Work Songs In The Reconstruction Era Of The United States

“Black troops helped construct schools, churches, and orphanages, organized debating societies, and held political gatherings where “freedom songs” were sung and soldiers delivered “speeches of the most inflammatory kind.” - Eric Foner, Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution, 1863-1877 In the following paragraphs below, I’ll be talking about how Work Songs were being used in the Reconstruction era. Along with the messages that it presented to America as a whole and how they inspired artists of today’s’ generation. It will reflect on how it was an essential point of our history, the literature that came with it as well as the authors who were encouraged by the texts. The following below will also express more in detail the different genres of Work Songs as the basis of music and texts that were given. The first thing I'm going to talk about how the work songs were being used during the Reconstruction era. During this time, African Americans have earned the right to express how they really felt and they did this by establishing music within the African American culture that gave them hope of freedom and to tell of their working conditions without being direct. Some of the work songs included “swing low, sweet chariot”, “pick a bale of cotton”, “chain gang”, and “Can’t you line it?”, these were used to alleviate the bad of the conditions the workers/slaves were in. “Work Songs usually use a call and response form that was a tradition slaves used when working in a plantation”. Work Songs had numerous messages they communicated among themselves and to their masters, with some messages being coded so that their masters do not understand what they were communicating. Examples of Work songs that had coded messages are “Blue Tail Fly” or “Jimmy Crack Corn.” The existing forms of literature from 1875 to 1877 were prose or ordinary language literature, poetry, folk music, and drama. As it relates to poetry, the most common form was epic poems.

Work songs gave inspirational messages to Americans in the reconstruction era to fight for the inequities that slaves faced. The songs mainly communicated the message of lessening the burden of slaves and other people that had been historically marginalized before the civil war. The work songs also communicated the messages of the deprived to entire America on the need to inspire people to see the suffering of people. The songs communicated the quest of the oppressed to get freedom from ills that were propagated against them. From the work songs, most American understood that messages of hope could be passed orally by people that had been denied the right to read and write. Even though the songs sometimes were used to communicate to other slaves the means and time to escape, they communicated to Americans that music can be used to pass coded messages that can only be understood by the people that have interests in certain types of music. Additionally, work songs were used as a form expressing opposition or rebellion without people using violence to protest inequalities. Just like other forms of literature such as poetry, drama, folk music, and ordinary language that existed in 1875 to 1877, the songs were used to give the message to Americans that non-violence means can be a good avenue for people to communicate their views. This way they can be heard so that corrective actions are set in place to address the plight of oppressed people. Work songs were also instrumental in communicating to America as a whole that people’s emotions can be clearly expressed through music, and therefore when someone is listening to music, they should strive to get the underlying meaning in a song and not just enjoy the music. An example of a work song that conveyed emotions is “field hollers or field call.” The other message this type of music communicated to Americans is that an uprising to fight for the liberty could be easily commenced through using music as a communication channel.

Work songs still inspire artists today to compose music that has messages and not music that entertains people. Work songs are the foundation for the gospel, blues, and jazz music. The work songs have inspired artists today to take enough time to write and compose songs so that artists produce either songs that have an explicit message or songs that have coded messages. More importantly, work songs have inspired artists at present to produce music that evokes emotion from listeners so that they get the message inherent in their music. This way, work songs have inspired artists to produce music that will make their fans to follow them fanatically due to the emotions displayed in music. The other way work songs have inspired artists is by making them produce hymns and songs that conserved the call-and-response form of the work songs while the main singers often sing a Capella. Even though work songs were considered something of the past, there are also reasons to believe that they influenced some of the artists today in the modern era. They were used in the reconstruction era to deliver messages to America as a whole and was still bought to the “new age” to influence the artists of today.