121-564: Huddie William Ledbetter ( / ˈ h j uː d i / HYOO -dee ; January 1888 or 1889 – December 6, 1949), better known by the stage name Lead Belly (not Leadbelly), was an American folk and blues singer notable for his strong vocals, virtuosity on the twelve-string guitar , and the folk standards he introduced, including his renditions of " In the Pines ", "Pick a Bale of Cotton ", " Goodnight, Irene ", " Midnight Special ", " Cotton Fields ", and " Boll Weevil ". Lead Belly usually played
242-492: A BBC tribute in 1999, which marked the 50th anniversary of Lead Belly's death, Van Morrison – while sitting alongside Ronnie Wood of The Rolling Stones – claimed that the British popular music scene of the 1960s wouldn't have happened if it weren't for Lead Belly's influence. "I'd put my money on that," he said. Wood concurred. Indian singer Bhupen Hazarika —who was, in general, influenced by spirituals during his days as
363-482: A chuigushou . Ensembles consisting of mouth organs ( sheng ), shawms ( suona ), flutes ( dizi ) and percussion instruments (especially yunluo gongs ) are popular in northern villages; their music is descended from the imperial temple music of Beijing, Xi'an , Wutai shan and Tianjin . Xi'an drum music, consisting of wind and percussive instruments, is popular around Xi'an, and has received some commercial popularity outside of China. Another important instrument
484-430: A melody , often with repeating sections , and usually played a number of times. A collection of tunes with structural similarities is known as a tune-family . America's Musical Landscape says "the most common form for tunes in folk music is AABB, also known as binary form ." In some traditions, tunes may be strung together in medleys or " sets ." Throughout most of human history, listening to recorded music
605-619: A pipa , as well as other traditional instruments. The music is generally sorrowful and typically deals with love-stricken people. Further south, in Shantou , Hakka and Chaozhou , zheng ensembles are popular. Sizhu ensembles use flutes and bowed or plucked string instruments to make harmonious and melodious music that has become popular in the West among some listeners. These are popular in Nanjing and Hangzhou , as well as elsewhere along
726-512: A "Traditional music" category that subsequently evolved into others. The term "folk", by the start of the 21st century, could cover singer-songwriters, such as Donovan from Scotland and American Bob Dylan , who emerged in the 1960s and much more. This completed a process to where "folk music" no longer meant only traditional folk music. Traditional folk music often includes sung words , although folk instrumental music occurs commonly in dance music traditions. Narrative verse looms large in
847-505: A Lead Belly record with the song ' Cotton Fields ' on it. And that record changed my life right then and there. Transported me into a world I'd never known. It was like an explosion went off. Like I'd been walking in darkness and all of the sudden the darkness was illuminated. It was like somebody laid hands on me. I must have played that record a hundred times." Dylan also pays homage to him in " Song to Woody " on his self-titled debut album . Lead Belly recordings were instrumental in starting
968-401: A class dynamic to popular understandings of American folk music. This was the final element of the foundation upon which the early folk music revivalists constructed their own view of Americanism. Sandburg's working-class Americans joined with the ethnically , racially , and regionally diverse citizens that other scholars, public intellectuals, and folklorists celebrated their own definitions of
1089-419: A cultural dichotomy , the other side of which is found not only in the lower layers of feudal, capitalist and some oriental societies but also in 'primitive' societies and in parts of 'popular cultures'". One widely used definition is simply "Folk music is what the people sing." For Scholes, as well as for Cecil Sharp and Béla Bartók , there was a sense of the music of the country as distinct from that of
1210-469: A fearsome scar the musician covered with a bandana). Lead Belly nearly killed his attacker at the time with his own knife. In 1925, he was pardoned and released after writing a song to Texas Governor Pat Morris Neff seeking his freedom, having served the minimum seven years of a 7-to-35-year sentence. He was credited with good behavior, which included entertaining the guards and fellow prisoners. He also appealed for mercy to Neff's known religious beliefs. It
1331-542: A former populist , in the party primary for governor in 1920. This defeat effectively ended Bailey's political career. Neff handily won the general election and started his term in 1921. Neff was a strong supporter of prohibition . He was instrumental in the development of the Texas State Parks Board . Neff and his mother, Isabella Neff, donated the land which would become the first state park in Texas. It
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#17327988149511452-587: A great body of English rural traditional song, music and dance, under the aegis of what became and remains the English Folk Dance and Song Society (EFDSS). Sharp campaigned with some success to have English traditional songs (in his own heavily edited and expurgated versions) to be taught to school children in hopes of reviving and prolonging the popularity of those songs. Throughout the 1960s and early to mid-1970s, American scholar Bertrand Harris Bronson published an exhaustive four-volume collection of
1573-399: A lower class" in culturally and socially stratified societies. In these terms, folk music may be seen as part of a "schema comprising four musical types: 'primitive' or 'tribal'; 'elite' or 'art'; 'folk'; and 'popular'." Music in this genre is also often called traditional music. Although the term is usually only descriptive, in some cases people use it as the name of a genre. For example,
1694-478: A management contract with Lead Belly, was not able to arrange concert dates. In March 1935, Lead Belly accompanied John Lomax on a previously scheduled two-week lecture tour of colleges and universities in the Northeast, culminating at Harvard . At the end of the month, John Lomax decided he could no longer work with Lead Belly. He gave him and Martha enough money to return by bus to Louisiana. He also gave Martha
1815-575: A notorious red-light district . He began to develop his own style of music after exposure to the various musical influences on Shreveport's Fannin Street, a row of saloons, brothels, and dance halls in the Bottoms. This area is now referred to as Ledbetter Heights. Between 1915 and 1939, Ledbetter served several prison and jail terms in Louisiana for a variety of criminal charges. Notably, in 1918 under
1936-404: A particular interest in folklore. Carl Sandburg often traveled the U.S. as a writer and a poet. He also collected songs in his travels and, in 1927, published them in the book The American Songbag . Rachel Donaldson, a historian who worked for Vanderbilt, later stated this about The American Songbird in her analysis of the folk music revival. "In his collections of folk songs, Sandburg added
2057-401: A people's folklore , or music performed by custom over a long period of time. It has been contrasted with commercial and classical styles . The term originated in the 19th century, but folk music extends beyond that. Starting in the mid-20th century, a new form of popular folk music evolved from traditional folk music. This process and period is called the (second) folk revival and reached
2178-506: A piano-like sound. Scholars have suggested much of his guitar playing was inspired equally by barrelhouse piano and the Mexican Bajo Sexto , a type of guitar that he encountered in Texas and Louisiana. Lead Belly's tunings are debated by both modern and contemporary musicians and blues enthusiasts alike, but it seems to be a down-tuned variant of standard tuning. Footage of his chording is scarce, so trying to decode his chords
2299-695: A possible better system, through the lens of the Great Depression. Woody Guthrie exemplifies songwriters and artists with such an outlook. Folk music festivals proliferated during the 1930s. President Franklin Roosevelt was a fan of folk music, hosted folk concerts at the White House , and often patronized folk festivals. One prominent festival was Sarah Gertrude Knott 's National Folk Festival , established in St. Louis, Missouri in 1934. Under
2420-621: A reference to beautiful women, while in the past they were notorious for their erotic content. The village "mountain songs" ( shan'ge ) of Jiangsu province were also well known for their amorous themes. Other regional song traditions include the "strummed lyrics" ( tanci ) of the Lower Yangtze Delta, the Cantonese Wooden Fish tradition ( muyu or muk-yu ) and the Drum Songs ( guci ) of north China. In
2541-501: A regular on Lomax and Nicholas Ray 's groundbreaking CBS radio show Back Where I Come From , broadcast nationwide. He also performed in nightclubs with Josh White , becoming a fixture in New York City's surging folk music scene and befriending the likes of Sonny Terry , Brownie McGhee , Woody Guthrie , and Pete Seeger , all fellow performers on Back Where I Come From . In 1940, Lead Belly recorded for RCA Victor, one of
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#17327988149512662-553: A revolutionary tool to preserve vanishing musical forms. The earliest American folk music scholars were with the American Folklore Society (AFS), which emerged in the late 1800s. Their studies expanded to include Native American music , but still treated folk music as a historical item preserved in isolated societies as well. In North America, during the 1930s and 1940s, the Library of Congress worked through
2783-463: A ship for being black, but it was not the Titanic . Still, the song includes the lyric "Jack Johnson tried to get on board. The Captain, he says, 'I ain't haulin' no coal!' Fare thee, Titanic ! Fare thee well!" Ledbetter later noted he had to leave out this passage when playing in front of white audiences. Folk music Folk music is a music genre that includes traditional folk music and
2904-432: A six-minute Alan Lomax interview. George Ezra developed his singing style from trying to sing like Lead Belly. "On the back of the record, it said his voice was so big, you had to turn your record player down," Ezra says. "I liked the idea of singing with a big voice, so I tried it, and I could." In 2015, in celebration of Lead Belly's 125th birthday, several events were held. The Kennedy Center , in collaboration with
3025-646: A son, Pat M. Neff, Jr. Neff joined the Democratic Party and entered politics, being elected in 1898 to the Texas House of Representatives , and serving from 1899 to 1905. He was elected to one term as Speaker . After returning to his law practice in Waco, Neff served for six years as the assistant county attorney and then as county attorney for McLennan County . Considered a progressive Democrat , Neff defeated former U.S. Senator Joseph Weldon Bailey ,
3146-499: A standard guitar, increasing the tension on the instrument, which, given the added tension of the six extra strings, meant that a trapeze-style tailpiece was needed to help resist bridge lifting. It had slotted tuners and ladder bracing. Lead Belly played with finger picks much of the time, using a thumb pick to provide walking bass lines described as "tricky" and "inventive", and occasionally to strum. This technique, combined with low tunings and heavy strings, gives many of his recordings
3267-657: A student in the US—transcreated Lead Belly's singing of "We're in the Same Boat Brother" into the Assamese language as " Ami ekekhon nawore zatri " (আমি একেখন নাৱৰে যাত্ৰী). Later, he also released a Bengali language version as " Mora jatri eki toronir " (মোরা যাত্রী একই তরণীর). In 2001 English-Canadian blues singer Long John Baldry released his final studio album, Remembering Leadbelly . It contains cover versions of Lead Belly songs, and features
3388-608: A studio guitar player on Merrywood Drive in Laurel Canyon. Later he returned to New York City. In 1949, Lead Belly had a regular radio show, Folk Songs of America , broadcast on station WNYC in New York, on Henrietta Yurchenco 's show on Sunday nights. Later in the year he began his first European tour with a trip to France, but fell ill before its completion and was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), or Lou Gehrig 's disease (a motor neuron disease). Lead Belly
3509-505: A summary trial for attempted homicide for stabbing a man in a fight. In 1939, Lead Belly served his final jail term for assault after stabbing a man in a fight in Manhattan . There are several conflicting stories about how Ledbetter acquired the nickname "Lead Belly", it probably happened while he was in prison. Some claim his fellow inmates called him "Lead Belly" as a play on his family name and his physical toughness. Others say he earned
3630-567: A traditional song would undergo a process of improvement akin to biological natural selection : only those new variants that were the most appealing to ordinary singers would be picked up by others and transmitted onward in time. Thus, over time we would expect each traditional song to become more aesthetically appealing, due to incremental community improvement. Literary interest in the popular ballad form dates back at least to Thomas Percy and William Wordsworth . English Elizabethan and Stuart composers had often evolved their music from folk themes,
3751-434: A tragic or regretful nature, prominently figures in many folk traditions. Nursery rhymes , children's songs and nonsense verse used to amuse or quiet children also are frequent subjects of traditional songs. Music transmitted by word of mouth through a community, in time, develops many variants, since this transmission cannot produce word-for-word and note-for-note accuracy. In addition, folk singers may choose to modify
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3872-456: A twelve-string guitar, but he also played the piano, mandolin , harmonica, violin, and windjammer . In some of his recordings, he sang while clapping his hands or stomping his foot. Lead Belly's songs covered a wide range of genres, including gospel music , blues , and folk music , as well as a number of topics, including women, liquor, prison life, racism, cowboys, work, sailors, cattle herding, and dancing. He also wrote songs about people in
3993-525: A younger man in Louisiana he had sung regularly at children's birthday parties in the black community). Black novelist Richard Wright wrote about him as a heroic figure in the Daily Worker , of which Wright was the Harlem editor. The two men became personal friends. In contrast to Wright, who was then a communist, commentators described Lead Belly as apolitical. He was known to support Wendell Willkie ,
4114-464: A zenith in the 1960s. This form of music is sometimes called contemporary folk music or folk revival music to distinguish it from earlier folk forms. Smaller, similar revivals have occurred elsewhere in the world at other times, but the term folk music has typically not been applied to the new music created during those revivals. This type of folk music also includes fusion genres such as folk rock , folk metal , and others. While contemporary folk music
4235-507: Is a genre generally distinct from traditional folk music, in U.S. English it shares the same name, and it often shares the same performers and venues as traditional folk music. The terms folk music , folk song , and folk dance are comparatively recent expressions. They are extensions of the term folklore , which was coined in 1846 by the English antiquarian William Thoms to describe "the traditions, customs, and superstitions of
4356-408: Is an ancient folk song from India, a country of Asia, of Meiteis of Manipur , that is an example of Asian folk music, and how they put it into its own genre. Archaeological discoveries date Chinese folk music back 7000 years; it is largely based on the pentatonic scale . Han traditional weddings and funerals usually include a form of oboe called a suona , and apercussive ensembles called
4477-494: Is difficult. It is likely that he tuned his guitar strings relative to one another, so that the actual notes shifted as the strings wore. Such down-tuning was a common technique before the development of truss rods , and was intended to prevent the instrument's neck from warping. Lead Belly's playing style was popularized by Pete Seeger , who adopted the twelve-string guitar in the 1950s and released an instructional LP and book using Lead Belly as an exemplar of technique. In some of
4598-530: Is generally no "authoritative" version of song. Researchers in traditional songs have encountered countless versions of the Barbara Allen ballad throughout the English-speaking world, and these versions often differ greatly from each other. The original is not known; many versions can lay an equal claim to authenticity. Influential folklorist Cecil Sharp felt that these competing variants of
4719-564: Is honored with a statue across from the Caddo Parish Courthouse, in Shreveport . Lead Belly's niece, activist Greshun De Bouse, founded National Huddie Ledbetter Day (August 1 annually), and received proclamations from the mayors of Oil City-where Lead Belly worked, LA and Shreveport, LA in 2023. Lead Belly was imprisoned multiple times beginning in 1915, when he was convicted of carrying a pistol, and sentenced to time on
4840-493: Is most likely to have led to the nickname. Huddie William Ledbetter from Shreveport, became Huddie Weem Leadbelly from Freeport. Lead Belly styled himself "King of the Twelve-String Guitar", and despite his use of other instruments, such as the accordion, the most enduring image of Lead Belly as a performer is wielding his unusually large Stella twelve-string. This guitar had a slightly longer scale length than
4961-467: Is recorded as age 19 and married one year. Others say she was 15 when they married in 1908. Ledbetter received his first instrument in Texas, an accordion , from his uncle Terrell. By his early twenties, having fathered at least two children, Ledbetter left home to make his living as a guitarist and occasional laborer. By 1903, Huddie was already a "musicianer", a singer and guitarist of some note. He performed to Shreveport audiences in St. Paul's Bottoms,
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5082-402: Is the sheng , a type of Chinese pipe , an ancient instrument that is ancestor of all Western free reed instruments, such as the accordion . Parades led by Western-type brass bands are common, often competing in volume with a shawm/chuigushou band. In southern Fujian and Taiwan , Nanyin or Nanguan is a genre of traditional ballads. They are sung by a woman accompanied by a xiao and
5203-672: Is the provenance of the American Folklife Center" at the library of Congress. Africa is a vast continent and its regions and nations have distinct musical traditions. The music of North Africa for the most part has a different history from Sub-Saharan African music traditions . The music and dance forms of the African diaspora , including African American music and many Caribbean genres like soca , calypso and Zouk ; and Latin American music genres like
5324-604: The Encyclopedia of the Blues gives January 20, 1888. His parents had cohabited for several years. They married on February 26, 1888, perhaps after his birth that year. When Huddie was five years old, the family settled in Bowie County, Texas . By the 1910 census of Harrison County, Texas , "Hudy Ledbetter" was living next door to his parents in a separate household with his first wife, Aletha "Lethe" Henderson. Aletha
5445-467: The Grammy Award previously used the terms "traditional music" and "traditional folk" for folk music that is not contemporary folk music. Folk music may include most indigenous music . From a historical perspective, traditional folk music had these characteristics: As a side-effect, the following characteristics are sometimes present: In folk music, a tune is a short instrumental piece ,
5566-717: The Grammy Museum held Lead Belly at 125: A Tribute to an American Songster, a musical event featuring Robert Plant , Alison Krauss , and Buddy Miller with Viktor Krauss as headliners and Dom Flemons as host, with special appearances by Lucinda Williams , Alvin Youngblood Hart , Billy Hector , Valerie June , Shannon McNally , Josh White Jr. , and Dan Zanes , among others. Also in Washington, D.C., Bourgeois Town: Lead Belly in Washington DC by
5687-474: The Great Depression . Regionalism and cultural pluralism grew as influences and themes. During this time folk music began to become enmeshed with political and social activism themes and movements. Two related developments were the U.S. Communist Party's interest in folk music as a way to reach and influence Americans, and politically active prominent folk musicians and scholars seeing communism as
5808-511: The Library of Congress was held where Todd Harvey interviewed Lead Belly family members about their relative, his contributions to American culture and world music and an overview of the significant Lead Belly materials in the center's archive. In London, England, the Royal Albert Hall held Lead Belly Fest , a musical event featuring Van Morrison , Eric Burdon , Jools Holland , Billy Bragg , Paul Jones , and more. Influenced by
5929-752: The PRC . Folk songs have been recorded since ancient times in China. The term Yuefu was used for a broad range of songs such as ballads, laments, folk songs, love songs, and songs performed at court. China is a vast country, with a multiplicity of linguistic and geographic regions. Folk songs are categorized by geographic region, language type, ethnicity, social function (e.g. work song, ritual song, courting song) and musical type. Modern anthologies collected by Chinese folklorists distinguish between traditional songs, revolutionary songs, and newly invented songs. The songs of northwest China are known as "flower songs" ( hua'er ),
6050-481: The Traditional 18 Dances display the dancing of birds and animals. For example: Musical types include: The classical Sinhalese orchestra consists of five categories of instruments, but among the percussion instruments, the drum is essential for dance. The vibrant beat of the rhythm of the drums form the basic of the dance. The dancers' feet bounce off the floor and they leap and swirl in patterns that reflect
6171-558: The University of Texas School of Law in Austin . There, he developed a close friendship with Tom Connally and Morris Sheppard of Texas, who both became politicians and were later elected as U.S. senators from the state. After receiving his law degree and passing the bar, on May 31, 1899, Neff married Baylor classmate Myrtle Mainer in her hometown of Lovelady . In 1901, they had a daughter, whom they named Hallie Maude. They also had
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#17327988149516292-432: The contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival . Some types of folk music may be called world music . Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted orally, music with unknown composers, music that is played on traditional instruments, music about cultural or national identity, music that changes between generations (folk process), music associated with
6413-439: The samba , Cuban rumba , salsa ; and other clave (rhythm) -based genres, were founded to varying degrees on the music of enslaved Africans , which has in turn influenced African popular music . Many Asian civilizations distinguish between art /court/classical styles and "folk" music. For example, the late Alam Lohar is an example of a South Asian singer who was classified as a folk singer. Khunung Eshei/Khuland Eshei
6534-522: The 50 albums most influential in the formation of Nirvana's sound. It was included in NME 's "The 100 Greatest Albums You've Never Heard list". Ram Jam , an American rock band, had a hit with the song " Black Betty " which they remade as a rock song in 1977. "Black Betty" was recorded by Lead Belly in 1939. Bob Dylan credits Lead Belly for getting him into folk music. In his Nobel Prize Lecture, Dylan said "somebody – somebody I'd never seen before – handed me
6655-559: The 67-year-old in his folk song collecting around the South. Son Alan Lomax was ill and did not accompany his father on this trip. In December 1934, Lead Belly participated in a "smoker" (group sing) at a Modern Language Association meeting at Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania , where the senior Lomax had a prior lecture engagement. He was written up in the press as a convict who had sung his way out of prison. On New Year's Day, 1935,
6776-432: The American folk, definitions that the folk revivalists used in constructing their own understanding of American folk music, and an overarching American identity". Prior to the 1930s, the study of folk music was primarily the province of scholars and collectors. The 1930s saw the beginnings of larger scale themes, commonalities, and linkages in folk music developing in the populace and practitioners as well, often related to
6897-575: The Association for Cultural Equity, is "distinct from the thousands of earlier recordings on acetate and aluminum discs he made from 1933 to 1942 under the auspices of the Library of Congress. This earlier collection—which includes the famous Jelly Roll Morton, Woody Guthrie, Lead Belly, and Muddy Waters sessions, as well as Lomax's prodigious collections made in Haiti and Eastern Kentucky (1937) —
7018-507: The British skiffle revival , which in turn produced several musicians prominent during the British Invasion . Lonnie Donegan 's recording of " Rock Island Line ", released as a single in late 1955, signaled the start of the skiffle craze. George Harrison of The Beatles was quoted as saying, "if there was no Lead Belly, there would have been no Lonnie Donegan; no Lonnie Donegan, no Beatles. Therefore no Lead Belly, no Beatles." In
7139-611: The Harrison County chain gang . He later escaped and found work in nearby Bowie County under the assumed name of Walter Boyd. In January 1918, he was imprisoned at the Imperial Farm (now Central Unit ) in Sugar Land, Texas , after being convicted of killing a relative, Will Stafford, in a fight over a woman. During his second prison term, Lead Belly was stabbed in the neck by another inmate. (The wound resulted in
7260-532: The Lead Belly Foundation. The younger of two children, Lead Belly was born Huddie William Ledbetter to Sallie Brown and Wesley Ledbetter on a plantation near Mooringsport, Louisiana . On his World War II draft registration card in 1942, he gave his birthplace as Freeport, Louisiana ("Shreveport"). There is uncertainty over his precise date and year of birth. The Lead Belly Foundation gives his birth date as January 20, 1889, his grave marker gives
7381-592: The Lomaxes published about Lead Belly in the fall of 1936 proved a commercial failure. In January 1936, Lead Belly returned to New York on his own, without John Lomax, in an attempted comeback. He performed twice a day at Harlem's Apollo Theater during the Easter season. He developed a live dramatic recreation of the March of Time newsreel (itself a recreation), which was about his prison encounter with John Lomax, when he
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#17327988149517502-538: The South as a project to preserve traditional music for the Library of Congress. This was one of numerous cultural projects during the Great Depression. Deeply impressed by Ledbetter's vibrant tenor and extensive repertoire, the Lomaxes recorded him in 1933 on portable aluminum disc recording equipment for the Library of Congress project. They returned with new and better equipment in July 1934, recording hundreds of his songs. While in prison, Lead Belly may have first heard
7623-628: The Texas frontier and attended local schools. He graduated from McGregor High School . He received his bachelor's degree from Baylor University in Waco . He worked for the next two years teaching at Southwestern Academy in Magnolia , Arkansas , to earn money to go to law school. Among his students was Harvey C. Couch , who would later become a successful entrepreneur in Arkansas. Upon returning to Texas, Neff studied and received his law degree from
7744-408: The article as his manager). Other photos showed Lead Belly's hands playing the guitar (with the caption "these hands once killed a man"), Texas Governor Pat M. Neff , and the "ramshackle" Texas State Penitentiary. The article attributes both of his pardons to his singing his petitions to the governors, who were so moved that they pardoned him. The article closed by saying that Lead Belly "may well be on
7865-548: The biggest record companies at the time. These sessions in California were held on June 15 and 17, with the Golden Gate Quartet accompanying some songs. The recordings resulted in the album, The Midnight Special and Other Southern Prison Songs , being issued by Victor Records . The album included sheets with extensive notes and song texts prepared by Alan Lomax. According to Charles Wolfe and Kip Lornell, "it
7986-522: The brink of a new and prosperous period." Lead Belly failed to stir the enthusiasm of Harlem audiences. Instead, he attained success playing at concerts and benefits for an audience of folk music aficionados. He developed his own style of singing and explaining his repertoire in the context of Southern black culture, having learned from his participation in Lomax's college lectures. He was especially successful with his repertoire of children's game songs (as
8107-439: The centrist Republican candidate for president, for whom he wrote a campaign song. Lead Belly also wrote the song " The Bourgeois Blues ", which has class-conscious and anti-racist lyrics. In 1939, Lead Belly was convicted and sentenced again to prison. Alan Lomax, then 24, took him under his wing and helped raise money for his legal expenses, dropping out of graduate school to do so. After gaining release, Lead Belly appeared as
8228-465: The classical suite was based upon stylised folk-dances, and Joseph Haydn 's use of folk melodies is noted. But the emergence of the term "folk" coincided with an "outburst of national feeling all over Europe" that was particularly strong at the edges of Europe, where national identity was most asserted. Nationalist composers emerged in Central Europe, Russia, Scandinavia, Spain and Britain:
8349-446: The complex rhythms of the drum beat. This drum beat may seem simple on the first hearing but it takes a long time to master the intricate rhythms and variations, which the drummer sometimes can bring to a crescendo of intensity. There are six common types of drums falling within 3 styles (one-faced, two-faced, and flat-faced): Other instruments include: Pat Morris Neff Pat Morris Neff (November 26, 1871 – January 20, 1952)
8470-550: The corruption associated with "Pa" Ferguson. Neff served as a member of the Railroad Commission of Texas from 1929 to 1933. After the death of Samuel Palmer Brooks , Neff was nominated to replace him as President of Baylor University. He resigned the post of President of the Board of Trustees, a position that he had held since it was vacated by B. H. Carroll in 1907, upon the nomination as President. In 1947, Neff
8591-546: The elements of nature, and have been enjoyed and developed in the Buddhist environment. The music is of several types and uses only a few types of instruments. The folk songs and poems were used in social gatherings to work together. The Indian influenced classical music has grown to be unique. The traditional drama, music and songs of Sinhala Light Music are typically Sri Lankan. The temple paintings and carvings feature birds, elephants, wild animals, flowers, and trees, and
8712-481: The end of the 1930s these and others had turned American folk music into a social movement. Sometimes folk musicians became scholars and advocates themselves. For example, Jean Ritchie (1922–2015) was the youngest child of a large family from Viper, Kentucky that had preserved many of the old Appalachian traditional songs. Ritchie, living in a time when the Appalachians had opened up to outside influence,
8833-399: The laborers who sing them to coordinate their efforts in accordance with the rhythms of the songs. They are frequently, but not invariably, composed. In the American armed forces , a lively oral tradition preserves jody calls ("Duckworth chants") which are sung while soldiers are on the march. Professional sailors made similar use of a large body of sea shanties . Love poetry , often of
8954-563: The last 20 years of his life working on an Interactive Multimedia educational computer project he called the Global Jukebox , which included 5,000 hours of sound recordings, 400,000 feet of film, 3,000 videotapes , and 5,000 photographs. As of March 2012, this has been accomplished. Approximately 17,400 of Lomax's recordings from 1946 and later have been made available free online. This material from Alan Lomax's independent archive, begun in 1946, which has been digitized and offered by
9075-486: The legacy of Lead Belly, and some modern rock audiences owe their familiarity with Lead Belly to Nirvana's performance of "Where Did You Sleep Last Night" (which Lead Belly called " In the Pines ") on a televised concert later released as MTV Unplugged in New York . Cobain refers to his attempt to convince David Geffen to purchase Lead Belly's guitar for him in an interval before the song is played. In his notebooks, Cobain listed Lead Belly's Last Session Vol. 1 as one of
9196-500: The local New York City market. He later founded Folkways Records . Between 1941 and 1944, Lead Belly released three albums under the Asch Recordings label. During the first half of the 1940s, Lead Belly also recorded for the Library of Congress . Lead Belly frequently performed Southern Blues at concerts by Si-lan Chen . In 1944 he went to California, where he recorded strong sessions for Capitol Records . He lodged with
9317-408: The loss of traditional music is slowed in nations or regions where traditional folk music is a badge of cultural or national identity. Much of what is known about folk music prior to the development of audio recording technology in the 19th century comes from fieldwork and writings of scholars, collectors and proponents. Starting in the 19th century, academics and amateur scholars, taking note of
9438-457: The modern movie Songcatcher . One strong theme amongst folk scholars in the early decades of the 20th century was regionalism , the analysis of the diversity of folk music (and related cultures) based on regions of the US rather than based on a given song's historical roots. Later, a dynamic of class and circumstances was added to this. The most prominent regionalists were literary figures with
9559-502: The money her husband had earned during three months of performing, but in installments, on the pretext that Lead Belly would spend it all on drinking if he was given a lump sum. From Louisiana, Lead Belly successfully sued Lomax for both the full amount of his earnings and release from his management contract. The quarrel was bitter, with hard feelings on both sides. In the midst of the legal wrangling, Lead Belly wrote to Lomax proposing they team up again, but this did not happen. The book that
9680-567: The music of Dvořák , Smetana , Grieg , Rimsky-Korsakov , Brahms , Liszt , de Falla , Wagner , Sibelius , Vaughan Williams , Bartók , and many others drew upon folk melodies. While the loss of traditional folk music in the face of the rise of popular music is a worldwide phenomenon, it is not one occurring at a uniform rate throughout the world. The process is most advanced "where industrialization and commercialisation of culture are most advanced" but also occurs more gradually even in settings of lower technological advancement. However,
9801-591: The musical traditions being lost, initiated various efforts to preserve the music of the people. One such effort was the collection by Francis James Child in the late 19th century of the texts of over three hundred ballads in the English and Scots traditions (called the Child Ballads ), some of which predated the 16th century. Contemporaneously with Child, the Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould and later Cecil Sharp worked to preserve
9922-459: The name after being wounded in the stomach with buckshot . Another theory is that the name refers to his ability to drink moonshine , the homemade liquor that Southern farmers, black and white, made to supplement their incomes. Blues singer Big Bill Broonzy thought it came from a supposed tendency to lie about as if "with a stomach weighted down by lead" in the shade when the chain gang was supposed to be working. However, his strong local accent
10043-487: The name of Walter Boyd, he was convicted of murder in Texas and sentenced to 30 years in prison. After writing a song pleading for clemency Ledbetter was pardoned by Governor Pat Morris Neff in 1925. Thirty years after starting his music career, he was "discovered" in Angola Penitentiary during a 1933 visit by folklorists John Lomax and his son Alan Lomax . They were recording varieties of local music in
10164-586: The news, such as Franklin D. Roosevelt , Adolf Hitler , Jean Harlow , Jack Johnson , the Scottsboro Boys and Howard Hughes . Lead Belly was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988 and the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame in 2008. Though many releases credit him as "Leadbelly", he wrote his name as "Lead Belly". This is the spelling on his tombstone and is used by
10285-417: The office. In 1924 Miriam Wallace "Ma" Ferguson , wife of controversial former Governor James E. Ferguson , won the general election. The Republican nominee , George C. Butte , an American jurist who had opposed James Ferguson's line item veto of the 1917 University of Texas appropriations bill, had a stronger than usual showing. Many voters crossed party lines to vote for him, as they were unhappy with
10406-408: The offices of traditional music collectors Robert Winslow Gordon , Alan Lomax and others to capture as much North American field material as possible. John Lomax (the father of Alan Lomax) was the first prominent scholar to study distinctly American folk music such as that of cowboys and southern blacks. His first major published work was in 1911, Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads . and
10527-705: The other. In the proliferation of popular music genres, some traditional folk music became also referred to as " World music " or "Roots music". The English term " folklore ", to describe traditional folk music and dance, entered the vocabulary of many continental European nations, each of which had its folk-song collectors and revivalists. The distinction between "authentic" folk and national and popular song in general has always been loose, particularly in America and Germany – for example, popular songwriters such as Stephen Foster could be termed "folk" in America. The International Folk Music Council definition allows that
10648-805: The outcomes of battles or lament tragedies or natural disasters . Sometimes, as in the triumphant Song of Deborah found in the Biblical Book of Judges , these songs celebrate victory. Laments for lost battles and wars, and the lives lost in them, are equally prominent in many traditions; these laments keep alive the cause for which the battle was fought. The narratives of traditional songs often also remember folk heroes such as John Henry or Robin Hood . Some traditional song narratives recall supernatural events or mysterious deaths. Hymns and other forms of religious music are often of traditional and unknown origin. Western musical notation
10769-449: The pace of many activities such as planting , weeding , reaping , threshing , weaving , and milling . In leisure time , singing and playing musical instruments were common forms of entertainment and history-telling—even more common than today when electrically enabled technologies and widespread literacy make other forms of entertainment and information-sharing competitive. Some believe that folk music originated as art music that
10890-826: The pair arrived in New York City, where Lomax was scheduled to meet with his publisher, Macmillan , about a new collection of folk songs. The newspapers were eager to write about the "singing convict". Time magazine made one of its first March of Time newsreels about him. Lead Belly attained fame — although not fortune. On January 23–25, 1935, Lead Belly had the first of several recording sessions with American Record Corporation (ARC). These sessions, combined with two others on February 5 and March 25, yielded 53 takes. Of those recordings, only six were ever released during Lead Belly's lifetime. ARC decided to simultaneously release these songs on six different labels they owned: Banner, Melotone, Oriole, Perfect, Romeo, and Paramount. These recordings achieved little commercial success. Part of
11011-400: The preservation of songs as artifacts of deceased cultures. "Functional" folklorists (e.g. Botkin and Alan Lomax) maintained that songs only retain relevance when used by those cultures which retain the traditions which birthed those songs. "Left-wing" folk revivalists (e.g. Charles Seeger and Lawrence Gellert) emphasized music's role "in 'people's' struggles for social and political rights". By
11132-665: The reason for the poor sales may have been that ARC released only his blues songs rather than the folk songs for which he would later become better known. Lead Belly continued to struggle financially. Like many performers, what income he made during his career came from touring, not from record sales. In February 1935, he married his girlfriend, Martha Promise, who came North from Louisiana to join him. During February Ledbetter recorded his repertoire with Alan Lomax, who also recorded other African Americans. Lomax interviewed Ledbetter about his life for their forthcoming book, Negro Folk Songs As Sung by Lead Belly (1936). But his father, who had
11253-538: The recordings in which Lead Belly accompanied himself, he made an unusual type of grunt between his verses, sometimes described as "haah!" Songs such as "Looky Looky Yonder", " Take This Hammer ", "Linin' Track", and "Julie Ann Johnson" feature this unusual vocalization. In "Take This Hammer", Lead Belly explained: "Every time the men say, 'Haah,' the hammer falls. The hammer rings, and we swing, and we sing." The "haah" sound can also be heard in work chants sung by Southern railroad section workers, " gandy dancers ", in which it
11374-541: The sinking of the Titanic in April 1912, Ledbetter wrote the song "The Titanic", his first composition on the twelve-string guitar, which later became his signature instrument. Initially played when performing with Blind Lemon Jefferson (1893–1929) in and around Dallas , Texas, the song is about champion African-American boxer Jack Johnson 's being denied passage on the Titanic . Johnson had in fact been denied passage on
11495-471: The songs they hear. For example, around 1970 the song Mullā Mohammed Jān spread from Herat to the rest of Afghanistan , and Iran where it was recorded. Due to its repetitive refrain and the predictability of the second half of each verse, it allowed for both its popularization, and for each singer to create their own version of the song without being overly-concerned for a melody or restrictive poetic rhythm. Because variants proliferate naturally, there
11616-497: The southern Yangtze area. Jiangnan Sizhu (silk and bamboo music from Jiangnan ) is a style of instrumental music, often played by amateur musicians in tea houses in Shanghai. Guangdong Music or Cantonese Music is instrumental music from Guangzhou and surrounding areas. The music from this region influenced Yueju (Cantonese Opera) music, which would later grow popular during the self-described "Golden Age" of China under
11737-584: The sponsorship of the Washington Post , the festival was held in Washington, DC at Constitution Hall from 1937 to 1942. The folk music movement, festivals, and the wartime effort were seen as forces for social goods such as democracy, cultural pluralism, and the removal of culture and race-based barriers. The American folk music revivalists of the 1930s approached folk music in different ways. Three primary schools of thought emerged: "Traditionalists" (e.g. Sarah Gertrude Knott and John Lomax ) emphasized
11858-565: The term "folk music": newly composed songs, fixed in form and by known authors, which imitated some form of traditional music. The popularity of "contemporary folk" recordings caused the appearance of the category "Folk" in the Grammy Awards of 1959; in 1970 the term was dropped in favor of "Best Ethnic or Traditional Recording (including Traditional Blues)", while 1987 brought a distinction between "Best Traditional Folk Recording" and "Best Contemporary Folk Recording". After that, they had
11979-490: The term can also apply to music that, "...has originated with an individual composer and has subsequently been absorbed into the unwritten, living tradition of a community. But the term does not cover a song, dance, or tune that has been taken over ready-made and remains unchanged." The post– World War II folk revival in America and in Britain started a new genre, Contemporary Folk Music , and brought an additional meaning to
12100-602: The term folk music should be used. Folk music may tend to have certain characteristics but it cannot clearly be differentiated in purely musical terms. One meaning often given is that of "old songs, with no known composers," another is that of music that has been submitted to an evolutionary "process of oral transmission ... the fashioning and re-fashioning of the music by the community that give it its folk character." Such definitions depend upon "(cultural) processes rather than abstract musical types...", upon " continuity and oral transmission ...seen as characterizing one side of
12221-947: The texts of 217,996 Latvian folk songs, the Latvju dainas . In Norway the work of collectors such as Ludvig Mathias Lindeman was extensively used by Edvard Grieg in his Lyric Pieces for piano and in other works, which became immensely popular. Around this time, composers of classical music developed a strong interest in collecting traditional songs, and a number of composers carried out their own field work on traditional music. These included Percy Grainger and Ralph Vaughan Williams in England and Béla Bartók in Hungary. These composers, like many of their predecessors, both made arrangements of folk songs and incorporated traditional material into original classical compositions. The advent of audio recording technology provided folklorists with
12342-530: The then-known variations of both the texts and tunes associated with what came to be known as the Child Canon. He also advanced some significant theories concerning the workings of oral-aural tradition. Similar activity was also under way in other countries. One of the most extensive was perhaps the work done in Riga by Krisjanis Barons , who between the years 1894 and 1915 published six volumes that included
12463-484: The town. Folk music was already, "...seen as the authentic expression of a way of life now past or about to disappear (or in some cases, to be preserved or somehow revived)," particularly in "a community uninfluenced by art music" and by commercial and printed song. Lloyd rejected this in favor of a simple distinction of economic class yet for him, true folk music was, in Charles Seeger 's words, "associated with
12584-478: The traditional folk music of many cultures. This encompasses such forms as traditional epic poetry , much of which was meant originally for oral performance, sometimes accompanied by instruments. Many epic poems of various cultures were pieced together from shorter pieces of traditional narrative verse, which explains their episodic structure, repetitive elements, and their frequent in medias res plot developments. Other forms of traditional narrative verse relate
12705-511: The traditional prison song " Midnight Special "; his versions became famous. On August 1, Ledbetter was released after having served nearly all of his minimum sentence. The Lomaxes had taken a record and a petition seeking his release to Louisiana Governor Oscar K. Allen at his urgent request. It included his signature song, " Goodnight Irene ". A prison official later wrote to John Lomax denying that Ledbetter's singing had anything to do with his release from prison. (State prison records confirm he
12826-658: The twenty-first century many cherished Chinese folk songs have been inscribed in the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity . In the process, songs once seen as vulgar are now being reconstructed as romantic courtship songs. Regional song competitions, popular in many communities, have promoted professional folk singing as a career, with some individual folk singers having gained national prominence. The art, music and dance of Sri Lanka derive from
12947-526: The uncultured classes". The term further derives from the German expression Volk , in the sense of "the people as a whole" as applied to popular and national music by Johann Gottfried Herder and the German Romantics over half a century earlier. Though it is understood that folk music is the music of the people, observers find a more precise definition to be elusive. Some do not even agree that
13068-583: The year 1889, and his 1942 draft registration card states January 23, 1889. These records were made by census takers, and ages and dates were defined in terms of the census date. The 1900 United States Census lists "Hudy Ledbetter" as 12 years old, born January 1888, and the 1910 and 1930 censuses also give his age as corresponding to a birth in 1888. The 1940 census lists his age as 51, with information supplied by wife Martha. The books Blues: A Regional Experience by Eagle and LeBlanc and Encyclopedia of Louisiana Musicians by Tomko give January 23, 1888, while
13189-469: Was a testament to his persuasive powers, as Neff had run for governor on a pledge not to issue pardons (most Southern judicial systems had no provision for approving parole from prison). After meeting Lead Belly in 1924, Neff returned to the prison several times after he was incarcerated again. He brought guests to the prison on Sunday picnics to hear Ledbetter perform. In 1930, Ledbetter was sentenced to Louisiana State Penitentiary (nicknamed "Angola") after
13310-655: Was an American politician, educator and administrator, and the 28th Governor of Texas from 1921 to 1925, ninth President of Baylor University from 1932 to 1947, and twenty-fifth president of the Southern Baptist Convention from 1944 to 1946. He served as Grand Master of Masons in Texas in 1946. Born on his family ranch near the Eagle Springs community in Coryell County, Texas , to Isabella Neff and her husband Noah, Pat Neff grew up on
13431-538: Was arguably the most prominent US folk music scholar of his time, notably during the beginnings of the folk music revival in the 1930s and early 1940s. Cecil Sharp also worked in America, recording the traditional songs of the Appalachian Mountains in 1916–1918 in collaboration with Maud Karpeles and Olive Dame Campbell and is considered the first major scholar covering American folk music. Campbell and Sharp are represented under other names by actors in
13552-424: Was changed and probably debased by oral transmission while reflecting the character of the society that produced it. In many societies, especially preliterate ones, the cultural transmission of folk music requires learning by ear , although notation has evolved in some cultures. Different cultures may have different notions concerning a division between "folk" music on the one hand and of "art" and "court" music on
13673-410: Was eligible for this due to good behavior.) But, both Ledbetter and the Lomaxes believed that the record they had taken to the governor had helped gain his release from prison. Ledbetter returned to a state in the midst of the Great Depression , and jobs were scarce. In September, needing regular work to satisfy parole, he asked John Lomax to take him on as a paid driver. For three months, he assisted
13794-510: Was named Mother Neff State Park . During the resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan during his administration, Neff was criticized for not taking a stronger stance. Neff is notable for his pardon of folk singer Lead Belly in his last days as governor. Neff was reelected in 1922 but did not seek a third term in 1924. At the time, it was "understood" that no governor should run for a third term, although Texas did not have official term limits for
13915-405: Was not possible. Music was made by common people during both their work and leisure, as well as during religious activities. The work of economic production was often manual and communal. Manual labor often included singing by the workers, which served several practical purposes. It reduced the boredom of repetitive tasks, it kept the rhythm during synchronized pushes and pulls, and it set
14036-534: Was one of the finest public presentations of Leadbelly's music: well recorded, well advertised, well documented. And the album justified its reputation as a landmark in African American folk music." Several of the recordings from these sessions were also issued as singles by Bluebird Records . In 1941, Lead Belly was introduced to Moses "Moe" Asch by mutual friends. Asch owned a recording studio and small record label, which mainly released folk records for
14157-411: Was originally created to preserve the lines of Gregorian chant , which before its invention was taught as an oral tradition in monastic communities. Traditional songs such as Green grow the rushes, O present religious lore in a mnemonic form, as do Western Christmas carols and similar traditional songs. Work songs frequently feature call and response structures and are designed to enable
14278-420: Was still wearing uniform stripes. By this time he was no longer associated with Lomax. Life magazine ran a three-page article titled "Lead Belly: Bad Nigger Makes Good Minstrel" in its issue of April 19, 1937. It included a full-page, color (rare in those days) picture of him sitting on grain sacks playing his guitar and singing. Also included was a striking photograph of his wife Martha Promise (identified in
14399-736: Was the first American country blues musician to achieve success in Europe. His final concert was at the University of Texas at Austin in a tribute to his former mentor, John Lomax , who had died the previous year. Martha also performed at that concert, singing spirituals with Lead Belly. Lead Belly died later that year in New York City. He was buried in the Shiloh Baptist Church cemetery, in Mooringsport, Louisiana , 8 miles (13 km) west of Blanchard , in Caddo Parish. He
14520-499: Was university educated and ultimately moved to New York City, where she made a number of classic recordings of the family repertoire and published an important compilation of these songs. In January 2012, the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress , with the Association for Cultural Equity, announced that they would release Lomax's vast archive of 1946 and later recording in digital form. Lomax spent
14641-484: Was used to coordinate work crews as they laid and maintained tracks. In 1976, a biopic titled Leadbelly was released, directed by Gordon Parks and featuring Roger E. Mosley as Lead Belly. In 1951, the Weavers ' recording of their arrangement of Lead Belly's "Irene", released as " Good Night, Irene ", was the first folk song to reach #1 on the U.S. charts, selling some two million copies. Kurt Cobain promoted
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