SPOTLIGHT ON HISTORYSPOTLIGHT ON HISTORY
Ground Rules of Blackface Minstrelsy
T
he writing of history encourages a mode
of objectivity that exempts scholars from
the burden of judging the actions of their
historical subjects. But that pose can be hard to
maintain where the commercial success of black-
face minstrelsy is concerned. Scholarly protocols
weigh against classifying even obvious oppression
as evil. In this case, however, not only was a legally
oppressed people denied personhood in a land con-
stitutionally committed to democracy, but many of
the distinctive ways these individuals found to cope
with life under such a regime were, in effect, stolen
from them by commercial entertainers as well. W hat
the entertainers “borrowed” was an African-tingedpersona—skin color, physical mannerisms, ways of
moving and speaking and of making music—that,
through the skills of artists like themselves, proved
to be imitable and profi table too, because audi-
ences throughout the English-speaking world found
blackface minstrelsy delightful to watch and fun to
imitate. It goes almost without saying that permis-
sion to borrow was not requested, nor did the lenders
share in the profi ts. Moreover, the stage persona was
grounded in the assumption of inferiority that rac-
ism carries with it. The sense of entitlement behind
this transaction—in effect a large-scale pattern of
humiliation and robbery—needs to be kept in mind
as the story of “the Ethiopian business” unfolds.Serenaders was invited to play at the White House. Spurred by popular demand,
countless minstrel troupes were formed: the African Melodists, the Congo
Minstrels, the Gumbo Family, the New Orleans Serenaders. Companies fl our-
ished along the Mississippi and in the cities of the Northeast, and the growing
railroad system made touring easier. But the center of blackface entertainment
was New York City; by the 1850s at least ten minstrel houses were open there, and
a few companies enjoyed consecutive runs of several years or more.
Minstrelsy was the fi rst musical genre to reverse the east-to-west transatlantic
fl ow of performers. Until Americans began to perform on stages in styles invented
here, a vast majority of stage performers were immigrants, chiefl y from the Brit-
ish Isles. Minstrelsy, however, had no need for performers trained in the Old
World. What it required were those who, like the four Virginia Minstrels, could
step into the voice and the character of a stage “Ethiopian” and entertain an audi-
ence with comic turns, dancing, and the singing and playing of popular music.
That minstrel skills could not be gained through formal study is confi rmed
by the makeup of the original minstrel band: violin, banjo, tambourine, and
bones. Only the violin was an instrument with established methods of instruc-
tion and a repertory of composed music. Yet the violin led a double life. As
the fi ddle, this bowed string instrument stood at the heart of Celtic American
dance music, with its jigs, reels, and hornpipes. Like their country counterparts,
minstrel fi ddlers like Dan Emmett held their instrument loosely and more or
less in front of themselves, rather than clamping it between chin and shoulder.
As a minstrel-band fi ddle, the violin was less a singing, lyric voice than a wiry,
rhythmic one, played with little or no vibrato, the minute, rapid variation of
pitch that lends expressivity to much singing and playing.
The banjo, as noted in chapter 4, migrated from Africa to the New World
before 1700. No record of white banjo playing exists, however, before Joelthe minstrel bandthe fi ddlethe banjo172028_06_132-161_r3_ko.indd 135 23/01/13 8:19 PM