We are thankful for a few songs of the Blacks from the period immediately following (and partly back into) the slavery period that are found in the writings of Joel Chandler Harris. These songs, from the 1881 edition of "Uncle Remus, Myths and Legends of the Old Plantation."
Later editions, even the first English edition of 1883, lacked much of the information of the first edition, and concentrated on the animal tales. The scholarship with which Harris treated his subjest was lost.
A couple of these songs lead into the Black gospel period from the old spirituals. This was a progression, probably seamless at the time.

I will post these in a new thread, called Harris, Plantation Songs. Harris very carefully reproduced the sounds of the language of that time. In singing the songs, he emphasizes that the songs depend for their melody and rhythm upon the musical quality of time, and not upon long or short, accented or unaccented syllables.