Download Diapositiva 1

• MUSIC IN THE UNITED
STATES OF AMERICA
How many different kinds of
music do you know?
How big is the family tree of
American rock music?
• Now listen to these songs. How many
kinds of music can you recognise?
• The music of the United States reflects the
country's multiethnic population. The country's
most famous kinds of music are hip hop, gospel,
blues, country, rhythm and blues (R ‘n’ B), jazz,
pop, techno and house, rock and roll and heavy
metal. The United States has the world's largest
music market and we can hear its music all
around the world. American music has
influenced many cultures all over the world.
Many American cities and towns have a strong
music identity and they produced particular
styles of music. For example cities like
Philadelphia, Seattle, New York City, San
Francisco, New Orleans, Detroit, Chicago,
Atlanta, Nashville and Los Angeles.
• Native Americans were the first inhabitants of
North American. All the different people who
came to America after the Native Americans
brought their music. From the 17th century
immigrants from Europe arrived and African
slaves came with their musical traditions. The
first white European settlers came from England,
Scotland and Ireland and they wrote folk music
in English. The word “folk” means “of the
common people”. These European immigrants
played the guitar, the mandolin, the banjo, the
harmonica, the piano and the drum.
Oh Susanna
The song “Oh Susanna” was written by
Stephen Collins Foster in 1848. It is one of
the most popular American songs of all
times. In 1949 it became a sort of anthem
for the pioneers that travelled to the Wild
West during the Gold Rush. Most of them
were gold diggers who were going to
California and to the Rocky Mountains to
look for gold. While they were travelling
they listened and sang this song.
• In the first line we read that the singer
comes from “Alabama”, a rural state in the
south of the USA, where in 1860 one
million people lived. Half of them were
black slaves from Africa.
• Then we read that the singer carries a
banjo on his knee”. A banjo is a musical
instrument of African origins that was easy
to play and easy to carry around because
it was light. It had 3, 4 or 5 strings. Today
in the USA it is still popular in country and
folk music.
The singer is going to “Louisiana”. This state
was called after the name of the French King
Louis XIV, who colonized this area in the 17th
century. The capital of this state is New Orleans,
still famous for its French Quarter and the typical
French (European) Carnival called in French
“Mardi Gras”. Napoleon sold this state to the
USA in 1803.
Later the singer says “I come from Dixieland”.
The word “Dixie” is a nickname for the southern
United States. This name comes from the
French word “dix” (that means “10”), that was
written in French on a 10 dollar bill in a bank in
New Orleans.
The word "Dixie" today also refers to the
11 Southern States that during the Civil
War (or Secession War, 1861-1865) got
separated from the rest of the USA to
form the Confederate States of America.
These states were: South Carolina,
Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia,
Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Arkansas,
North Carolina, and Tennessee.
Some lyrics in the song are nonsense: “ It
rain'd all night the day I left, The weather it
was dry, The sun so hot I froze to death...”
and later “ I shut my eyes to hold my
breath...”
The original version of this song is also
offensive to black people. In fact this was
one of the first songs in history with the the
word “nigger”. The singer sang “And I
killed five hundred niggers”. Today the
word “nigger” is extremely rude and
offensive in English speaking countries. In
the USA people use the word “coloured” or
more often the word “black” or “African
American”.
However you can often hear the word
“nigger” (or “nigga”) among black
teenagers and young people in the USA,
especially in hip hop and rap songs. But
be careful, only black people, not white
people, can use this word for their
“brothers” or, as they call themselves, their
“bros” ! ….You don’t want to end up like
Bruce Willis in the film “Die Hard” !?
• If you ever visit the black neighbourhood
Harlem in New York, just don’t do this…
Clementine
The song “Oh my darling Clementine” (1884) is
sung by a man who is talking about the loss of
his darling, the daughter of a miner in the 1849
California Gold Rush. The Americans bought the
state of California from Mexico in 1848. In 1849,
when they discovered gold mines, it became the
fastest growing state in North America. The
small port village of San Francisco in northern
California, not far from the mines in the
mountains, in a couple of years became a city
with 30.000 people and today it has over
800.000 people.
However this song isn’t a real sad
romantic ballad but it is a parody of a sad
ballad and there are many funny
moments. “Clementine's feet are so big
that she has to wear boxes instead of
shoes (because there aren’t any size 9
shoes). What’s size 9 in Italy?
Another funny fact is that her "tragic
demise" is caused by a splinter in her toe
that makes her fall and drown – clearly a
ridiculous accident.
Finally, at the end of the song, the lover
forgets his lost love after one kiss from
Clementine's "little sister".
John Brown's body
In 1859 John Brown transformed his farm in West Virginia
into a fortress, where white and black people could live
together. He stole a lot of weapons from the Army, he took
many hostages and he declared that all black slaves in
America should be set free.
He fought for one day against the American Army but then
he surrendered. He was hung.Still today some people see
him as a crazy terrorist. Some other people see him as the
first man who fought for the abolishment of slavery.
Two years after his death, in 1861 the American
Civil War (Secession War) started when the
Southern slave states declared their secession
from the USA and formed the Confederate
States of America (called "Confederacy" or
"South"). This war began because the southern
stated didn’t want slavery to be abolished, since
they made a lot of money in the plantations
where African slaves grew cotton, tobacco, rice,
cocoa, coffee, sugar cane. The war finished in
1865 when the Confederacy was defeated and
slavery abolished.
The northern soldiers used this song about John
Brown as their anthem.