CHAPTER 2 | FURTHER READING 61
And since the laws of the time held that the song could not be copyrighted in the
Un ited States because it orig inated in England, many A merican music publishers
rushed their own editions into print. By 1870 American performers of virtually
every stripe could buy a sheet music version tailored to their own needs. Singers
interpolated the song into stage performances, seeking to touch the hearts of
audience members for whom it was already a kind of anthem.
“Home, Sweet Home” was performed in most of the settings that made up
America’s musical landscape—the theatrical and concert stage, the parlor, the
dance hall, the parade ground, the battlefi eld, the campfi re—and was one of the
best-loved melodies of the nineteenth century.The history of secular music in the early republic traces a growing demand for
professional standards of creation, performance, and presentation. The rising
sophistication of musical tastes was by no means uniform among the varied pop-
ulations of the young United States, however. The next chapter returns to the
subject of sacred music to explore widening divisions in Americans’ conceptions
of the best qualities and purposes for devotional music.QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION AND REVIEW
- How did amateur and professional musical activities overlap in early Amer-
ica? Do amateur and professional musicians interact in any of the same ways
today, and if so, how? - Contrast and compare social dancing in early and present-day America. Do
different styles of dance mark different social groups, and if so, how? - Compare the presence of popular songs in early American theatrical genres
with the use of contemporary popular songs in today’s Broadway musicals,
films, and television programs. Are there present-day equivalents of any of
the three principal genres: ballad opera, pasticcio, and comic opera?
FURTHER READING
Camus, Raoul François. Military Music of the American Revolution. Chapel Hill: University of
North Carolina Press, 1967.
Dizikes, John. Opera in America: A Cultural History. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press,
1993.
Keller, Kate van Winkle, with John Koegel. “Secular Music to 1800.” In The Cambridge His-
tory of American Music, edited by David Nicholls, 49–77. Cambridge: Cambridge Uni-
versity Press, 1998.
McConachie, Bruce A. Melodramatic Formations: American Theatre and Society, 1820–1870.
Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1992.
Porter, Susan L. With an Air Debonair: Musical Theatre in America, 1785–1815. Washington, DC:
Smithsonian Institution Press, 1991.
Silverman, Kenneth. A Cultural History of the American Revolution. New York: Crowell, 1976.
Sonneck, Oscar G. Early Concert-Life in America (1731–1800). 1907. Reprint. New York: Da
Capo, 1978.172028_02_044-062_r3_ko.indd 61 23/01/13 8:14 PM