The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #153108 Message #3583894
Posted By: Q (Frank Staplin)
13-Dec-13 - 04:29 PM
Thread Name: Music for the movie '12 Years A Slave'
Subject: RE: Music for the movie '12 Years A Slave'
Black fiddle players were known in North America from the 17th C. on.
Pere Labat wrote (1694)- some slaves played the violin well.
"In Virginia as well, slaves were valued for their fiddling prowess by the 1690's." Pp. 80-81, and many other references.
See Dena J. Epstein, 1977, "Sinful Tunes and Spirituals, Black Folk Music to the Civil War," University of Illinois Press