BILLIE HOLIDAY, who wrote and immortalized one of our favorite songs, “God Bless The Child,” quickly came to mind after learning that Pres. George W. Bush signed a proclamation on June 29, 2001 to henceforth honor Black Music Month. Holiday is the ideal person to honor in recognition of our initial Black Music Month, insofar as her haunting lyrics and singing style embodied the soulful roots of Black music that evolved from the mournful slave Worksong/Spirituals, circa 1619 to 2002 America’s angry Rap.
Yes, before Rap, before R&B, before Jazz and before Blues… there was the Worksong. None of the musical genres that came after these work songs could have existed without them. The “Call & Response” form of these worksongs came straight out of the slaves’ African heritage. Originally, they were ritualistic in nature and related directly to the religions they had left behind.

The only instrument they used were the drum and their own voices. Not long after they arrived in America, however, they were not allowed to sing in their native tongue, nor put anything related to their religion in the lyrics. The drums were believed to incite rebellion and they were taken away.
And so, the slaves began to merge the tone and rhythm of their old language into the chant and the lyrics that were derived directly from their everyday life. The voice was used as an instrument and set the scene for what was to come. In the last 50-100 years of slavery, it became acceptable to convert slaves to Christians.
Before this time it was not even a consideration, for in order to justify slavery, you had to believe slaves to be soul less. Interesting! It was the Quakers who put a twist on the dilemma and claimed that converting the slave to Christianity was a justification for slavery. As slaves were allowed religion, it became a unifying social occasion. Something for them to rally around and believe in. Up until this point, they had not been allowed to practice any kind of religion at all, except furtively.

Now they could father, socialize and in a sense, elevate their spirits. Gospel grew out of this, as singing became a natural outlet for their pent up frustrations and troubles. The same “Call & Response” of the worksong was utilized and expounded the Blues. After the civil war, the newly freed people had a whole new world to deal with, a world that didn’t want them.
Many freed slaves developed a transitory lifestyle. Most Black men took up both the guitar and harmonica, instruments that were cheap and easy to travel with. It was in this setting of displacement in their own country, that the blues were born from their souls. The early blues artists and even the later jazz musicians used their instruments as extensions of their voice.
Around 1914, the great exodus north began. WWI was a major catalyst in producing the modern Black man. Although segregated and unappreciated, they gained an enormous sense of being part of something… that something being Americans and not just ex-slaves. During the reign of Napoleon, the military band was popular among the French. This translated to the importation of brass band instruments to all the French settlements, New Orleans included. Free Creole Blacks and later their newly freed brethren, became infatuated with these instruments and the sounds they could make. Incorporating the sounds of blues and the same non-western, no syncopated rhythms that had been brought from Africa, a new breed of music began to grow.
What started as traditional marching band music began a metamorphosis as blues. First Ragtime and then Jazz. Again the instrument was employed to mimic the human voice in tonality and spirit and again, something wonderful emerged. Many middle class Blacks considered Blues the “devil’s music,” but Jazz was acceptable, thus “Black music” became the rage, moreso after White musicians began to imitate it.

From jazz grew Bebop, Swing, Boogie Woogie and it became more and more mainstream. More and more musicians tried to do new things. Nothing shaped modern day Rock & Roll more than Rhythm & Blues. It was first and foremost a backlash against the direction that Jazz had gone.
Out of the Hard Bop movement within Jazz itself, the innovators added a new funky backbone. The sound took on the soulful feel of Gospel and became almost exclusive Black music… but not for very long. The radio began to blare the “shouting blues” and again it was taken up by the mainstream. Now you can listen to almost any modern rock today and you will hear the soul roots of Rhythm & Blues pioneers.

Black musicians continued to experiment, looking for their own uniqueness. It was a form of rebellion; therefore they came up with Funk, a street music that inspired plenty of movement, which evolved into Hip Hop. Hip Hop was defined in the streets during the late 70s… rapping, D.J.ing and break dancing.

Hip Hop was and still is its own sub culture, and that culture had its own voice. Rap is the closest road that Black music has taken back to its original roots in the worksong, the “Call & Response.” The rhythmical use of the voice, as an instrument, and the deep-seated frustration inherent in the environment are all present.

The evolution of Black music is simply the evolution of American music. It is also a definitive parallel with the history of the African in America. It speaks clearly of the feelings and thoughts of a people who had to exist within a society and yet still be forced to remain separate from it. When you talk about Black music, you’re talking about African-American history.
And nobody spoke more eloquently, or mournfully than Eleanora Fagan Gough, the child of a 13-year-old girl and a guitar player named Clarence Holiday, who was born on April 7, 1913 in Baltimore, Maryland. Eleanora, at 15, ran away after her mother moved to New York in 1928 and took the name of movie star Billie Dove.

Billie was allowed to sing, when she wasn’t cleaning floors in a “Good Time House.” A rich “John,” who had a nightclub in Harlem heard her sing and hired her. The young singer’s fame spread rapidly and in 1933 Holiday made her first recordings, with Benny Goodman, and became the featured singer for Count Basie, who tabbed her “Lady Day.”
Lady Day got hooked on heroin and lived a fast, hard life. She died on July 17, 1959. Eleanora Fagan Gough, aka Billie Holiday was only 44-years-old.