www.
myblues.
euwww.
myblues.
eu
FROM LASH TO CASH:
ONE STEP ON THE PATH TO THE BLUES
~~
Essay by Erwin Bosman, ©February 2012
The lineage of the blues to the AfricanAmerican slave field hollers, work songs
and spirituals has been endlessly repeated....
More
www.
myblues.
euwww.
myblues.
eu
FROM LASH TO CASH:
ONE STEP ON THE PATH TO THE BLUES
~~
Essay by Erwin Bosman, ©February 2012
The lineage of the blues to the AfricanAmerican slave field hollers, work songs
and spirituals has been endlessly repeated.
Plenty of historical overviews highlight
how these vocal articulations echoed
African cultural elements, and how their
characteristics have had a defining impact
on the development of the blues.
It is safe
to say that, if Africans had not been
captivated and set to work as mere ‘chattel
property’ by Euro-American colonists,
Western musical history would have
sounded very differently.
The ‘sounds of
slaves’ in the American colonial context
have set in motion a cultural development
that, at the end of the day, culminated in
what I believe to be one of the most
impressive and expressive forms of
American, and Western, art.
Yet, a correct
understanding of the mechanisms involved
in the transformation of African modes of
expression to a new
Less
