African American Music: An Introduction

This collection of seventeen essays surveys major African American musical genres, both sacred and secular, from slavery to the present. With contributions by leading scholars in the field, the work brings together, in a single volume, treatments of African American music based in large part on ethnographic fieldwork, which privileges the voices of the music-makers themselves, woven into a richly textured mosaic of history and culture. At the same time, it incorporates musical treatments that brings clarity to the structural, melodic, and rhythmic characteristics that both distinguish and unify the music of African Americans. The text includes musical transcriptions, photographs, and illustrations that bring the music to life as expressions of a diverse people and culture. The second edition includes new essays on the topics of African and African American musical continuities, African- derived instrument construction and performance practice, techno, and the quartet and art music traditions. The new entry on religious music has been divided into separate, expanded treatments of spirituals and gospel music, the remaining essays have been substantially revised and updated. To facilitate ease of use, sections II and III of the original edition will appear in a forthcoming separate volume entitled Issues in African American Music. This new edition also includes an audio CD of 16 examples referenced in the text, as well as a companion website with audio, video, and links to further resources.