend the convicts' release "because the governor
had discretion" in the matter, is error.
The statement quoted from Major is the statement he made in the Spaugh
case. In the Stacker Lee case, Governor Hadley in his official order
quoted Attorney General Major as follows. "Cannot sign recommending
parole for the reason the record discloses he has violated his
commutation heretofore granted by the governor."
But the governor issued the order, notwithstanding the statement
of the attorney general, and then failed to release the prisoner.
Someday I hope to tackle the two dissertations mentioned earlier.
Meanwhile, other projects are lined up to fill my remaining three
weeks off from school.
Sue Attalla
satt...@mail.gbronline.com (Sue Attalla) wrote in message news:<4a5469f8.02121...@posting.google.com>...
Joseph Scott
Eberhart wrote:
The song has long been associated with "Frankie and Johnny" (based
> on another real-life incident that occurred in St. Louis), which
> definitely points to Mammy Lou and Babe Connors. At least two of the
> extant versions of "Stack O'Lee Blues," by Ma Rainey (1925) and Johnny
> Dodds (1938), employ the "Frankie and Johnny" melody to accompany the
> Stackolee lyrics.
I don't find this bit of Eberhart's argument convincing. If "Stack"
already existed by the end of 1896 -- and I accept Eberhart's claim
(based on lyrics directly about the first trial) that it very probably
did -- and if we know "Frankie Baker" (aka "Frankie," aka "Frankie And
Albert," also sometimes known from about 1910 on as "Frankie And
Johnny") as such was written no earlier than 1899, that is, the year
Frankie Baker actually murdered Al Britt over "other woman" Alice
Pryor in St. Louis, then how could establishing a connection that was
made by someone at some point between "Stack" and "Frankie" lyrics,
even a hypothetical connection happening as early as 1899, in of
itself provide us with evidence that Mammy Lou or anyone at Babe's was
involved in the way "Stack" sounded during 1896-1898?
Rainey's 1925 "Stack O' Lee Blues" was credited to "Taylor/Williams,"
and was more or less the song "Frankie" as we know it ("he was my man"
etc.) with Mr. Stack grafted into the lyrics -- possibly an original
1920s creation of this Taylor and Williams. (Clarence Williams? Jasper
Taylor??) Dodds' 1938 version was credited to "Spencer" and sung by
O'Neil Spencer, a young jazz drummer who IIRC was of about the same
generation as R&B pianist Archibald. Getting back to the first
generation recorded folk bad-man-balladeers, I just listened to Blind
Jesse Davis, Blind Davey Miller, John Hurt, Frank Hutchison, and Hull
and Reed's versions of "Stack" again and they all sound similar to
each other melodically and structurally and none have any lyrical or
melodic connection to "Frankie" that I could hear. Structurally they
sound more like "Railroad Bill" than "Frankie," not surprising since
the song "Railroad Bill" was probably already in existence back around
1896, unlike "Frankie."
Hmm, that raises a question. Twelve-bar strains were already pretty
common in folk music by the the time the 1890s ended. Can anyone here
name a tune published any time during the 1890s, ragtime or not, that
contains a 12-bar strain with an exact chord progression of either
I-I-I-I-IV-IV-IV-I-V-V-I-I (most common "Frankie" chords) or
I-I-I-I-IV-IV-I-I-V-V-I-I (most common progression for so-called
"Blues" among earliest-born musicians)? To the best of my knowledge,
as of 1898, I-I-I-I-I-I-IV-IV-I-V-I-I would have been better known
than either of those; in my opinion we can place the typical
"Stack"/"Railroad Bill" structural approach in a slightly earlier era
of folk music (as early as mid-1890s) than the usual "Frankie" chords
(first popular during '00s as far as evidence I know of is concerned).
Anyway Sue, that's my thoughts on that particular part of Eberhart's
argument; thanks again for the great summary, season's greetings,
Joseph Scott
Sue Attalla
> Thanks Sue!
No problem. I enjoyed reading the article, and the time spent on the
summary may prove useful a few months from now. Besides, I'm glad
someone waded through it.
>
> Eberhart wrote:
>
> The song has long been associated with "Frankie and Johnny" (based
> > on another real-life incident that occurred in St. Louis), which
> > definitely points to Mammy Lou and Babe Connors. At least two of the
> > extant versions of "Stack O'Lee Blues," by Ma Rainey (1925) and Johnny
> > Dodds (1938), employ the "Frankie and Johnny" melody to accompany the
> > Stackolee lyrics.
>
> I don't find this bit of Eberhart's argument convincing. If "Stack"
> already existed by the end of 1896 -- and I accept Eberhart's claim
> (based on lyrics directly about the first trial) that it very probably
> did -- and if we know "Frankie Baker" (aka "Frankie," aka "Frankie And
> Albert," also sometimes known from about 1910 on as "Frankie And
> Johnny") as such was written no earlier than 1899, that is, the year
> Frankie Baker actually murdered Al Britt over "other woman" Alice
> Pryor in St. Louis, then how could establishing a connection that was
> made by someone at some point between "Stack" and "Frankie" lyrics,
> even a hypothetical connection happening as early as 1899, in of
> itself provide us with evidence that Mammy Lou or anyone at Babe's was
> involved in the way "Stack" sounded during 1896-1898?
This part of the argument didn't convince me, either. Why, for
instance, would Henry Bridgewater's friendship with Babe Connors and
his role in her conversion to Catholicism make it any more likely that
the song originated at her place than at his own? Lyons was
Bridgewater's brother-in-law; therefore, Bridgewater had a special
interest in Shelton's conviction and cause to generate the
anti-Shelton propaganda. Similarly, wouldn't he have a greater
influence on musicians in his own saloon than on those in hers?
Eberhart seems convinced Bridgewater had a hand in the creation of the
song, but ignores the possibility that, if he did, it could have been
first sung in Bridgewater's saloon. One certainly can't say that it
was; equally, one can't say that it wasn't.
Eberhart complicates the Babe Connors'issue by presenting an anecdote
about Paderewski's visiting the Castle Club, learning songs from Mammy
Lou, and declaring of "Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-aye," "That's going to be the
theme of my next composition." Eberhart then adds, "In a season or
two the song, like many others that originated with Mammy Lou, got
into vaudeville by way of some manager who visited Babe's and became a
sensation." This statement leads into his three bulleted reasons for
believing "Stackolee" orginated in the Castle Club. It seems to me
that he wants us to believe that all popular St. Louis songs
originated in one club. A big claim!
Eberhart makes some other questionable assertions. For instance, he
suggests that Bill Dooley had a hand in the lyric. Granted, Eberhart
only suggests this, basing his hunch on an unclear source attributing
"Frankie and Johnny" to Dooley. Eberhart then cites a reference in
David's dissertation to a 1942 _St. Louis Post-Dispatch_ article that
appears to discuss Dooley's selling his songs on the streets for a
dime and dying in Detroit in 1932. I haven't looked at the article
(and, judging from the indirect citation, suspect Eberhart may not
have either). However, like the Paderewski anecdote, this article
doesn't seem relevant to the point he's trying to make about THIS
song's authorship. Similarly, Eberhart seems convinced that
"Stackolee" began as ragtime. I'll supply his full argument here,
which leads into the Castle Club discussion:
The "Stackolee" music most probably originated as a ragtime
composition. St. Louis in the 1890s was the center of syncopated
sound, even before the first ragtime sheet music appeared in 1897.
Though ragtime's origins are both obscure and controversial (rag piano
mmusic may go all the way back to 1870s Philadelphia), St. Louis
offered an ideal location for the fusion of African Ameriican song and
dance with German American piano composition and marches that became
ragtime (Berlin, _Ragtime, 5-31; Jasen and Tichenor 1-27; David
260-70; Southern; Young, Guest, 98-145).
The heart of St. Louis's popular song performance was the famous
music hall and bordello at 212 S. Sixth Street, the Castle Club, run
by Babe Connors . . .
This Philadelphia comment puzzles me. Of the sources Eberhart names,
I have only _Ragtime: A Musical and Cultural History_ and _Rags and
Ragtime_. I see nothing pertinent about Philadelphia in either index,
nor do I recall having read of anything remotely similar to 1870s
Philadelphia ragtime. If anyone knows what this is about and cares to
post an explanation, it would be interesting. I probably should add
that the only Eileen Southern source in Eberhart's references is
"Afro-American Musical Materials," from _The Black Perspective in
Music_ 1 (Spring 1973), and the Nathan Young source is one I've never
come across and that sounds mysterious: A Guest of Honor: A
Re-creation--1999 A.D.; Scott Joplin's 'White-Black' Magic Years in
Texarkana, Sedalia, Chicago & St. Louis, 1868-1908. St. Louis:
Warren H. Green, 1986.
Getting back to Eberhart's argument . . .
Much like the guesses that Dooley had a hand in the "Stackolee" lyric
because he wrote other popular (perhaps topical) songs and that the
Castle Club introduced the song because it introduced others, Eberhart
writes that the song "probably" began as a rag because St. Louis "was
the center of syncopated sound." Not much to go on in any of these
cases. He's a bit more careful with his mention of Tom Turpin: "Its
tempting to speculate that Turpin knew Shelton and had a hand in
popularizing the ballad." Eberhart doesn't quite succumb to this
temptation even though Tom Turpin's signature on one of the petitions
is a stronger connection between Turpin and Shelton than established
between Dooley or Babe Connors and the ballad. If Turpin were
involved with helping popularize Bridgewater's anti-Stack Lee
propaganda, would we then have to ask if Turpin later felt guilty,
experienced a change of heart (much as did the ten jurors, prosecuting
attorney, and judge), and, therefore, signed the petition requesting
Stack's release?
Thanks for the thoughts on Eberhart's argument and for the additional
information and question. Hopefully someone will have an answer. You
might also try posting to the ballad listserv:
<BALL...@indiana.edu>. When I joined recently because I had a
question, I received a flood of replies--several of them supplying
precisely the information I needed.
Sue Attalla
Ed Berlin
the Eberhart article myself later this week. Based on what has been
posted here, I have altered one paragraph and made several other small
changes in the original Stack-a-Lee article on my website. I expect
to add a new Forum subject in a few days.
A question was asked about Nathan Young and his book _A Guest of
Honor: A Re-creation--1999 A.D._. I read the book in 1988; as I don't
have access to it at present, the following is from memory. (I also
commented on Young in _King of Ragtime_, p. 305, note. 23.)
I had several extended telephone conversations with Young in 1988; he
was in his 90s at the time. According to his published vita, he had
graduated from Yale Law School in 1918 and became a judge in St. Louis
at a time when it had to have been unusual for a black American to
attain that position. In retirement, he wrote about African American
figures, especially those involved in music. He claimed to have many
source materials from the ragtime years, and asserted that his book on
_A Guest of Honor_ was based on reports from Ed McKinney, a friend who
had seen the opera. Though I enjoyed our talks, they raised doubts in
my mind and I asked Trebor Tichenor about Young. He told me he had
known Young for many years and had heard the same stories, but Young
consistently refused to show Tichenor any of the materials he claimed
to have.
Young's book _A Guest of Honor_ is unreadable. I forced myself
through it, but the process was painful. From what I had discovered
about the opera & Joplin in my own research, I concluded that the
accounts in the book are unquestionably fiction. A simple example:
Young describes Joplin's father as "a giant of a man"; Joplin
relatives, in interviews, recalled him as being small and slight.
(Young also discusses Stack-a-Lee; I'll have to reread to see what he
had to say on that subject.) The heart of Young's thesis is that the
opera _A Guest of Honor_ had not been lost, but was suppressed by the
Copyright Office because of its radical political nature. Can you
picture it? Clerks at the Copyright Office reading through an opera
to gauge its politics? Besides, we know that Joplin admired Booker T.
Washington, hardly a radical figure on the African American scene at
that time. Young tried to create a Joplin who never was. And as for
his attitude toward evidence: among the characters in the book are
two musicologists (with Jewish-sounding names) whom Young belittles
for their insistence on seeing evidence. In a letter in which I thank
Young for sending me two copies of his book, I comment that, though we
had never met, he describes me well.
Ed Berlin
http://www.edwardaberlin.com/
Sue Attalla
hinted that it dealt with the opera, but since it was cited as a Stack
Lee source, even that much wasn't certain. Thanks for clarifying the
fact. It's good to know, however, that Young was right about
something.
As for the supression of _Guest of Honor_, granted, Booker T.
Washington was about as much of an accommodationist as a successful
black could be at the time. His education at Hampton Institute did
much to shape his outlook and definitely determined his career. Once
at Tuskegee, he knew he had no alternative if he wanted to succeed
against the odds. Nevertheless, if you've correctly theorized in
_King of Ragtime_ that Joplin paid tribute to Booker T. Washington's
famous White House dinner as Theodore Roosevelt's guest of honor (and
I have additional reasons to believe you're right, all of which I hope
will come out someday), grounds *could* exist for claiming radical
political content. Although my lack of time to hunt for my source
might sound like failure to produce the evidence, I came across a poem
on the White House dinner that fits the situation. The inflammatory
piece was published shortly after the dinner, probably in a Little
Rock or other Arkansas newspaper, perhaps a Mississippi paper. I'm
guessing that because I recall finding the poem while reading such
papers at the University of Arkansas. As the author describes the
event, an overwhelming tone of disgust pervades the poem. One line
etched itself in my mind: "Will the White House ever be clean again?"
Copyright clerks aren't likely to have read the opera, for political
content or any other reason, but might some racist at the Library of
Congress have shared the poet's viewpoint and seen that the opera
conveniently got lost? Or might the opera have included a dedication,
or similar readily visible statement, that identified its
objectionable content to the copyright clerks? Okay, so it sounds
far-fetched . . .
Changing the subject, can you suggest a feasible tactic for getting a
review copy of an upcoming Harvard University Press book?
Sue Attalla
EdBe...@optonline.net (Ed Berlin) wrote in message news:<5b1c85b6.03010...@posting.google.com>...
Ed Berlin
totally convinces me that this is the true story of Stack-a-Lee. And
what an extraordinary tale it is! That such efforts were made by
officials and others involved in the case to have the governor commute
the sentence indicate that Stack was not the arch villain as
represented in song & legend. He was apparently libeled by William
Lyons' family and supporters, including Lyons' brother-in-law Henry
Bridgewater, a wealthy and powerful figure in the African American
community. And how did they libel him? In song! I can think of
candidates for public office being derided in brief ditties during
political campaigns, but nothing like this. Here, the song took on a
life of its own, evolving through a century and creating an
unjustifiably negative symbol of immense stature. Amazing.
Eberhart's speculative material is also impressive. We can't know for
sure what music was used in the original song or its immediate
successors, but a plausible case is made for a "Frankie and Johnny"
type piece. Given the prominence of the court case, we understand
how the song had gained wide currency so quickly. My discovery of a
ragtime pianist using the song in mid-1897 supports the suggestion of
an 1896 genesis. Though there is no hard evidence that the music
started off as ragtime, that a ragtime pianist played the music is,
again, supportive.
John Russell David's doctoral dissertation _Tragedy in Ragtime: Black
Folktales from St. Louis_ (St. Louis University, 1976) apparently
provided key information and clues; this thesis should be examined.
(The dissertation is probably available through University
Microfilms.) David had interviewed Edward McKinney about Stack-a-Lee.
McKinney was also the person Nathan Young claimed as source of
information about _A Guest of Honor_. (No, that doesn't make Young
more believable on _A Guest of Honor_; everything that recently
uncovered documents reveal about Joplin and the opera exposes Young's
fictions. And rather than include Young's paintings & "speculative
portraits" of the story's subjects, I would have preferred for
Eberhart to have reproduced more documents and more of the early
lyrics.)
Appendix A, "Partial Discography", is not entirely clear. I'm
confused about the three columns labeled Recordings, Releases,
Publications. Why should Publications be part of a discography? What
are Releases? And the earliest four items listed have no indication
in any of the three columns.
The author claims that the Stack-a-Lee music was quickly dispersed to
both urban centers and rural areas, but offers no evidence. We know,
though, that in little more than a year it had at least traveled
across Missouri to Kansas City, where the pianist Charles Lee resided.
That migration might have been immediate and suggests that we look in
KC newspapers for accounts of the story to see how it was treated
there. Was the story of the trial and aftermath followed by major
black newspapers such as the _Indianapolis Freeman_? I've read all
the issues of the Freeman during the relevant years but, while I would
have recognized a reference to Stack-a-Lee (had I spotted it), I would
not have stopped to examine an item about the murder trial of Lee
Shelton. There's more research to be done.
Reading through the history of this thread, I'm impressed with the
comments made by some of the contributors . . . Joseph Scott, for
instance. I've learned a lot from the discussions and I've adjusted
the Forum on my website to correspond more closely to these new
realizations.
Ed Berlin
Sue Attalla
people were left feeling uncomfortable, even guilty, about the
sentence given to Lee Shelton in the second trial. William Lyons
appears to have expected trouble before he entered Bill Curtis' saloon
that Christmas night and to have armed himself with a knife. Whether
he pulled it on Lee Shelton, we'll probably never know, but evidence
indicates that he certainly may have, and that action would have made
the shooting self-defense. If one is innocent until proven guilty
beyond the shadow of a doubt, Stack Lee was wrongfully punished.
This is a complex story, partly because St. Louis papers provide
negative portraits of events transpiring at both Bridgewater's and
Curtis' saloons. (I'm sure that wasn't the least bit unusual at the
time since I'm referring to white-owned papers). Yet, some of this
material is potentially relevant. Buried in an article Eberhart
mentions but doesn't fully discuss, for instance, one finds damning
evidence against Bridgewater. Although not pertaining directly to the
William Lyons-Lee Shelton case, it reveals that he was a scoundrel.
Therefore, one can easily accept the assertion, especially in the face
of the goings-in court and the efforts for a pardon, that such a man
would have launched an unethical campaign against another.
Of course, we must keep in mind that Lee Shelton was probably no
saint. To fully vindicate Stack Lee, someone will need to establish
the case that twelve years in the prison system corrupted the morals
of a sweet, innocent young man. Non-violent, law-abiding citizens
don't break into homes, hit the resident on the head with a revolver,
and crack his skull.
As Ed says, it will be interesting to learn if black newspapers
covered this case. Buried within those articles, might one find
allusions to the song? White St. Louis papers don't mention it in the
articles covering the trials and pardons, but I've found perhaps
hundreds of other allusions to a single song buried in far more
unlikely places, such as sports pages and weather reports.
Sue Attalla
EdBe...@optonline.net (Ed Berlin) wrote in message news:<5b1c85b6.03010...@posting.google.com>...
Sue Attalla
committed the robbery and assault. Since this alleged act was
regarded as parole violaton, he was returned to jail without a right
to trial for the new charges. Could he have been unlucky enough to be
framed a second time? Think of all the additional lyric possibilites.
Speaking of unlucky, 1895 was a *very* bad year to be named William
Lyons:
Allen Smith, a notorious negro of East Point, fired a pistol ball
through the breast of William Lyons, another negro, yesterday
afternoon at 2 o'clock.
The shooting was without provocation and has created intense
excitement among the negroes of the little village. Lyons had the
reputation of being a sober, quiet, industrious negro and had many
friends among the citizens of East Point. He is now in a most
critical condition and cannot possibly live. . . (Atlanta
Constitution, Oct. 14, 1895)
Sue Attalla
. . . <snip>
> Appendix A, "Partial Discography", is not entirely clear. I'm
> confused about the three columns labeled Recordings, Releases,
> Publications. Why should Publications be part of a discography? What
> are Releases? And the earliest four items listed have no indication
> in any of the three columns.
>
> The author claims that the Stack-a-Lee music was quickly dispersed to
> both urban centers and rural areas, but offers no evidence. We know,
> though, that in little more than a year it had at least traveled
> across Missouri to Kansas City, where the pianist Charles Lee resided.
> That migration might have been immediate and suggests that we look in
> KC newspapers for accounts of the story to see how it was treated
> there. Was the story of the trial and aftermath followed by major
> black newspapers such as the _Indianapolis Freeman_? I've read all
> the issues of the Freeman during the relevant years but, while I would
> have recognized a reference to Stack-a-Lee (had I spotted it), I would
> not have stopped to examine an item about the murder trial of Lee
> Shelton. There's more research to be done.
. . . <snip>
> Ed Berlin
One of the sources for item 1 was Lomax's _The Land Where the Blues
Began_. Perhaps another reader has that book and can check it.
Someone is likely to have Lomax and Lomax's _American Ballads and
Folksongs_, listed as the source of item 5. Checking that source may
help identify the significance of the x in Eberhart's "Pub." column.
If no one can check sooner, my copy is temporarily in my office at
school, and I can look Monday.
About two years ago, I read a portion of Lawrence Levine's _Black
Culture and Black Consciousness_, listed as the other source for item
1. Although I was focusing on very different material and probably
didn't read the section including this song, I'd be surprised if
Levine includes recording information. He's interested in cultural
carry-overs from African and in ways that blacks achieved spiritual or
psychological power in circumstances rendering them otherwise
powerless. Therefore, he's more likely to have quoted a lyric to
support a point. If no one has the book, my public library does, and
I can check it next time I'm there, perhaps Tuesday or Thursday.
Odum's frequently cited 1911 article appears as the source for items
3-4. Odum provides two variant lyrics (Eberhart's items 3 & 4) and
associates them with the states Eberhart lists (Mississippi,
Louisiana, Tennessee for item 3, Georgia for 4). The difference is
that Odum also includes Alabama and Georgia for 3. Odum writes that
the variant lyrics were sung to different music, but doesn't elaborate
or provide transcriptions. Also, he states that the song was "being
sung by the negro vagrants all over the country." That could account
for the song's spread through urban centers and rural areas, but he
provides no supporting evidence. He doesn't mention any recordings.
(His goal in the article is to classify secular folk songs and folk
poetry collected throughout the South.)
To begin answering Ed Berlin's questions about the "discography," we'd
need to check several of these sources to see what we find there. For
instance, Odum's article contains no mention of recordings and no
printed music; it has no x in any of the columns. Does the same hold
true for the other items with no x? Do the entries with an x in the
"Pub." column contain music, not merely a lyric? (I notice that
several of these are from John Russell David's dissertation.) Is
"Discography" simply an unfortunate, too specific, choice of words for
a table in which we find the sources of other forms in which the song
appears? I'll look at the Hughes and Bontemps source and the J.
Rosamond Johnson source unless another reader already has one or both
of those. They each have an x in the "Pub." column.
Far more potentially interesting than this, however, would be checking
the suggested newspapers.
Sue Attalla
Sue Attalla
Discography":
Lomax and Lomax's _American Ballads and Folksongs_ and Langston Hughes
and Arna Bontemps' The Book of Negro Folklore_.
The Lomax book devotes pages 93-99 to "Stagolee" and opens: "'His real
name ws Stack Lee and he was the son of the Lee family of Memphis who
owned a large line of steamers that ran up and down the Mississippi.'
. . .'He was a nigger what fired teh engines of one of the Lee
steamers.' . . . 'They was a steamer runnin' up an' down de
Mississippi,name de Stacker Lee, an' he was one o' de roustabouts on
dat steamer. So dey called him Stackerlee.' Whoever he was, he was a
bad man and he killed Billy Lyons, probably in Memphis some thirty or
forty years ago." I'm posting it as it appears; ellipses are in the
original.
The Lomaxes provide lyrics for a version A and B. They name a woman
who sent them version A and refer to this version as the way the song
was sung when new. They quote from what their informant wrote about
the song. She speaks of its "minor refrain" and "spoken
interpolations." The Lomxes also write briefly of an unsuccessful
1933 effort to find music for these verses, or additional verses that
would fit this rhythm, during a trip to the Memphis levee district and
Beale Street. Version A begins:
'Twas a Christmas morning,
The hour was about ten,
When Stagalee shot Billy Lyons
And landed in the Jefferson pen.
Unlike version A, version B, set in New Orleans, includes a melody
line. The Lomaxes name several sources of this lyric: a Texas
barrel-house pianist, two Angola prisoners, and a New Orleans docks
roustabout. The lyric describes the loss of Stack's money and
"milk-white Stetson hat" to Billy. (Version A doesn't mention the
hat.) Stack tells Billy that he's not going to hurt him at the moment,
but warns Billy not to stay around. Billy doesn't take Stack's advice
and is shot when Stack returns with a gun. After Stack is found
guilty, he's said to be "Angola bound." Stack escapes from Angola and
is recaptured. An attempt is made to hang him. When his neck won't
break, the police chief shoots him six times. Many people go into
mourning about the death of this "good man Stagolee." Stack ends up
in hell, taking the devil's pitchfork and declaring, "Im gonna rule
Hell by myself."
The Hughes and Bontemps book includes two lyrics, but no music. The
first is described as "An old version, collected by Onah L. Spencer.
It begins:
It was in the year of eighteen hundred and sixty-one
In St. Louis on Market Street where Stackalee was born.
By the end of this version, Stack is found guilty of first-degree
murder and "sent down to Jefferson pen for seventy-five years" where
the other prisoners whisper about Stack's burning "in hell forever
over an old Stetson hat!"
The second lyric reprinted in the Hughes and Bontemps book is referred
to as the "Harlem version." It introduces "Sister Lou," the woman
Stack tells about the murder after the fact. She speaks of his one or
two year friendship with Billy and calls the sheriff, who wants
nothing to do with "that bad Stackolee." After fleeing and being
flattened on the New Haven track, Stack lands in hell where he
encounters an ex-girlfriend. He decides to go off with both the
girlfriend and the devil's wife. As he goes, he winks at the devil,
and says, "I'll go with you." The devil strikes Stack, and the
version closes:
Now, to end this story, so I hear tell,
Stackolee, all by his self, is running hell.
All that said, just because the variant lyrics seemed interesting and
provided a couple of mentions of Jefferson City and one of St. Louis
that must have been overlooked for many years, here's the definitive
answer to what George Eberhart was doing in his "Partial Discography.
I've shortened it slightly:
Sue--
Thanks for your kind words about my article! . . .
You have accurately figured out my Rec./Rel. abbreviations. Basically,
most sources listed a recording date for jazz compositions, while rock
and pop sources tend to consider the release date of more interest. It
probably has to do with the improvisational nature of jazz recordings.
As I recall, the first four items on the list were merely mentioned in
passing, with no lyrics published; however, they served to date the
diffusion of the song itself. There is only one X per entry because I
felt the recording date to be primary, and the others secondary (for
dating purposes). I ignored any release dates if I had a recording
date.
There may have been a better way to do it, but as a non-musicologist,
I
saw that as the most convenient way to list them.
For those who don't have access to the journal, the article has been
reprinted (without the pictures) in Earnestine Jenkins and Darlene
Clark
Hine, eds., _A Question of Manhood: A Reader in U.S. Black Men's
History
and Masculinity, vol. 2_ (Indiana University, 2001), pp. 387-440. . .
.
--George Eberhart
Joseph Scott
It should be noted, for anyone who doesn't know, that John and Alan
Lomax are regarded as quite unreliable and, er, creative by many
serious folk music researchers (some of whom are quite open in their
scorn for their intellectual sloppiness, frankly). I'll give a random
example of a claim Alan Lomax put in print that falls within one of my
areas of knowledge:
"It must never be forgotten that all blues are for dancing...."
A counterexample to that "all" claim would be the first blues
singer/guitarist recording star, Blind Lemon Jefferson, the single
most influential blues musician of the 1920s, who like so many blues
guitarist/singers played for tips, and dropped and added beats to his
music while he was showing off his virtuosity on guitar, making it
quite unsuitable for dancing, because it wasn't dance music; his
general approach was taken up by other major blues recording artists
such as Lightnin' Hopkins.
The Lomaxes' creativity reportedly extended to song lyrics.
I really don't feel comfortable dwelling on this topic too much when
Alan Lomax has just passed away, but I wanted to note that it is
important to be careful with these fellas.
Joseph Scott
George
did a superb job in summarizing my article in _Popular Music and
Society._ I was particularly intrigued by the other items that have
turned up, especially the ragtime variations of Charles Lee and Stack
Lee’s obituary. I thought I’d take this opportunity to clarify some
topics that came up.
1. John Russell David's dissertation did lead to my finding many of the
same sources he used. However, I have gone farther than he did in
putting the story together, so many of my speculations are truly my own,
including the origin of the song with Stack Lee’s enemies and political
rivals. David had the advantage of talking to many people who remembered
the times and the events in those days; but his dissertation had other
purposes than solely to tell the Stack Lee story, and it was a bit
disjointed. I needed to look at the original and other sources to put a
coherent timeline together.
2. Sue asked, if Henry Bridgewater was the catalyst for the smear
campaign, why was Babe Connor responsible for disseminating the song at
the Castle Club and not Bridgewater's saloon at 11th and Lucas? The
Castle Club was a three-story mansion and music hall (Reedy’s Sunday
Mirror, June 24, 1894, p. 4; probably the upper stories were used as a
bordello), complete with a chorus line of topless dancers who performed
on a mirrored floor (Jasen and Tichenor, p. 28; no source given, but
this is consonant with what I have gleaned from other sources), while
Bridgewater's was primarily a saloon where the principal activities were
drinking and gambling. Babe's would have been a much better place to get
the word out. Based on a dimly remembered diagram of the layout of
Bridgewater's saloon that I saw in a St. Louis paper after the September
11, 1892, murder of Charles Wilson, the place was not set up for
entertainment; there was a bar, tables, and a backroom or upper room
where gambling took place. Perhaps a pianist or singer would perform at
Bridgewater's, but the venue just wasn't the same; Babe had an
additional advantage in that whites would go to the Castle Club who
would probably never venture into a black saloon -- and whites were on
juries and wrote for newspapers and stole music that later would be
heard in a bowdlerized form in parlor rooms where Stack's reputation
would be further sullied. And Babe had the singers and piano players
that were so vividly remembered by the obituary writers in August 1899,
calling her the “proprietress of the most widely-known dance hall
between Portland, Ore., and Portland, Me.” There may have been other
music halls in St. Louis, but my guess is that none came close. The St.
Louis Republic on August 5, 1899, p. 7, listed the following songs that
originated in the Castle Club: "Hot Time in the Old Town," "I'm a
Natural Born Gambler," "That Ain't No Lie," "Mr. Johnson, Turn Me
Loose," May Irwin's "Come Kiss Yo Honey Boy," and "The Bully of the
Town." It also credited her with being responsible for the St. Louis
coon song craze (=vocal ragtime). Also, it said, “Though ‘Babe’ Connors
was not the author of these songs, she was looked upon as their sponsor,
and she took pride in being known as the sponsor. She went beyond that.
She was glad that they became popular all over the country, and it was a
source of gratification to her that actors and actresses sang her songs
in well-edited versions, and gained applause therefore.” That's what I
was basing her popularity on in my article.
3. I don't think Bill Dooley had anything to do with Stack Lee, at least
directly. I only included him because David had listed him as a possible
source.
4. For pre-1890s ragtime, my sources are as follows: David says (quoting
Eileen Southern's 1973 article in _Black Perspective in Music_, which I
haven't read) that rag piano music was heard in Philadelphia in 1875 by
Old Man Moore, who pioneered the practice of "ragging" quadrilles and
schottisches. Southern also said that "rag piano" music was common
throughout black communities in the 1880s. Finally, an article in the
April 4, 1909, St. Louis Post-Dispatch says that a "negro woman" named
Mammy [perhaps it was Mama Lou? David speculated] invented ragtime music
in 1888 in a house at Broadway and Clark in St. Louis. She loved to sing
in the streets; one song concerned the famous racehorse of the 1880s
named Proctor Knott. Someone who heard her sing said that her songs were
"ragged" or unusually syncopated.
5. Yes, Nathan Young was a pretty poor and very opinionated source. But
he at least had some nice artwork that I used to illustrate the article.
His writings are highly imaginative, to say the least.
6. I am particularly pleased to hear that Charles Lee may have been
performing a ragtime version of Stackolee in 1897. It would be wonderful
to have more documentation on the early melody and lyrics. I'm sure the
story that David and I came up with is only a small part of the whole saga.
7. David's 1976 dissertation is available through Bell and Howell
(formerly University Microfilms International). That's where I got mine
in the 1980s. Check the Web site at
http://www.umi.com/hp/Support/DServices/order/
--George M. Eberhart
Senior Editor, _American Libraries_
work: gebe...@ala.org
home: noo...@xsite.net
Sue Attalla
Within the context of George Eberhart's research on the Stack Lee case
in St. Louis, I hoped the Lomax excerpt would speak for itself. I was
tempted to cite another example from the same book but couldn't
without extended explanation that I didn't want to get into. Your
succinct illustration did the job.
When quoting a lyric allegedly received in a letter, the Lomaxes could
have exercised their creativity and figured no one would be the wiser.
However, in this case, they wouldn't have included "Jefferson pen"
when trying to establish Memphis as the song's place of origin. But
why ignore the words in front of them? How hard would it have been to
check on the existence of a Jefferson pen in Tennessee? When not
finding one, how hard to expand the geographical search?
Many books perpetuate similar inconsistencies and errors. The writers
pass along what someone told them, or what they read in another book
or article, as if it were fact. Or, perhaps, they twist the facts to
suit their fancies. If a couple of people say Stack Lee lived in
Memphis, then he must have lived in Memphis. I've run into the same
attitude when researching my great grandfather, composer/orchestrator
Wm. Christopher O'Hare. In 1939, _The Story of the House of Witmark_
referred to him as "a southerner, from Shreveport, Louisiana." So, by
golly, he was born and grew up in Shreveport. A few years ago, I tried
to tell one ragtime "scholar" that this was a false assumption--that
my great grandfather had moved to Shreveport from Washington, D.C. at
21 and 12 years later moved to New York to join the Witmark staff. I
was corrected. O'Hare had worked for Witmark in Chicago and never
lived in New York. It didn't matter that newspaper accounts disagreed
or that my dad had visited his grandfather in New York. After all,
that was "impossible."
False information all too easily becomes "accepted truth," such as
happened with "bad man" Stack Lee. When we're lucky, someone comes
along to ask the unasked questions, explore the unexplored resources,
and set the record straight.
Sue Attalla
j_ns...@msn.com (Joseph Scott) wrote in message news:<a2d52481.03011...@posting.google.com>...
Joseph Scott
Been thinking more about all this. I want to follow up on two comments
from Ed:
My discovery of a
> ragtime pianist using the song in mid-1897 supports the suggestion of
> an 1896 genesis. Though there is no hard evidence that the music
> started off as ragtime, that a ragtime pianist played the music is,
> again, supportive.
[...]
>
> The author claims that the Stack-a-Lee music was quickly dispersed to
> both urban centers and rural areas, but offers no evidence. We know,
> though, that in little more than a year it had at least traveled
> across Missouri to Kansas City, where the pianist Charles Lee resided.
First of all, in my earlier posts in the thread about earliest-born
folk musicians I forgot about Ed Haley, born in 1883, who was also
recorded singing "Stack," with the same usual "Railroad Bill"-like
structure I described in the other posts -- similar to the way pretty
much all the pre-1900-born recorded musicians seem to have known
"Stack." Haley had no formal schooling, and like Jesse Davis and David
Miller, he was blind, in Haley's case from age 3. Haley was a West
Virginian, Miller was born in rural Ohio and lived in Kentucky, and
Davis lived in Alabama.
("Railroad Bill" is believed to be about Morris Slater, a "black" man
who became an outlaw in 1892 and became a folk hero as he famously
evaded capture year after year until March, 1896.)
David Miller is not known to have known any "blues"-as-such, I think
I'm right in saying; he apparently learned most of his repertoire
before "blues"-as-such came to Kentucky (which would be, speaking very
roughly, about 1910 or 1915 -- Louisville would more likely be 1910
than anywhere else in KY). The recordings John Lomax made of Jesse
Davis do include one "blues"-as-such, "Kansas City," but he knows it a
la the smash hit record version by Jim Jackson (released on Vocalion
in Dec. 1927) and thus he probably learned it in the late 1920s or
later, i.e. it's probably irrelevant to dating most of his repertoire.
Otherwise Davis's repertoire is that of a man who learned most of his
music around the late 1890s and early '00s, e.g. "Spanish War,"
"Railroad Bill," "It Ain't Gonna Rain No More," "Brady."
(Incidentally, if John Lomax thought to ask Davis what year he was
born, what his parents' or children's names were, and so on,
unfortunately he did not leave any documentation of having done so;
meanwhile, Lomax did find time to leave a record that the area where
he recorded Davis featured "starved red hills where the white
limestone bones poke their outlines up....")
Jesse Fuller grew up in Georgia, very poor, and probably already knew
"Stack" there, before he relocated to California roughly the late
1910s, living there the rest of his life. Furry Lewis lived in West
Tennessee. John Hurt lived in a small rural town in mid-Mississippi --
a region that he almost never left during his life, prior to his
"discovery" in the 1960s.
So all in all, there seems to be good evidence that "Stack" was known,
in the "Railroad Bill"-like form, in many Southern states as of the
1910s. These states would include Missouri, Mississippi, Tennessee,
Kentucky, Alabama, West Virginia, and probably Georgia. (BTW, judging
from the recorded evidence, poor West Virginia "whites" had a very
lively interest in "black" folk music relative to other states; that
was probably largely because so many "blacks," many of them from
Alabama, worked alongside poor "whites" during WV's huge coal boom. An
instance of filthy lucre temporarily demanding relative integration,
and that in turn producing more integration than usual of music.) I
don't think "Stack" was well-known rurally as far as Texas or the
Carolinas; there are some major recorded folk artists born before 1900
from those states, whose huge repertoires were well-documented -- Gary
Davis and Mance Lipscomb, e.g. -- and I don't recall any versions of
"Stack" from any of them.
So that's rural areas; now, I wanted to comment a bit on urban areas.
Again, Ed mentioned:
> The author claims that the Stack-a-Lee music was quickly dispersed to
> both urban centers and rural areas, but offers no evidence.
Obviously if a song is well-known in rural areas in five or more
states, it will have moved through some urban areas getting there, to
_some_ extent. But we shouldn't exaggerate how much that had to
happen: Handy, e.g., born in the 1870s, consistently gave the
impression that if he had spent all his time in large towns with his
nose in the air, as it were, he really never would have much
encountered all the "low" "black" folk music that he eventually took
such an intellectual interest in, both the blues and the pre-blues
"black" folk music. It was possible for folk songs to move from state
to state, e.g. among railway workers, without coming to much attention
of relatively "prominent" or upwardly mobile people in urban areas
(which would include many ragtime pianists).
What I'd be interested to know is, we know that Blind Boone set
"black" folk tunes down -- and they were about as "authentic" "low"
"black" "folk" tunes as you could ask for, such as "Pallet On The
Floor" -- and that, correct me if I'm wrong, "Stack" wasn't one of the
ones Boone set down. So, are there parallels to Boone, other ragtime
pianists who might have included "Stack" in a medley or as a strain,
and if so who, and was it more around 1902, or around 1912? Because
it's possible that as of, say, 1912, "Stack" was much better known to
rural folk musicians than to ambitious town musicians, possible that
(assuming that it started out fairly well-known to pianists, which I
think it probably did) it remained well-known to rural guitarists and
fiddlers years after it was still very well-known to ragtime pianists.
Best to all,
Joseph Scott
Joseph Scott
he lived in West Virginia, not Kentucky. (The memory is an annoying
thing -- it's often just when you think you can rely on it that you
can't.)
This puts an even larger concentration of the "whites" who knew
"Stack" early on in the state of WV than I realized, including Haley
(b. 1883), Miller (b. 1893), Hutchison (b. 1897), and the Fruit Jar
Guzzlers (Bolar and Stevens' band of that name, not Macon's band of
that name) (prob. b. about 1900). Perhaps it would even be accurate to
say that "Stack" was little-known in the mountains, with the exception
of WV? It may have been brought up to WV by coal-mining "blacks" from
AL, and all of its other early movement may have been near the
Mississippi River and/or in the Deep South states.
Joseph Scott
Sue Attalla
have rached West Virginia.
This morning I received J. Rosamond Johnson's _Rolling Along in Song_,
which I'd requested through ILL. It's one of the items listed in
George Eberhart's Partial Discography and contains two versions of the
song in a section titled "Fragments of Blues." The first version,
simply called "Stagolee," is similar in its condemnation of Stack Lee
to most of what we've seen and ends each stanza with the refrain "Oh,
that bad, bad,/bad man Stagolee done come." Although it doesn't name
William Lyons, it refers to Stagolee's victim as "the best of
citerzen." The second version. "Stagolee Done Kill de Bully," sides
with Stack Lee. Again, William Lyons isn't named, but the penultimate
stanza speaks of donations for his funeral and burial: "Some folks
give a nickel an' some a dime,/I didn't give a penny, he's no friend
of mine." The final stanza states with conviction: "He's gone to hell
I know," speaking not of Stack Lee, but of the man Stack killed.
Johnson lists both versions as "Adaptations" and indicates "Melody by
J. Rosamond Johnson." I assume that means Johnson's music represents
his original setting of lyrics he'd heard or seen written and that he
had modified somewhat to suit his composing purposes. In contrast,
most songs in this collection are simply listed as "Arranged by J.
Rosamond Johnson."
Johnson has written an extensive introduction, pages 9-27, in which he
discusses several genres of "black" music (spirituals, coon songs,
ragtime, etc., ending with Gershwin's _Porgy and Bess_ and the comment
that _Porgy_ "bears out the opinion of Dvorak on the value of
Afro-American folk songs as artistic material and their possible
contribution to an American music." This introducton covers many
other topics, such as the common use of the pentatonic scale, which he
also calls the "Negro major mode." As part of Johnson's discussion of
stop-time and breaks, he provides an example and follows it with a
curious sentence: "But with the Scott Joplins and other famous
dance-hall musicians, these cadences soon developed and became far
more intricate." "The Scott Joplins"? Initially, I wondered if
Johnson might be using Joplin's name as a way of referring to all
ragtime pianists, in contrast to some other dance-hall performance
style. But that doesn't fit what follows--a discussion of how this
music "became the popular vogue of ragtime."
But all that is a digression. Something else Johnson wrote might tie
in with your theory about the song's journey to West Virginia with
Blacks migrating from the South in search of mining jobs. Although
the two versions of the Stack Lee song he provides appear in the
"Fragments of Blues" section, I couldn't find any discussion of Stack
in Johnson's discussion of blues. INSTEAD, he includes Stack in his
work song section. Here's the paragraph:
And the wheels of his musical emotions turned and rolled in other
directions, too. Singing all the time, singing while he worked in the
fields, finding a new song for each and every job as he went trucking
along--down and up the gangplank to a freight car or to some steamboat
outward or inward bound--he soon found the making of a molodic
expression, which stimultated his movement as he toiled on and on with
his carefree rhythmic stride. These songs are now known as work
songs. No one saw fit to record them in earlier days--or perhaps I
should say that those who made research into folklore might have
considered them not fit to record. Nevertheless, the wheels of
musical invention in the Negro's mind rolled out this type of song,
and by the use of slight adulteration, we can recommend many versions
of "John Henry," "Stagolee," "Steamboat Bill," and "Railroad Dan," the
"Hammer Song," and others.
That's not much on "Stagolee, for sure, but Johnson talks at more
length about "John Henry" and the "Hammer Song," saying that they
seemed to have more versions than any other work song. Then he adds,
"I might recall more than ten with different melodies." As you
speculate, the story of Stack Lee and William Lyons could easily have
been carried from place to place as a work song, probably down river
from St. Louis to Memphis to New Orleans and then away from the river
as boatmen found other lines of work. Improvisation--of words and
melody--could have been common from the outset, leaving it next to
impossible to find the original song about Stack Lee, the one George
Eberhart convincingly argues probably arose as anti-Stack propaganda
promulgated by the Henry Bridgewater faction.
Granted, Johnson's book wasn't published until 1937 (well into Stack's
blues years), and he doesn't provide any supporting detail;
nonetheless, the little he says makes some sense.
Sue Attalla
j_ns...@msn.com (Joseph Scott) wrote in message news:<a2d52481.03011...@posting.google.com>...
. . . <snip>
Joseph Scott
Rosamond's brother James Weldon Johnson discussed various kinds of
"black" folk music in the introduction to one of his books, too, _The
Book Of American Negro Poetry_, 1922. These two men's writings about
pre-blues "black" folk music and blues are worthy of attention imo
because they were both born in the South early enough to actually know
what they were talking about (in contrast to, e.g., Bill Broonzy
making the claim that "Joe Turner" was written in a specific year,
before he was born), and they both seem to have been very good
critical thinkers.
The two things I made a note of when I read the _Negro Poetry_ intro
were that he said "The Bully" was already around as a "black" folk
song before it was published -- interesting because it's partly
12-bar, and was published in 1895 -- and that in discussing various
kinds of "black" folk music, he specifically gave blues as an example
of relatively _new_ "black" folk music. This fits with everything I've
read from people born in the South in the 1860s-1880s who were asked
about "blues" music; they consistently indicate that they first
encountered it roughly the turn of the century, and knew other kinds
of rather similar folk music well before it. (Depending on the region,
some "black" Southern folk musicians recalled that they never
encountered a "blues" until about the late '10s.) John Lomax, born in
the South in the 1860s, remarked somewhere that when he collected folk
songs from "black" musicians, he tended to avoid "blues," he was after
the _old_ "black" folk songs.
What I'd be interested to know about the expressions "blues song,"
"blues tune," and "blues music" is this: We know that the first
newspaper mention of "ragtime" music is from, IIRC, 1894 and the first
newspaper mention of "jazz" music is from, IIRC, 1913 -- in both cases
that's roughly a half decade before that style became fairly
well-known in the U.S. Correspondingly, what is the earliest newspaper
mention of "blues" music, a "blues" song, or a "blues" tune (in
contrast to simply mentioning someone "having the blues," an
expression that goes way back)?
I don't know, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was roughly a half
decade before blues music became fairly well-known in the U.S., i.e.
roughly a half decade before 1914 or so. Meanwhile there are plenty of
known 12-bar folk tunes, not a one with the word "blues" in it, going
back to about 1895. These, including "Stack," are sometimes called
"blues ballads" by researchers, but I think that's an anachronism that
does more harm to our understanding than good, if no one referred to
any song as a "blues" until roughly the mid-'00s, and I don't know of
any evidence that anyone did. (Arguments that "blues" music goes back
to the 1890s or some time in the 1900s before 1908 often rest on
finding "black" folk floating lyrics in print, before 1908, that are
also found in 1910s-1920s "blues" songs, but just because a folk
floating lyric appeared in one song, and also later in another folk
song that was considered a "blues" song in its day, doesn't mean the
first song was considered a "blues" song in its day. One argument of
this kind that I read recently used a lyric that isn't even closely
tied to the blues tradition, is more associated with the "coon song"
tradition, which of course does go back into the 1890s, a lyric that
appeared on a _non_-blues record by "black" musicians made in 1902,
and this lyric being in print some time in the '00s [I forget which
year, 1905 maybe] was supposed to tie the existence of "blues" to at
least as early as that year. Doesn't work.)
Anyway, those lyrics you quoted are interesting, certainly fit with
the impression that emotions ran high on both sides of the Sheldon
debate in the 1890s and the song was used partly as propaganda.
Joseph Scott
ConeyIslandTodd
Where was that reference to "jazz" music in 1913? Thanks.
Todd Robbins
Joseph Scott
An article in the March 6, 1913 San Francisco Bulletin made a
reference to "... ragtime and 'jazz'...."
Joseph Scott
Sue Attalla
Apologies for taking so long to respond, but I've been swamped with
class prep, work-related reports to write, and the chance to begin
learning astonishing new things from two cousins who found me
recently. Seems we had a couple of murders in my great grandmother's
side of the family, one that appears to have affected my great
grandparents' wedding in Marshall, TX, back in 1890. Weird stories,
interesting new relatives--descendents of my great grandmother's
sister Catherine Slater Copeland.
BUT back to the issue at hand. Before responding, I wanted to re-read
James Weldon Johnson's preface to the first edition of _The Book of
American Negro Poetry_, which I hadn't read for approximately 4 years.
My primary recollections weren't of music, but of the section that
follows the music discussion--poetry, particularly dialect poetry.
Now that I've found time to reread the preface this morning, I'm
struck by details that hadn't caught my attention previously. In "The
Bully" reference you mentioned, for instance, Johnson classifies that
song with other early ragtime songs that "like Topsy, 'jes grew.'"
I've seen that quote from _Uncle Tom's Cabin_ applied to another
specific song more than once, most notably in a comment made by Alfred
G. Robyn during a visit home to St. Louis. Robyn, son of a prominent
St. Louis organist and also an organist himself, had established a
reputation as a musical theater composer and was closely associated
with M. Witmark & Sons, NY. He declared he would take that other
"jes' grew" tune to New York and make it famous.
Johnson's comment about May Irwin's similarly picking up the
pre-existing "Bully Song" and making if famous fits with other
references I've seen to the song. One, from a folklorist writing of
the "Bully Song" in 1911, clearly classifies it as an old black folk
song, not as a hit tune originating in vaudeville with a white woman.
Thanks for adding the interesting information, raising additional
questions, and inspiring me to reread Johnson's preface. I'll watch
for blues references in newspapers.
Sue Attalla
j_ns...@msn.com (Joseph Scott) wrote in message news:<a2d52481.03020...@posting.google.com>...
Sue Attalla
Boy" in _The Book of American Negro Poetry_ (pages 248-250 in my
Harcourt Brace Javonovich paperback). Most of the poem recounts Big
Boy's journey through life--his series of jobs (including coal mining
in W. VA) and his female conquests. However, Brown frames that
odyssey with stanzas in which Big Boy, who has no regrets for having
taken his "livin' as it came" and "grabbed [his] joy," asks only that
he be with Casey Jones, Stagolee, John Henry, and Jazzbo when he dies.
This seems to place Stagolee among the good guys in Big Boy's eyes,
but I don't recognize Jazzbo. An Internet search--though not an
exhaustive one--turned up nothing that sounds right. The majority of
hits relate to Prince Jazzbo, a reggae singer. Other than this
obviously wrong Jazzbo, I've turned up the following:
Lillyn Brown and her Jazzbo Syncopaters--No one named Jazzbo as far as
I can tell, but the group's name might have been derived from the
original Jazzbo.
http://www.redhotjazz.com/lbjazzbo.html
Jazzbo's Carolina Serenaders (a.k.a. Original Memphis Five)--white
guys. Cclicking on the link to the site's "Musicians" page, still no
Jazzbo.
http://www.redhotjazz.com/jazzbos.html
Jazzbo Jim-the dancer on the roof--Patented in 1921, this *might* come
closest, but was Jazzbo Jim a real person, a character in song, or
merely a toy?
http://pages.akeslingerantiques.com/5055/PictPage/1159698
Can you (or anyone) identify Jazzbo? Was he, perhaps, someone famous
whose nickname I don't recognize? This is irrelevant to the Stack Lee
inquiry, of course, but certainly relevant to Sterling Brown's poem.
The English professor in me wants to know.
Sue Attalla