Boy, that's a good question, Nigel. I sometimes get flak for singing "Old Black Joe"; but I like the song, and I think it shows Joe's dignity and value in the face of a very difficult life. Robeson sang it a number of ways. On the recording I'm listening to now, he sings "old, old Joe." I think he also used "old man Joe" on one recording. I like "Old Black Joe," and see nothing wrong with it. On the other hand, some Foster songs have a very patronizing view of African Americans, and I don't sing some of them.

I see that Stephen Collins Foster Memorial State Park in Florida is now Stephen Foster Folk Culture Center State Park. The visitor center is a replica of a plantation house, and inside are animated miniature dioramas, depicting a good number of Foster songs - complete with pickaninnies and darkies and all the stereotypes. Maybe it has lightened up in the ten years since I attended the Florida Folk Festival there, but the park seemed to be a reflection of the deepest part of the Deep South at the time I was there.

-Joe-