Folk Songs
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996
From: Rob Forbes
Subject: Folk Songs Query
A student of mine is interested in pursuing a senior essay on Civil War-era folksongs. He is particularly interested in Irish folk music as well, and if sufficient source material exists, would like to combine the two and look at Irish-American folksongs of the Civil War. Suggestions would be appreciated.
Rob Forbes
Department of History
Yale University
New Haven, CT 06520
Tel.: (203)432-0714 Fax: (203)773-9777
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996
From: David Deacon
Subject: Folksong query
This can be a fruitful area of study, and fun if the student is into singing. A little warning, however, that there have been a lot of popular books that give pretty easy answers. Irish (Celtic, ugh) music and the Civil War are both hip, and what with Jay Unger and Ken Burns . . . . It pays to be skeptical especially of fan oriented stuff.
That said, there is some good stuff. First of all, historical aspects of Irish-Americans in the Civil War, Thomas Francis Meagher, Thomas Mitchell, Northern and Southern, the Fenians right after the war. You can find songs in unlikely places. Of course, Kirby Miller's work should be of use.
I would start in the index by Malcolm Laws, _Native American Ballads_ or some such title. Of course the Journal of American Folklore is another good place to look. Then individual collections, which tend to be state or region oriented. Vance Randolph's _Folk Songs of the Ozarks_ has quite a bit of Civil War material, "Brother Green," and the like. "The Cumberland Crew," about the battle between the USS Cumberland and the CSS Virginia was sung to the tune of Lannigan's Ball in Nova Scotia (Helen Creighton did a collection with that song in it). The boundary between folk and popular music has been pretty obscure frequently--"The Bonny Blue Flag" was set to the tune of "The Low Back Car," the text of which was written by Samuel Lover. Brendan Breathnach's work on Irish music would be a good introduction to the melodic aspects of Irish music. It seems to me that there should be some recent stuff published, or recorded even. Mick Moloney, folklorist and musician, is the great authority on Irish American music these days.
David Deacon
Syracuse University
Date: Fri, 3 May 1996
From: David Herr
Subject: Folk Songs - 2 responses
One place to start when researching Civil War era folk songs would be with a gentleman by the name of Bobby Horton, one of the top Civil War song researchers (in my opinion) and recording artists. You can contact Mr. Horton via mail at 3430 Sagebrook Lane, Birmingham, AL 35243. He has an extensive archive of songs in his private collection, and if there's anyone that knows anything about CW music, this is the fellow (and a darn nice guy he is too).
Karel Lea Biggs
Ohio Civil War Association
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JMV@GWUVM.GWU.EDU writes:
An outstanding source for ethnic music in the US is the seven volume set of LPs (boy does that sound dated) produced by the Library of Congress for the US bi-centennial in 1976. Called "Ethnic Music in America" it is accompanied by extenisve liner notes. The author of this material is Richard K. Spottswood. While the eariest recording included are late 19th century many of the songs of Civil War era vintage. Spottswood currently produces a weekly music program for WAMU in Washington, D.C., a local NPR outlet at The American University. Some of his programs "revisit" such topics as the Irish in America and civil war memories.
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