ABSTRACT
In the country blues the rigid formal structure—which came from Europe and the town—is gradually imposed on folk sources that embrace the Negro's alienation, Stephen Foster's search for love, his reliance on animal sensation, whether as substitute or as fulfilment. Fundamentally, barrelhouse piano is a two-voiced music for the player's left and right hand. So the music played on barrelhouse pianos naturally represented the triumph of the guitar's percussion over the vocal lyricism of the country blues. Just as Negroes preserved voodoo-worship while reconciling its symbolism with Christian mythology, so they transformed, in New Orleans, the techniques of the work-song into religious orgy. Yet while rag is a composed music, an emulation of white techniques that seems to belie the instinctual character of American Negro music, it is in an odd way a parody music—like the Cake-walk from which it had descended.
