Here's an article on a different twist in the path from Old World to New: The Past Returns to the Present: Archaic British hymn-singing practices survive in London's West Indian churches. Yes, lining out, but a whole 'nother sound. I hear Eastern European / medieval / ?

And this (lengthy!) article "Praise: The Melody of Religion" opens by tying in the sound of the Jewish synagogue... About 2/3 of the way down, you get to Gaelic Psalmody, and the discussion compares the Black West Indies style of lining out...

It also mentions "Black Baptist churches in the United States have a practice which they call 'Dr. Watts' or 'Long Metre' (cf. the Scottish term 'Long Tunes'), and the old Regular Baptist Churches in eastern Kentucky apparently come closer than that in resemblance to the singing of the Gaelic precentors (see T.E. Miller, article on Oral Psalmody in Journal of the Hymn Society of America, January 1984)." Which leads me to wonder who Dr. Watts was, and is he any relation to Isaac Watts, the early 18th century hymn writer??

me, Googling? Guilty!

And hopping over to sample D.K. Wilgus (on paper, really!) I find (as has already been pointed out) there's nothing new under the sun in folk music discussion ('specially on Mudcat, where so many of us are enthusiasts, rather than scholars):

"To define the nature of the argument, one may pose the problem: what elements in the Negro spiritual have been borrowed from the music of the North American whites and what are due to an African heritage and/or the Negroes' own creation in American? Whatever the confusion in some minds, no serious student has imaginged that Negroes disembarked in Virginia singing "Deep River" or "Roll, Jordan." And whatever the confusion in some minds, no reputable scholar who has studied the problem has ever said that Negroes merely imitated or echoed white song. The issue lies between the extremes; and it is unfortunate that a few early commentators and the hysterical fringes of both sides have obscured the problem."

I think echoes my view of the "ownership" issue. I'd rather just continue with my fascination with attempting to trace the entangled threads of relationship among all our musics.

~ B in T
I've already said... time on my hands