Is the Blues Folk Music?

The blues is such a distinct and popular genre of music with multiple styles and interpretations of it. But is this popular well know genre of music folk music? Most would agree that the blues is a family member of folk music but there are aspects within the blues that can be considered to stray away from folk music.

It can be noted that the blues origins stem from the African slaves that were forced over to American. The blues first took form of simple work songs and eventually developed into something bigger. It developed into its own genre with numerous styles and has become woven into the fabric of American music. The foundation of what makes the blues a relative of folk music is that "...blues songs are adapted and passed along in traditional folk manner" (Wald 111)much like the folk songs of immigrants that came to the new world. The passing down of songs from generation to generation is the life blood of folk music. The passing down of songs is one of the corner stones of the blues. In folk music there are aspects within the music that can be found from other cultural folk music. The blues has been "...quoted with some lyrics that were popular with colored soldiers in France"(Wald 111). There are major foundations in folk music that are found in the blues and are major corner stones of it.

But there are also aspects in the fabric of the blues that are considered to stray away from the ways of folk music. One major part is that the blues is often "...regarded as a pop rather than folk style specifically, as a variety of ragtime" (Wald112). To some people regard he blues as popular music rather than apart of folk music.

Folk music, especially the blues, and commercial interest have interacted since the early twentieth century. It began when"commercial record companies began seriously recording regional country, blues. and gospel artists simultaneous to radio's first days" (Lornell 51).  As these folk styles became popular within the regions they originated from there became an increasing want to record and broadcast the music. These songs recordings would be advertised in "newspapers and magazines advertisement...in monthly releases" (Lornell 51). This interaction does affect these cultural traditions because it forms them into a main stream mold that transforms the style into what they people want to hear rather than keep it traditional. It is great that folk songs of a people are broadcast out throughout the nation. But with that the folk music seems to lose its value and originality.

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The Blues and nothing but the Blues

The blues is weaved  into the fabric of American music, It is one of those generations of American that has adapted and grown since it was developed by the African American. The music itself contains different aspects and takes on it. Musicologist Robert Palmer has found features within the blues.
What we know as the blues was considered as "black country" and its origins are derived from the African slaves that were forced to America in the eighteen hundreds. These song were used during work time to pass the time and to entertain the mind through he long mundane tasks. These songs are lead by a single singer and are comprised of improvised short lines. This songs generally took on Biblical, romantic, or of themes of struggle. Through the generation this music has modeled to the specific ways of that time but still retaining its principles.
The blues, like with any form of music, can hold different definitions to different people. Musician Elijah Wald defines the blues as first being black popular music that derived from folk of poor background. It was used to help other folk understand the problems and aspirations of folk on the on the street or out in the country. Later down the road music formed into something entirely different that being played for a white cult audience that picked up on the blues and interpreted it as there own,
Wald also strongly advocated for a blues musician named Robert Johnson who like Charley Patton, did not want become a superstar of the music or make it into the mainstream. Rather he aspired to make genuine blues popularized. All though he did not make a dent during his time of perform his work played more of an impacted down the road because he became the primary example of pure blues.
Blues music started out as simple work songs but later evolved into one of the strongest forms of music we know today. There are many variations to the music but may try to keep it pure like Robert Johnson. But the blues is music of the folk.






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Caribbean music is vivacious and spirited with a wide variety of styles and influences. Caribbean music itself can be divided into five different themes.

1. Race and Ethnicity
Caribbean music has French, Puerto Rican, American, and African influence and songs reflect on ethnically while at the same time prompting cultural indemnity.

2. Music Sex and Sexism
The music reflects love betrayal, and loss it also reflects the struggles of male and female roles in Caribbean society.

3. Caribbean International
Due to Caribbean's migrating to North America their music has spread to such cities as San Diego, Cleveland, New York, and Detroit, these songs also reflect living in such cities.

4.Unity/Diversity in Continent of Islands
Caribbean Islands divided politically, geographically, language, and political domain and can be dived into three cultural zones, Spanish, French, and English. All are influenced musically be American popular music such as R&B.

5. Music and Politics
Within the Caribbean there is a lot of toil, poverty, and repressive/corrupt government and music has been a form of escape from it while at the same time reflects these trails.

These themes together build the foundation of Caribbean music as a whole. Each theme brings an interesting aspect to the music.


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Hawaiian American

There are multiple ethnic ties with the Hawaiian music. It’s predominately vocal with a connection to mana. Songs consists of mele and hula interprets it. 

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Franco-American Cajun, Zydeco, Northeastern

French colonist settled in Louisiana where they intermingled with natives mixing their two cultures into Cajun. Cajun music mix of two cultures, the French brought their fiddle and folk songs, the Natives high pitched style. Zydeco is a subset of Cajun music. Franco’s in northeast sang bawdy songs called gaulois. 

                                              

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The Music of the Hispanic Americans

Like most folk music of immigrants that came to America "Hispanic American folk music and folk based music is very closely related to the styles brought from their native countries" (Lornell 251). There are many styles of Hispanic American folk this is especially true in Texas where music and other forms of Hispanic culture is group under the name "Tex-Mex".  the music and culture is highly concerted along the broader of Mexico and Texas. Styles of Hispanic American folk music that can be found there is Corridos, Mariachi, and Conjunto.

Conjunto music particularly is used in constructing and affirming identity for the Hispanic American folk. Conjunto "...reflects it's origins in Northerner Mexico" and is the  "...most prominent form of folk music along he boarder" (Lornell 257). It is the music of the blue collar men and women of society and it "...remains to this day the everyday music of working-class Texas Mexicans and Mexican "Nortenos" (Northerners)" (Pena). The music helps to preserve a Mexican working class culture. Its establishes the identity of the folk in society in regards to social class and it gives these folk a voice. This ideology of the Mexican working culture was carried over and rooted in America because Conjunto music helped to construct and affirm it in the soil of the new land. Another example of a folk where music serves as a similar purpose were the Irish. There songs were of the working class much like the Hispanics and their music. 

The experience of the Hispanic immigrants  were similar to those of other immigrants that came to the America. These other groups included the African Americans, the Irish, Scottish, and English. Their songs were of the working folk and their music help to preserve it the identity and affirm it in the new world. The Hispanic Americans musical response focused heavily on their native countries folkways and ideologies. Although American folkways did touch the music of the Hispanic Americans, but it did not over take it and completely change over the generations like other music of other immigrants groups such as the Germans and the their Polka. The African Americans take on music reflected the inner struggles of oppression and the Anglo Cowboys of the west sang songs that provoked their loneliness. These groups did not maintain the music of their native lands like that of the Hispanic Americans.

Hispanic American is heavily based on their native country's music from style, to form, to what instruments are used. There are many styles of Hispanic music especially in the region of the Texas and Mexican boarder (Tex-Mex region). Conjunto is one particular style of music that affirms the Hispanic folks identity as a working class people.


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The German The Polish and The Polka

 Ethnomusicologist Kip Lornell advocates that "today's polka music and dance is distinctly American". Lornell says that "because it has been over one hundred years since many of northern Europeans immigrated to the United States" (Lornell 236). These northern Europeans (the Germans and Polish) brought their forms of music to the new world. They hoped to sustain their culture and sustain their identity as a folk through their music in the melting pot of the new world. They strive to keep their folks ways alive with their music by handing it down to their children who were born in America but as generation from generation carried the music it adapted to the folk ways of America to a point where it became what it was not intended to become, American.

The music of polka has intertwined into the fabric of American folkways It as taken on new forms and styles making it the music American. Such styles include "Chicago style polka which has a distinctive sound and performance" (Bohlam Encyclopedia of Chicago). The polka way and music has become distinctly American.

The immigration experience for the Germans Poles, Czechs, and the Scandinavians in the Midwest differed greatly to that of the English, Irish and Scottish in the Appalachian region and the Africans down south. When the English , Irish, and Scottish came to America they came at a time when America was taking mass amounts of immigrants, They experienced great struggle trying to find work and make a new life for themselves. The Africans were stolen from their home land and forced to live in southern plantation. They experienced the great struggle due to the great oppression of the their white counter parts. While the northern Europeans on the other hand came to America after the second world war when the immigrants had been established and it was easier to gain a new life in America. The path was already cleared for them from their previous European brothers who ventured into the new world.

Not only were their experiences different but their musical response also differed. The musical responses of the English, Irish, and Scottish consisted of old English ballads that had been handed down from their parents parents and songs that describe life in the Appalachian region. The Africans response was emotional. Songs provoked inner emotional struggle working on a plantation and the pain of discrimination. The northern Europeans take was purely jovial which made for polka and dance music. The polka music was a way to define the folk as a people in a new world.

When immigrants came to the new world the brought with their luggage and their music. With their music they hoped to preserve their way of life so that it could be handed to the next generation. But with the passing down of music to generation to generation the music adapted and changed to the American folk ways much like the polka music of the Germans and polish. Each immigrant group also had their own response to music ranging from inner struggles to festive dances.


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John Lomax and The Cowboys

John Lomax was enthnomusicologist in the early twentieth century. He grew up in Texas and was exposed to cowboy songs and frontier songs growing up in the area were he lived. He later attended University of Texas at Austin where he majored in  English Literature and later on went off to collect ballads of cowboys after he graduated.  He spent many years out south and west collecting ballads of the cowboys and of the frontiersmen. An anthology of his collected data entitled Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads was later written after his years in the field.

Who were the cowboys of which Lomax put so much time and effort into studying? When the thought of a cowboy comes to most peoples minds an imagine of the typical romanticized man is imagined. In reality these people were "...illiterate people, and people cut off from news papers and books, isolated and lonely" (Lomax xvii), not really the typical image that comes to mind. The were rough and rugged men that lived "...in the canons of the Rocky Mountains, among the mining camps of Nevada and Montana, and on the remote cattle ranges of Texas, New Mexico and Arizona" (Lomax xvii). They were lonely men living and working in the rough conditions of the land they lived on. They worked laborious jobs of miner, rangers, and desolate cattlemen. They lived out in the the open fields of the west, the cold Rockies of Colorado, and out in the scorching deserts of New Mexico and Arizona.

Most of their time was consumed with their work of mining and ranching, but between they were "...thrown back on primal resources for entertainment and for the expression of emotion they utter to themselves to somewhat the same character of songs as did their forefathers of perhaps one thousand years ago" (Lomax xvii).  They sang songs of that evoke their inner emotions and struggles of lonesomeness tied in with the struggle of the work they did. These songs held similar to old Anglo-Saxon ballads of their ancestors and Lomax found the connection between the two. He would reference these ballads to great epics such as Beowulf and classic Anglo stories such as Sir Galahad and King Arthur. He made these connection because he found that these ballads of these rugged men out west of North America correlated to these stories and with Anglo-Saxon music and litterateur. Lomax was a English Literary Major and study in great depth of such English works and he was able to connect the dots between the two.


John Lomax study the cowboys and frontiersmen of the North American and was able to construct an anthology of all the ballads he collected over the years of study out in the field. The vision of  the romanticized cowboys that we invasion in out head greatly differed from that of the reality. These men worked hard out in the rough terrain of the land on which they lived on. When the time came when they were not working they would sing songs in the camps where they lived that express their lonesomeness and emotional struggle of working out in the land. John Lomax was able to find the correlation between the ballads of the rugged cowboys and that of the Anglo-Saxon ballads and literature.


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