Down in the Valley Week 3 (9.8.11)

“Down in the Valley, the valley so low, hang your head over, hear the wind blow.” After listening to Leadbelly and Solomon Burke sing their version of the “Down in the Valley,” Solomon Burke’s version seemed like a very recent and familiar gospel song. Not only was his song sung at a KKK meeting in 1961 before the Civil Rights Movement in 1965, but it was an almost soulless edition of a gospel performance for a large audience, performed in the comfort of his chair. After listening to the great John Hurt’s “You are my Sunshine” from last week, Solomon Burke’s song seemed like a comical play, where he was the “king” of gospel choir. Where is the struggle and roughness of the song? This raises the question of authenticity. How can we tell when a song is authentic and when it isn’t? What does authentic even mean? To me, it is something honest, and raw, when we can feel the struggle and pain in someone’s voice. Next, we discussed the availability of music, where everyone can simply download McJagger within minutes, eliminating any trip to the music store. The records are more like collector items locked away in a box, rather than played for the sake of listening to music. Again, we discussed numerous artists such as Jesse Fuller and Allie Gilbert, and discussed how musicians tell a different version of a song simply by how the melody and song is sung. As professor Dubovsky said, “These songs will save you.” The songs are learned slowly over the course of the semester, for the sake of music and learning from the songs and their lyrics. It is more than another class at Berkeley, but is a cool learning experience that all my friends and I are going through together.

The topic for next week’s discussion: Pete Seeger, “O Mary Don’t You Weep.” It is an African American spiritual song (about the biblical story of Mary of Bethany) before the American Civil War, that offers an outlet for resistance, inspiration, and hope. I am curious to see where next weeks discussion takes us.

Reading: pg. 1-33

How to sing: “Style is half of folk song, as it is of all music and it can be acquired as art is acquired, first by imitation, second by absorption, and finally by understanding.”(18) – Alan Lomax

In Alan Lomax’s article, the function of folk music is to produce a feeling of “security for the listener by voicing the particular quality of the land and the life of its people.” The traveler may bring back all the familiar emotions of home through a song that reminds him of family, love, and conflict. Alan Lomax states, “Our best songs and dances are the hybrids of hybrids, mixtures of mixtures.” On the American frontier, colonists not only carried a traditional melody, but were poor country men who were judged by their character and capacities. The common man (the individual), was everything in American folk song. Lomax goes on to discuss how the British and the West African traditions gave rise to hybrid music in America. Few African instruments remained in North America, but African musical habits continued to live on, as slaves sang in leader chorus style, with a more relaxed throat, deep pitched and mellower voices than Anglo people. Community songs of labor and worship and dance songs outnumbered the narrative pieces, as the emotion of the song was joyful, erotic, and playful. Lomax categorized folk music in the different regions: southern folk music was more guilt ridden, pinch voiced, and violent; northern was more permissive and open voiced. African American songs are where the words, tune, and accompaniment flow together to make a whole, and then they sing one stanza many times to a strong off beat rhythm. Yet, any attempt to sing with a good vocal technique reduces the effectiveness of the song. The best way to learn folk song style is by example, because the songs were treasured family heirlooms, reminders of adventures or memories of an experience.

Alan Lomax continued to raise many interesting points about folk songs. Folk songs grow in small steps, meaning that people participate in their growth where the old are added onto and create new versions. The original material loses some characteristics and gains others. Lomax states, “The folk song does not exist in any one of its variants, but rather in the aggregate of its variants. One should never say he “knows” a folk song, (30).” I liked his analogy on how a folk songs growth is similar to adding new patches onto an existing quilt. The honesty and emotion conviction of the artist’s song can live on for centuries because it is transmitted on how well he or she sang the song. What emotions do we feel from the song? A lot of times it is based on how honest the musician sounds. Does the song deal with pain? Often times we feel it. The songs deal with realities, like violence, cruelty, and poor working conditions. They also deal with deep shadows of the land, yet, the song can split at any moment and become comical. Lomax gives the example: “Can with a dead body compare…old Dan Tucker was a fine old man, washed his face in a frying pan.” There was enthusiasm for African American Folk music, (“John Henry,” “a man ain’t nothing but a man….”), so as that African American and white songs traded dances, and religious ideas, which had heavy influence on American culture. I also like how Lomax stated, “The folklorist has the duty to speak as the advocate for the common man, similar to how an anthropologist has the duty to speak as the native’s advocate,” (27).