The Day Is So Long And The Wages So Small: Music on a Summer Island [Paperback]

Samuel Charters (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1999

A richly textured collection of memories and observations ... terrific.?Straight No Chaser

In the summer of 1958 Samuel Charters and Ann Danberg travelled to Andros, an "island on the wrong side of the wind" in the Bahamas. They were drawn to this remote location by a song, so rich and startling in its resonance that they followed it to its source.

In The Day is so Long and the Wages so Small Charters recalls the unique experience of this incredible summer. Living within the small yet vital community descended from a handful of Bahamian slaves, Charters and Danberg discovered the pleasures and the harsh realities of island life.

They also found that the historical fusion of disparate cultures on Andros, from Africa and Europe, had resulted in a rich, distinctive musical confluence that stubbornly resisted the influx of modern styles. The invaluable recordings they made that summer introduced the world to the guitar music of Joseph Spence, the ballads and 'rhyming' songs of John Roberts and Frederick McQueen, and a wealth of traditional Bahamian music.

Samuel Charters, the eminent historian of jazz and blues music, is the author of the award-winning The Roots of the Blues, The Legacy of the Blues, and the novel Louisiana Black (filmed under the title White Lies) all of which are available from Marion Boyars Publishers.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The quest to record and preserve the last vestiges of a fast-disappearing musical culture is vividly rendered in this account of a summer on the Bahamian island of Andros. In 1958, when Charters and his future wife, Ann Danberg, then in their early 20s, made their trek to the island, Andros was a barren, swamp-ridden backwater, with fewer than a thousand inhabitants, almost all descendants of Bahamian slaves. A budding music historian, Charters (The Roots of the Blues) had discovered a series of Alan Lomax's Library of Congress recordings of Andros folk songs from the late 1930s, and was so intrigued by the musicAa fusion of 18th-century anthems and African polyphonyAthat he decided to seek out the musicians and their songs. Lugging a heavy, suitcase-sized tape recorder, and traveling on the tightest of budgets, he and Danberg finally made it to the tiny settlement of Fresh Creek. On the porch of their mosquito and crab-infested house there, they recorded the guitar music of Joseph Spence and the ballads and rhyming songs of John Roberts. Still, they were assured that their project wouldn't be complete until they had heard the voice of the legendary singer, Frederick McQueen. Charters's final chapters document their search for the elusive musician; he concludes with a rousing outdoor performance by McQueen. The elegiac, leisurely pace of this slim memoir evokes the moods and rhythms of a long-distant island summer. Song lyrics included. (Sept.) FYI: Smithsonian Folkways Records will issue a single CD selection of the music described in this book, under the same title.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Charters has been one of our most respected writers on blues and jazz for four decades. In the late 1950s, he traveled to Andros Island in the Bahamas in the hopes of coming back with some field recordings of a distinctive music first recorded by Alan Lomax 25 years earlier. First, however, he had to get to the island that fishermen described as being "on the wrong side of the wind." His first option was a rickety fishing boat, but the captain got drunk, so the mission was aborted. Charters finally made a harrowing flight in a tiny plane that touched down on a dirt runway on the shabby side of paradise. He set up housekeeping in a shack without electricity or running water and set about finding an elusive bunch of musicians who thought nothing of the Billboard chartsAthey sang for the song. The trip resulted in four records released on Folkways Records nearly 40 years ago as well as this valentine to a more innocent time when only the music mattered. For comprehensive collections.ADan Bogey, Clearfield Cty. P.L. Federation, Curwensville, PA
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 176 pages
• Publisher: Marion Boyars Publishers Ltd (November 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0714530565
• ISBN-13: 978-0714530567
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.8 ounces
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,037,444 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #87 in Books > History > Americas > Caribbean & West Indies > Bahamas

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