This first volume of Music in Black American Life collects research and analysis that originally appeared in the journals American Music and the Black Music Research Journal, and in the University of Illinois Press's acclaimed book series Music in American Life. In these selections, experts from a cross-section of disciplines engage with fundamental issues in ways that changed our perceptions of Black music. The topics includes the culturally and musically complex Black music-making of colonial America; string bands and other lesser-known genres practiced by Black artists; the jubilee industry and its audiences; and innovators in jazz, blues, and Black gospel.

Eclectic and essential, Music in Black American Life, 1600–1945 offers specialists and students alike a gateway to the history and impact of Black music in the United States.

Contributors: R. Reid Badger, Rae Linda Brown, Samuel A. Floyd Jr., Sandra Jean Graham, Jeffrey Magee, Robert M. Marovich, Harriet Ottenheimer, Eileen Southern, Katrina Dyonne Thompson, Stephen Wade, and Charles Wolfe

| Cover Title Copyright Contents Preface Acknowledgments Introduction / Sandra Jean Graham 1. Toward a Philosophy of Black Music Scholarship / Samuel A. Floyd, Jr. 2. Backstage: "White folks do as they please, and the darkies do as they can" / Katrina Dyonne Thomp 3. The Origin and Development of the Black Musical Theater: A Preliminary Report / Eileen Southern 4. Innovators, Imitators, and a Jubilee Industry / Sandra Jean Graham 5. Rural Black String Band Music / Charles Wolfe 6. Nashville Washboard Band: Something Out of Nothing / Stephen Wade 7. The Blues Tradition in St. Louis / Harriet Ottenheimer 8. James Reese Europe and the Prehistory of Jazz / R. Reid Badger 9. Before Louis: When Fletcher Henderson Was the "Paul Whiteman of the Race" / Jeffrey Magee 10. Sweeping through the City: Thomas A. Dorsey and the Gospel Nexus (1932–1933) / Robert M. Marovich 11. "My Soul's Been Anchored in de Lord" and Black Satin Clothes at the Fair / Rae Linda Brown List of Original Publications Contributors Index Back cover |"Although the essays in this volume provide a selective history of early Black American music, they illustrate a desire to extend and enrich our understanding of Black musicking. As such, they have fulfilled the editorial goals of their original publications while contributing to new narrative strategies for American music history."—Sandra Jean Graham, from the Introduction
|Laurie Matheson is the director of the University of Illinois Press and longtime editor of the series Music in American Life.