Lhamon reconstructs the hidden history of public dance, musical fusion, Jim Crow, and racial identity (& transgression) in antebellum U.S. cities, then traces it forward into the 20th century:
Author: Marek
Cartoonist, musician, teacher.
Converse: New and Complete Method for the Banjo, With or Without a Master (A.K.A. “Green”) (1865)
This instructive tutor by the “Father of the Banjo” bears a distinctively Irish flavor …
Banjo History Videos
Here are some videos on banjo history, noting especially the early banjo’s roots in Africa and the Caribbean: Akonting Roundtable Segment One: The History and Music of the Akonting
United States it am de place (Rice, 1858)
This mysterious half-dialect minstrel song from Rice’s 1858 Method for the Banjo offers an intriguing glimpse into the economics and racial politics of the antebellum era…
Hamilton College: “Banjo Instruction Manuals” Collection
Includes instructors by Howe (a.k.a. Chaff) (1851),Converse (1867), Buckley (1868), & many more…
Chaff: The Ethiopian Glee Book (1848-9)
Collects four-part settings of popular songs from the antebellum minstrel stage…
Rice: Correct Method for the Banjo… (1858)
with or without a master. / CONTAINING THE MOST POPULAR, Banjo Solos, Duets, Trios and Songs, / performed by the Buckley’s, Christy’s, Bryant’s, Campbell’s, White’s / And other Celebrated Bands of Minstrels of which the Author was a member.
Mary Blane (1840s)
The lost-love minstrel tune “Mary Blane” was one of the most popular songs of the early minstrel era (see Mahar’s list):
Library of America: The Civil War Told by Those Who Lived It
Library of America: The Civil War Told by Those Who Lived It “Hundreds of selections from scores of eyewitnesses, both North and South, in the heat of battle and at the home front, from November 1860 to June 1865.”
Abraham’s Daughter (Winner, 1861)
“One Country and one Flag, I say, whoe’er the war may slaughter…”
Cockrell: Demons of Disorder (1997)
by Dale Cockrell … A riveting analysis of unconventional texts from the first two decades of minstrelsy.
Lott: Love & Theft (1993)
“For over two centuries, America has celebrated the very black culture it attempts to control and repress, and nowhere is this phenomenon more apparent than in the strange practice of blackface performance. Born of extreme racial and class conflicts, the blackface minstrel show sometimes served to usefully intensify these conflicts. Based on the appropriation of…
The Hardtacks 