The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1900-05-27
THE REAL NEGRO MUSIC.
DON'T SEEK FOR IT IN ARTIFICI'
ALLY MADE "COON SONGS"

theatres Musical Taste Of the Race -
weird Places where Their Real Music u
sang - Is Origin and Its Expression.
A%LRxANpRIA A, La, May Announcement
IN q recent issue Of THE Sun that a band OF all
nero performers would give Carmen" IN the
Lexington Avenue Opera House in New York
city aroused considerable interest in this
rsgion and there we're a good many predictions
Of the result. These predictions, In the man.
asreed that the negroes would sing well ana
that they would act fairly well though the
acting would bear. necessarily. traces oil ANA
tsurishness-but IL was contended that the
performance would not be markedly diner
emit from a performance given by white people
OF talent and training, leaving out OF question
the timbre OF the negro voice, which no amount
Of cultivation can destroy. though II Is some
times marred by teachers. These predictions
were based on the fact that the negro on ths
eta4e cannot be induced 10 sing like a negro.
He sings, or endeavors to sing, Ike r white
vocalist. The end Of II is that hi is not genuine
and in that sense IL Disappointing. although he
makes az good music As one would care To hear,
The experiment has been tried many times OF
gathering in the South and sending out an all
negro minstrel company. The members Of u
did not act themselves. They acted negroes
As they had seen white minstrels act them and
there was not a tradition Of negro minstrelsy
handed down from Steve Foster and Dan
Bryant and the Christys which they violated.
They had the olio. the interlocutor. the -four
end men. the shop-worn almanac gags. the sem
timental balladists, who sang in shaky amman
Of hons and mother or the strayed girl, the fell
low who tells the audience that he has adver-
tlsed for a bootblack when a tough coon staggers
in. walls his eyes and plays every instrument
from a cows horn To a concert grand me
knockabout pair. the whole business. They
soloed and quartetted and chorused white
mans music in imitation of negro music as
white men have sung in imitation or negro
singers for seventy-fve wears.
Naturally. being an imitation OF an imita-
ton, they did not draw well and, after disastrous
seasons Of greater or less length. the mem
hers Of them split and earned their livlngs in
vaudeville, where they do well. II is notlcea-
BILE, however. that they do better in proportion
as they become more themselves and less a
white travesty Of themselves. The success OF tho
comedy team, Williams and Walker, both ne
croes. is due to the fact that the pair OF them,
and notably the lengthy Williams, are not df-
ferent on the stage from what they are on II.
The most prominent instance Of the Afro
American CultlNdltu 10 TIE lUINN -StthilN '
gree is Nme. Sissieretta Jones. heralded long
sgo by an enthusiastic press agent as the
Black Patti" Nine Jones is thorough IN coll
oratura and trills and roulades and bravuras 10
beat the band. but she does not sing in any way
like a negress. Even in the simpler songs which
she gives as encores she is out Of her race, She
renders Way Down On the Suwanee River
palpably as Emma Abbott used to give it, and
- ,aaa zn,a ., ata1,s .,nInllAH
upon the white PATHS. though. of course, il is
not the same thing, by much. This Is not say
ing that Nine Jones does not sing well, for she
does. She sings with taste, good execution and
her voice is good But, facing the footlights,
in dscollete white silk aud flashing with dla-
monds. she is not one-hall 20 much like the
negress Of the South "a she Is like a prima
donna of the second-clas, from southern Italy,
OF the unsteady talented negro sent through
the schools. Southern experience, at least,
teaches that he is apt to nave a competent voice
and a competent ear, H,strionic ability often
Is not lacking. He Is industrious, sober. learns
readily. memories well and develops into a
genuinely good musician, but he has never had
the power to represent or portray the peculiar
musical genius OF his people II Is trained out
OF him or associated out of him during his years
Vi Itclutltt III lHN kl'hN ~ - ''A'' ''''
hourly contact with whites of his profession.
Uncharitable persons find in this some sort
of backing for their declaration that the Afro
American has merely the initiative and not the
creative faculty. but NE assertion i unfair
The chances are that if a white youth We're sent
to a negro college OF music. surrounded always
by negroes. listening always TO negro singing
and taught by negroes. he would come to sing
~ atfaYnnf IN Stnu A. tho navrp vi Vns songs
Many times in Louisiana wealthy planters, find
ing among their tenants some male or female
voice Of exquisite beauty. have educated its
possessor. in the hope that he or she would ba
able to show the world what negro singing IS
when rendered by one IN whom II is bred In
this sense the experiment has been consistently
a failure. though in n majority Of cases the
beneAciaries have developed into competent
men and women. able 10 earn their livings
through vocali2arion and manitNsting the in
eradicable negro sense of gratitude for favors
received.
People in the North and East for the most
part do not know genuine negro music, because
they have not heard il. They have heard So
called negro melodies, mostly Of a comic char
acter, written by white hacks. The German
composer, long-haired, fat and choked up
with beer and pretnels: the French composer.
sallow and thin. who has been toying with that
fairy with the green eyes, absinthe, the Ital-
ian composer. toting his burden Of spa ghctti
and red ink and kotowing az the shrinos Of
Verdi and Donizetti. are followers Of widely
variant prophets hut when il comcs 10 writing
A NEGRO melody" they are ms one, They string
some notes along a staff almost any theme will
do, inst 50 II he old enongh-syncopate II pro-
fusely, write a raC-time accompaniment. give
bohemian" newspaper man 81 10 write stan2as
In alleged dialect. entitle the moss "tiwinc Ter
XIII All de Yaller Coons" and the deed is done.
They imagine that they have something really
representative Of the six or seven millions Of
American negroes. This imagining Is natural.
since outside Of Thompson street they have
never seen twenty negroes together,
Negro music made by negroes. the express
sions Of untaught minds striving for harmonies.
do not betray excessive syncope. The hearts
Of these people do not beat In syncopation. :
like Chopin's in the first flush If his Partisan
success, The syncope has been placed as a
brand upon music that is spuriously neCroid nv
the inhuman producers Of popular" stun 4
partial definition of s%vncopation ia: \ dis
placement If the accent nv driving II 10 an IN
accented pulse, producing a momentary dis
eonance. That is IA near ms n man may como
to II in few words 4 strong instance Of II ia
the horrible Telegraph Nah BABY " which il
as little like an unsecured plantation sons n any
thing in all the wide range of music II ia
worthy Of remark that when n genuine negro
melody is taken from negro lips and sung from
the stage 1t becomes popular. whether II be