Mississippi history is a sad history of slavery and oppression. It is a history of racism and refusal to let go of segregationist ideals. Mississippi history is enough to give many the blues. In fact, the Blues style music originated in Mississippi and gravitated outward from there. .Mississippi history and Blues history are intertwined. Delta Blues is a blues style that originated in the Mississippi Delta and influenced many musicians. Another musical art form, Jazz may be considered an offspring from the Blues and also started in the South. There are many Blues musicians and singers that come from Mississippi or have become linked to Mississippi for various reasons. Bessie Smith, Charley Patton, Muddy Waters, and Cassandra Wilson have all made their mark on Mississippi history through the Blues and Jazz music. Although Bessie Smith was not born in Mississippi nor did she make her home there, she will always be known for her tragic and early death there. Blues singer Bessie Smith known as “Empress of the Blues” was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee in 1894. The Blues may have come naturally for Smith. Early in her life, she lost her father before she could even remember. Smith was an orphan by the age of nine having also lost her mother. Furthering her attraction to Blues music, she also lost a brother before she was ten. It is no wonder that she experienced the pains of poverty at this early age. An older sister took over the responsibility of the family, but it could not have been easy. Smith and a brother helped earn money for the family by “busking,” a form of street performance. Another brother left the family to join a traveling vaudeville show. Although his exit was painful and without warning for Smith, it laid the path f... ... middle of paper ... ...in Chicago and transplanted the Blues there. His style of playing became associated with the Chicago Blues style. Blues music is a big part of Mississippi history. Delta Blues is the distinctive style of Blues music that originated in the Mississippi Delta. One of the most famous early women Blues singers, Bessie Smith died in Mississippi and will always be associated with Mississippi. Charley Patton, who spent his entire life in Mississippi, is considered the “Father of Delta Blues”. He influenced many younger Blues player. Muddy waters was born in Mississippi and learned to play the Blues there, but he developed a style of Blues music that influenced Mississippi and beyond. Works Cited http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bessie_Smith http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charley_Patton http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dockery_Plantaion http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muddy_Waters
Ethel Waters was born in Chester, Pennsylvania on October 31, 1896. She had a hard life in which she faced rejection from her mother and poverty. Waters' love of singing began as a child when she sang in church choirs but her childhood was cut short when at thirteen she married an abusive man, dropped out of sixth grade, and was divorced a year later. Shortly thereafter, she began working as a maid until two vaudeville producers discovered her while she was singing in a talent contest in 1917. She toured with vaudeville shows, and was billed as "Sweet Mama Stringbean" because of her height and thinness. In 1919, she left the vaudeville circuit and performed in Harlem nightclubs. Two years later she became one of the first black singers to cut a record on the Black Swan Record label with her release of "Down Home Blues" and "Oh, Daddy".
Secondly, it is important to discuss the people of the state. According to Wikipedia, the 2010 U.S. census stated, “ Mississippi is an ethnic diverse state with 59% of the residents being White, 37% African American, 0.5% American Indian, 0.9% Asian American and 2% other. With this many ethnic group, the area is filled with cultural activities to promote their ethnic backgrounds. Prior to the 1830s there were many tribes of Indians in Mississippi. However, in the 1830s the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek, most of the Indian population was moved to Oklahoma. Now, the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians is located in Philadelphia, Mississippi and the surrounding counties”. According to the same census, “Mississippi has the highest proportion of African American in the nation.
When Bessie graduated from high school, she enrolled in the Colored Agricultural and Normal University, which is now Langston University in Langston, Oklahoma. But with money issues she had to drop out after her first semester because all her savings had run out. But she could have stayed and work, but her mother needed help at home so Bessie gave up school just to help her mom out at home. Not long after that she moved to Chicago in 1915, where her brother was then living, and attended beauty school. She spent her early years in World War 1 working as a manicurist at the White Sox Barber Shop. She operated a small but profitable chili parlor.
Bessie Smith was born April 15, 1894 in Chattanooga, Tennessee. She later in life became known as the “Empress of the Blues”. At the age of eighteen she being traveling with a group by the name of Moss Stokes Company. While with the group she met Ma Rainey who also became a friend and mentor to her. After traveling with the group, in 1923 she was discovered by Columbia Records. After signing with Columbia, she released her first song Downhearted Blues. The song Downhearted Blues went on to sale over 800,000 copies and became one her most popular songs. During the 1920s and 1930s she had become one of the most famous blues singers in America. During that time period Bessie recorded over 160 tracks. Because of the time period many black singers
The blues emerged as a distinct African-American musical form in the early twentieth century. It typically employed a twelve-bar framework and three-lined stanzas; its roots are based in early African-American songs, such as field hollers and work songs, and generally have a melancholy mood. The blues can be divided into many sub-genres, including Classical, Country, and Urban. The purpose of this paper is to focus on the careers of two of Classical blues most influential and legendary singers: Ma Rainey and Bessie Smith.
Working in the fields of Mississippi Delta, Water’s was brought up surrounded by the “field hollers” that provided blues with its distinctive vocal textures. Amongst these were also a number of musicians who were able to begin to break free from the confines of working the fields. Arguably the most notable being that of Robert Johnson who created a body of work which summed up the Delta culture and sound. At first this received little attention outside of Delta but it did influence other blues musicians in the area such as Muddy Waters and this is evident in his early acoustic recordings such as “Country Blues”. Johnson’s recordings also inspired Alan Lomax to visit Delta on behalf of the Library of Congress in search of similar artists. After recording some early acoustic tracks with Lomax, Water’s was able to hear himself back and he later recalled that the experience of hearing himself on these records convinced him he could be a serious professional.(2)
Ragtime and Blues are different in that they originated from different places. Blues developed in the south. Blues is mainly a vocal music. It was emotional, in that the earliest form was singing and hand clapping. The blues started out with slaves because they would use it to sing about their pain and problems. However, ragtime was popular among many Americans and flourished. The term “ragged time” came to be used to describe its key trait which was syncopation. Ragtime music is tuneful, but it is primarily rhythmic. Whereas a blues song can be sung freely by one person, or a chorus, without a strict rhythm, ragtime is more like a march. The popularity of ragtime flourished at world fairs and was welcomed by many people. Both styles
Mississippi is the birth place of the Blues. Music is one way that all people of Mississippi come together in the same place at the same time. Music is alive and well at church, in community buildings, and even schools. African-American culture has cr...
It is very difficult to determine the exact origin of the blues. Although its earliest roots evolved from West Africa, the blues probably emerged in the United States around the 1800's relative to the African America plight into slavery, as spirituals, work songs, and "arhoolies" (traditional, vernacular, or regional music) (The Arhoolie Foundation). All had some form of influence on the blues as a distinct form of music. The emergence of the blues would have occurred with the social and economic circumstances of the African Americans. (Crosby) Blues was a way of communicating discontent. But it was the spiritual blues that was the music of an unhappy people - the music that told of death, and suffering, and a cry for some hope of freedom and liberation from their torment. Yes, the slaves did get their freedom but were still bound to their "Chains" by racism.
What exactly was the Civil Rights movement in Mississippi? It was a time during the 1960s that had affected people even up to this day, and had also initiated the formations of documentaries and cinematic material that were created to renovate events. It was a time when the privilege and opportunity of drinking from a publicly-used water fountain depended on your race and color of skin. A not so recent film, Mississippi Burning, was produced in order to show detailed happenings that occurred during this time period. The movie talks about many characters that actually existed throughout history. It was shocking to experience the way people were treated in Mississippi. People were murdered for racist reasons, organizations were created to pursue horrible deeds, and people that were looked up upon were a part of these organizations. This film reenacts certain situations and was talked about frequently when it was first released. Reviews stated that the movie was somewhat historically accurate. However there were also those who explained that the film was superficial in a way that abused what really did happen during that time. Mississippi Burning was historically factual in introducing characters who were actually alive during this time. However it failed to realistically demonstrate how actual quarrels took place, and included unnecessary, dramatic events for entertainment and economic reasons.
Most people know Mississippi for its music such as; gospel, blues, jazz music, and rock and roll. But it is much more than the creator of blues it is much deeper than that. Mississippi wasn’t Mississippi at first it was discovered by European travelers. The first major European expedition into the territory that became Mississippi was that of Hernando Desoto to who passed through in 1540. Another part of Mississippi was claimed by the French. They claimed territory that included Mississippi as part of their colony of New France and started settlement. Did you know a lot of Mississippi’s counties and parts are named after Indian tribes that were here hundreds of years ago? They included the Natchez, the Yazoo, the Pascagoula, and the Biloxi. Hundreds of years ago Mississippi was controlled by a lot of people. On December.10, 1817, the western portion of Mississippi territory became the state of Mississippi, the 20th state of the union. A lot of people think that Jackson was always the state capital it wasn’t. Natchez was the capital of Mississippi first; the capital was moved to Jacks...
Elizabeth “Bessie” Coleman was born on January 26, 1892 to Susan and George Coleman who had a large family in Texas. At the time of Bessie’s birth, her parents had already been married for seventeen years and already had nine children, Bessie was the tenth, and she would later have twelve brothers and sisters. Even when she was small, Bessie had to deal with issues about race. Her father was of African American and Cherokee Indian decent, and her mother was black which made it difficult from the start for her to be accepted. Her parents were sharecroppers and her life was filled with renter farms and continuous labor. Then, when Bessie was two, her father decided to move himself and his family to Waxahacie, Texas. He thought that it would offer more opportunities for work, if he were to live in a cotton town.
Known as the “Empress Of Blues”, Bessie Smith was said to have revolutionized the vocal end of Blues Music. She showed a lot of pride as an independent African-American woman. Her style in performance and lyrics often reflected her lifestyle. Bessie Smith was one of the first female jazz artists, and she paved the way for many musicians who followed.
The Blues started in the late 1800's in levee camps or plantations in places like Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas were many African Americans lived. The blues of that time was called country blues. It was a mixture of African music, field hollers, work songs, religious music, and ragtime.
Bessie Smith is the best blues singer of the twentieth century because the legacy she left behind still affects us today. Bessie Smith is known as the “Empress of Blues”, and this title is well deserved. Bessie Smith is the most influential and significant blues singer of the twentieth century. Bessie Smith's ability to have full control over the genre was amazing because it allowed her to have a soulful but powerful performance ("Bessie Smith Queen of the Blues"). Smith's work ethic that was drilled in by her older sister helped her launch and continue on with her successful career. Because of Smith's work ethic, she was able to rise out of poverty and into fame (Forman). Bessie Smith influenced many other singers like Billie Holiday, Janis Joplin, and more ("Bessie Smith"), and she also had role in changing the musical landscape for African American women (Machado). During her prime, Bessie Smith sold thousands of records and was well paid ("Bessie Smith Queen of the Blues"). She signed with Columbia Records and the focus of her songs were about a woman's control over her body and sexuality (Machado). Smith's success gave hope to