Comments on Please Come Flying: American Songs 2 Sneak Preview: Oh Susanna

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2009-08-15T23:14:24.481-04:00

That's fascinating, Kris. Thanks! & The Be Good Ta...

2009-01-01T17:29:59.514-05:00

That's fascinating, Kris. Thanks! & The Be Good Tanyas version *is* great, isn't it?

I once read a book about a woman who moved out wes...

2008-12-31T19:51:43.215-05:00

I once read a book about a woman who moved out west and lived on the wide open plains. When one of her neighbors died she was responsible for dressing the body for burial. She placed a buckwheat cake in his mouth as part of the burial ritual (I suppose as a symbolic last meal). In the song "Oh, Susannah", I believe that the singer has a dream that, upon waking, makes him fear that his beloved Susannah may be dead. In his dream, she had a buckwheat cake in her mouth -- perhaps referring to the burial traditions of some people. Anyway, it's a great song performed especially well by "Be Good Tanyas". Check it out if you get a chance.

Kris

Hidden meanings?Many people don't even know the me...

2008-06-15T20:04:50.939-04:00

Hidden meanings?
Many people don't even know the meanings of songs. We sing "Yankie Doodle" not knowing that it was a term of derision, an insult.

Waltzing Matilda was once sung on television with a group of dancers doing a waltz. It should ofcourse been sung on TV with a policeman arresting a hobo for vagrancy, since that is what the phrase 'waltzing matilda' means.

Thanks, anonymous! I hadn't heard that about the s...

2008-03-18T21:36:01.542-04:00

Thanks, anonymous! I hadn't heard that about the slaves singing Oh Susanna. I wonder if there's been any research into the "hidden meaning."

I learned that "Oh Susannah" is also a song the sl...

2008-03-18T17:23:28.086-04:00

I learned that "Oh Susannah" is also a song the slaves used to sing on their way to freedom. I believe it had a special, hidden meaning to them.
The first time I remember hearing "Oh Susannah" was in music class in first grade. Only a couple people in my class had heard it before, but everyone loved it. We got to play different kinds of instruments to it, and dance around the room. It was a lot of fun!

Thanks for the thoughtful comments, Don. I read so...

2007-11-13T06:07:06.245-05:00

Thanks for the thoughtful comments, Don. I read somewhere that the miners changed the chorus to things like "I'm going to California, my washpan on my knee." That's the thing I love the most about these traditional songs. People from all over the country and throughout time are able to connect with them in all kinds of different meaningful ways.

Actually, support of a political party does not me...

2007-11-12T19:47:50.877-05:00

Actually, support of a political party does not mean that one supports all aspects of their policies. There is some indication that Foster opposed the violence involved in Republican calls for abolition rather than abolition itself. Northern views on Blacks often embraced freedom but still considered them to be considerably "lesser". Even Foster's use of a variety of words popular at the time can be attributed to a simple use of the vernacular in songs and ditties.
It is certainly true that later historical commentary was certainly very "creative" of a persona rather than historically accurate.

The main thing to remember is that it was an amazingly popular song and remains so. Its popularity in California mining fields certainly shows that none of it was in any way limited to the American south.

Hi again, Don. I had to check on that one with a f...

2007-11-12T09:42:17.236-05:00

Hi again, Don. I had to check on that one with a friend who did his graduate school dissertation on Stephen Foster a couple years ago. His research found Stephen Foster to be a Democrat (a pro-slavery party at the time), not an abolitionist. There *was*, however, a movement years after his death to reconstruct Foster as an abolitionist and a humanist to counter some other images of his persona that had been created. He's a *very* interesting character, not only because of his own persona and accomplishments (which were vast), but also because of the way that the public has tried to co-opt, change, and reconstruct that persona over the years.

And yes, Oh Susanna was (and still is) an impressively popular song. Thanks for your comments!

Stephen Foster was actually an Abolisionist and th...

2007-11-11T10:34:40.030-05:00

Stephen Foster was actually an Abolisionist and the song Oh Sussanah is a song from a Black man to a Black woman (probably an idealized one). The song emphasizes the desire of the male to prosper and enjoy his musical performance ambitions and that "his sussanah" should not worry (this being not long after the time where marriage ceremonies performed by Black ministers would end with 'till time or distance do you part').

The song was immediately popular nationwide.

Thanks, Don, for the additional insight. I didn't ...

2007-11-10T21:00:18.103-05:00

Thanks, Don, for the additional insight. I didn't know that a buckwheat cake would have been a wedding-related luxury...very interesting. And yes, that second verse is something else...as I noted earlier, this is the main problem with Stephen Foster. It's so hard to sing many of his songs in a modern context without censoring them. And for good reason.

Some meanings:Banjo on my knee: to have an intent ...

2007-11-09T20:00:16.583-05:00

Some meanings:
Banjo on my knee: to have an intent to be a performer in a minstrel show. We would now say 'stagestruck' but at the time the only opportunity would have been a minstrel show singer.

Buckwheat cake: No, not a pancake flipper short-order cook. For a black in the South it was a luxury item consumed at a wedding and would be symbolic of Susannah having married as he was wandering. Or perhaps his hopes that she would marry him upon his arrival though that would be doubtful.

This song is one of the most often censored ones ever... I'm sure everyone noticed the absence of the second verse which is often censored to protect current race relations issues.

A good place to start is Carl Sandburg's The Ameri...

2007-11-02T08:39:53.312-04:00

A good place to start is Carl Sandburg's The American Songbag. Alan Lomax also has a lot of great books like American Ballads and Folk Songs that go into detail about the origins of various traditional songs. A lot of it is really fascinating.

Thanks for the links. I tried searching on the web...

2007-11-02T07:36:32.545-04:00

Thanks for the links. I tried searching on the web myself but never found anything more than lyrics and general biography.

You know how they have books such as the annotated Alice in Wonderland and the annotated Mother Goose? Do you know if there is a similar reference work for songs?

Does anyone else have a different take/insight on ...

2007-11-01T12:18:18.504-04:00

Does anyone else have a different take/insight on the buckwheat cake imagery?

Hi Kathy.That's a really interesting question. Fro...

2007-11-01T12:17:14.333-04:00

Hi Kathy.
That's a really interesting question. From the reading I've done on Stephen Foster and his songs, I would imagine the buckwheat cake was important in two ways:

First of all, Stephen Foster was a master of form, and there simply isn't another word that rhymes with "south" other than "mouth". So he had to put something in it. :)

Secondly, I believe "Oh Susanna" (like many of Stephen Foster's early songs) was written for the minstrel stage. Minstrel songs were often sung in blackface and portrayed African-Americans as jolly, happy, tap-dancing fools who loved the South and all it stood for. A buckwheat cake is definitely something that would have been a staple of the poor, southern Black diet. So putting a buckwheat cake in Susanna's mouth firmly places her in a certain economic and social category and removes her from the white, upper/middle class audience who would have first encountered her song.

The interesting problem with Stephen Foster (as I mentioned in the post above) is exemplified in "Oh Susanna". In addition to being deliberately and horribly racist in the verses, he also gave his African-American characters real feelings and emotions, which was rare at the time. So, yes, Susanna has a buckwheat cake in her mouth, but also a tear in her eye.

If you're interested in further reading, here are some links I came across today:

Whither Zither Pete's analysis of the song (where he imagines the song being sung to a buckwheat pancake griddle-flipper): Part One, Part Two (with a great general analysis of the song)

Joanne O'Connell's 500-page dissertation for the University of Pittsburgh: Understanding Stephen Collins Foster: His World and Music (.pdf) I've only skimmed through this, but there's a lot of interesting stuff.

Well, Kathy, probably more than you were looking for, huh? You shouldn't get me started! :)

I have always wondered what "the buckwheat cake wa...

2007-10-31T21:18:07.244-04:00

I have always wondered what "the buckwheat cake was in her mouth" meant. Did that have some sort of symbolic or superstitious meaning, indicating death, or perhaps a delicate way of indicating pregnancy? Or maybe I am reading too much into it, and she was merely eating and feeling sad.

It is a good dish-washing melody, isn't it?

2007-09-15T16:49:17.076-04:00

It *is* a good dish-washing melody, isn't it?

I remember my dad whistling it as he swung a hamme...

2007-09-11T23:58:27.092-04:00

I remember my dad whistling it as he swung a hammer sitting on the roof of my new horse barn in Monico. Then, we would dance around the kitchen singing it as my brother & I washed dishes late at night - belting it out as loud as we could! :) Emilie Schmitz (Probst)

It was the first solo song I played on the violin ...

2007-08-29T17:22:46.524-04:00

It was the first solo song I played on the violin in grade school!