On Nov 20, 2020, at 23:54, Moses Ebe Ochonu <meochonu@gmail.com> wrote:
Nigerians/Africans' relationship with country music is a subject that requires a sustained academic investigation.
I hope it's not too late to jump in on this thread, which seems to have gone all over everywhere.
Country music has deep African roots, which probably helps to explain its popularity in Africa.
The banjo's being the most obviously African musical instrument to have survived slavery in the US is only the most tactile example of that African influence.
Ethnomusicologists have been exploring other aspects of Country's African roots. Alas I have no musical talent myself and thus can only report what others discover.
I talked a little about it in "The African Heritage of White America" in _Africanisms in American Culture_ edited by J.E. Holloway.
Others picked up on it and I was able to report more in the book's second edition.
Country music has never been completely white in the United States.
Oral tradition has it that Deford Bailey was first to play at the Grand Ole Opry.
Even when Country tried to segregate itself they couldn't stop Ray Charles from recording country music.
But "white" culture in the US has never been completely European. If we're smart we learn where we can.
We've just had trouble acknowledging that fact about ourselves. Or some of us have.
I think one reason US culture has been so popular around the world is that mixing.
John Edward Philips <http://human.cc.hirosaki-u.ac.jp/philips/>
International Society, College of Humanities, Hirosaki University
"Homo sum; humani nihil a me alienum puto." -Terentius Afer
<http://newworldafricanpress.com/books/000026.htm>
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