Shellac Shanty

Well, I have two "yes" votes for posting the Minstrel & "Darky" discs. I was worried about how to preface these, but the zenman posted his comments... and I could not state it any more eloquently. Herewith follows his comments about the issue:

Posting what we now think of as racist material? I would vote yes, actually.

I think that it's very important, especially for listeners of the types of music you so graciously present, to [have] a genuine understanding of the cultural differences between Then and Now. Nothing can present this better than the most popular of media from that earlier period, the 78 RPM record.

There are several other sites that already make this type of material available - the Archive.org 78rpm collection is quite full.

The first time you hear this 'Minstrel Show' material your jaw drops. Listen to more and you find that there are brutal racial stereotypes being presented of not only Blacks, but of Italians, Jews, Poles, the Dutch and Germans, and so on. This was an accepted fact of life in those times. Blackface is anathema now but a given in vaudeville then.

You don't see 'Amos and Andy' on television any more for good reasons. And unless you search them out, you also won't be seeing cartoons with these racial stereotypes, nor will you, wthout a bit of looking, se Irving Belin's 'This Is The Army' (from WW2), which features several blackface numbers. And so it should be, as we have grown, somewhat, out of these cruel stereotypes that genuinely offend and hurt so many people who frankly deserve much better from this country and this culture.

By posting this material -with the proper caveats- [emphasis added] you do the world a favor. I think it's very important to show how ingrained such thoughless cruelty was at one time, and how we have grown - albeit slowly, and with resistance from many - out of this. It's especially important for mainstream whites to hear this, as many of them are blissfully unaware of how common this was only a few decades ago.

But most people don't know anything about history anyway. Maybe this could shake up their brains and make them think about it a little.

Wow. I could not have said it any better myself.

Now, on to the discs. These came out in the late 1910s and early 1920s, and, as stated by zenman, contain RAMPANT racial slurs and stereotyping.

The Victor Minstrel Company always had the one line in their recordings, at least the ones that I have heard... "Gentlemen, be seated!" at which point the 'show' would begin. The first one, Mississippi Minstrels, according to the label, contains the following songs: "I Guess I'll Have to Telegraph My Baby", I Want to go Back to the Land of Cotton", and Remus Takes the Cake". You may hear some of the then-current Victor recording artists in here, I think Campbell & Burr, Billy Murray, and members (if not the entireity) of the Peerelss Quartet had done some of the minstrel recordings. You have the songs, interspersed with anecdotal humourous segues, and the the players march off the stage.

Minstrel records like this were actually one of the ways that a lot of sheet music was sold during the period... people heard the snippet of the tune, then went to go get the sheet music so they could play it on the i=piano in their parlors.

Speaking of the Peerless Quartet, they are on the other side of this record, with a "Descriptive Negro Medley", Down on the Levee. Songs included are "Sunshine", No Use Awaitin' Till To-morrow", "Oh, Ma Yaller Gal", "On the Mississippi", "Hallelujah", "Checkerboard Suit", and "Take Your Feet Out of the Sand".

Again, I MUST CAVEAT... these guys dropped the Ni**er-bomb more times than I would care to count. These are presented for HISTORICAL REFERENCE as well as a view of the times, which is vastly different than what we have now. And for that, I thank the Gods.

Next up is Golden & Hughes' "Darky" Specialty number, Unlucky Mose. The duo tell the story about a man who thinks himself the luckiest man in the world because he has a hat on his head, shoes on his feet, bacon in his pan, etc. and then is told by a compatriot otherwise. Something like that. Again, heavily stereotyped, just like the blackface artists did on the vaudeville stage (and on shows like Amos and Andy, etc.). This is a sketch number as opposed to purely musical.

The other side of the Victor disc gives up another VIctor Minstrel Company number, New Orleans Minstrels. Are we noticing a bit of a regional theme here? Remember, these were concocted and recorded by men in New York City that had probably never been to the Deep South, and this is how they characterized that region to the rest of the country, and the world. Anyway, the songs here include "At A Georgia Campmeeting", "All I Wants is My Black Baby Back", and "On Emancipation Day".

If you're offended by these, I apologize. But, they're a piece of American history, whether we like it or not. History cannot, and SHOULD not, be revised just because it makes some people uncomfortable.

I have more of these, along with some other period pieces, which I may bring out on a later posting. Some of them are quite musical, actually...

Ah well, enough history for a while.