"Oh! Susanna" is a minstrel song by

Stephen Foster Stephen Collins Foster (July 4, 1826January 13, 1864), known also as "the father of American music", was an American composer known primarily for his parlour and minstrel music during the Romantic period. He wrote more than 200 songs, inc ...

(1826–1864), first published in 1848. It is among the most popular American songs ever written. Members of the

Western Writers of America Western Writers of America (WWA), founded 1953, promotes literature, both fictional and nonfictional, pertaining to the American West. Although its founders wrote traditional Western fiction, the more than 600 current members also include histori ...

chose it as one of the Top 100 Western songs of all time.

Background

In 1846, Stephen Foster moved to

Cincinnati, Ohio Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state line wi ...

, and became a bookkeeper with his brother's steamship company. While in Cincinnati, Foster wrote "Oh! Susanna", possibly for his men's social club. The song was first performed by a local quintet at a concert in Andrews' Eagle Ice Cream Saloon in

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Western Pennsylvania, the second-most populous city in Pennsylva ...

, on September 11, 1847. It was first published by W. C. Peters & Co. in Cincinnati in 1848. Blackface minstrel troupes performed the work, and, as was common at the time, many registered the song for copyright under their own names. As a result, it was copyrighted and published at least twenty-one times from February 25, 1848, through February 14, 1851. Foster earned just $100 ($ in 2016 dollars) for the song, but its popularity led the publishing firm

Firth, Pond & Company Firth, Pond & Company was an American music company that publisher, published sheet music and Distribution (marketing), distributed musical instruments in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The company began in 1847 in music, 1847 when William Ha ...

to offer him a royalty rate of two cents per copy of sheet music sold, convincing him to become the first fully professional songwriter in the United States. The name Susanna may refer to Foster's deceased sister Charlotte, whose middle name was Susannah.

Song

The song blends together a variety of musical traditions. The opening line refers to "a banjo on my knee", but the song takes its beat from the polka, which had just reached the U.S. from Europe. Writer and musician Glenn Weiser suggests that the song incorporates elements of two previous compositions, both published in 1846: "Mary Blane", by

Billy Whitlock William M. Whitlock (1813 – 1878) was an American blackface performer. He began his career in entertainment doing blackface banjo routines in circuses and dime shows, and by 1843 he was well known in New York City. He is best known for h ...

, and "Rose of Alabama", by Silas S. Steele. He points out that the melody of the verse of "Oh! Susanna" resembles that of "Mary Blane", and the opening of the chorus of "Oh! Susanna" is almost identical to that of "Rose of Alabama". Moreover, the story lines of both "Oh! Susanna" and "The Rose of Alabama" involve a lover going from one Deep Southern state to another with his banjo in search of his sweetheart, which suggests that Foster got the inspiration for his lyrics from Steele's song. The first two

phrases In syntax and grammar, a phrase is a group of words or singular word acting as a grammatical unit. For instance, the English expression "the very happy squirrel" is a noun phrase which contains the adjective phrase "very happy". Phrases can consi ...

of the melody are based on the

major pentatonic scale A pentatonic scale is a musical scale (music), scale with five Musical note, notes per octave, in contrast to the heptatonic scale, which has seven notes per octave (such as the major scale and minor scale). Pentatonic scales were developed ...

. The song contains contradictory lines such as "It rain'd all night the day I left, The weather it was dry, The sun so hot I froze to death...", which have been described as "

nonsense Nonsense is a communication, via speech, writing, or any other symbolic system, that lacks any coherent meaning. Sometimes in ordinary usage, nonsense is synonymous with absurdity or the ridiculous. Many poets, novelists and songwriters have u ...

". It is one of the songs by Foster that use the word "

nigger In the English language, the word ''nigger'' is an ethnic slur used against black people, especially African Americans. Starting in the late 1990s, references to ''nigger'' have been progressively replaced by the euphemism , notably in cases ...

" (others are "Old Uncle Ned" and "Oh! Lemuel", both also among Foster's early works), which appears in the second verse ("De lectric fluid magnified, And killed five hundred nigger.").

Popularity and adaptations

The song is not only one of Stephen Foster's best-known songs, but also one of the best-known American songs. No American song had sold more than 5,000 copies before; "Oh! Susanna" sold over 100,000. After its publication, it quickly became known as an "unofficial theme of the Forty-Niners", with new lyrics about traveling to California with a " washpan on my knee". A traditional Pennsylvania Dutch version uses Foster's melody but replaces the lyrics entirely.

Notable recordings

One of the earliest recordings, using the original "killed five hundred Nigger" lyrics, was released by Harry C. Browne in 1916 (Columbia COL A-2218). Browne also released other openly racist songs that same year, including '' Nigger Love a Watermelon, Ha! Ha! Ha!''. The song is sung by a band in '' Wilson'' (1944) during the

1912 Democratic National Convention The 1912 Democratic National Convention was held at the Fifth Regiment Armory off North Howard Street in Baltimore from June 25 to July 2, 1912. The Convention The convention was held at the Fifth Regiment Armory in Baltimore from June 25 t ...

. A 1955

novelty record A novelty song is a type of song built upon some form of novel concept, such as a gimmick, a piece of humor, or a sample of popular culture. Novelty songs partially overlap with comedy songs, which are more explicitly based on humor, and wit ...

ing of the song by

The Singing Dogs The Singing Dogs was a musical recording project under whose name two 45rpm singles were released in the 1950s. The idea for the Singing Dogs came from Danish recording engineer Carl Weismann who recorded the sounds of various species of birds. B ...

reached No. 22 on the US Billboard Pop Singles chart, and No. 13 in the UK. A humorous recording of "Oh! Susanna" was the last track on the second album by

The Byrds The Byrds () were an American rock band formed in Los Angeles, California, in 1964. The band underwent multiple lineup changes throughout its existence, with frontman Roger McGuinn (known as Jim McGuinn until mid-1967) remaining the sole cons ...

, ''Turn! Turn! Turn!'', in 1965. Bing Crosby included the song in a medley on his album '' 101 Gang Songs'' (1961).

James Taylor James Vernon Taylor (born March 12, 1948) is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. A six-time Grammy Award winner, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000. He is one of the best-selling music artists of all time, havi ...

also included a version of the song on his second album, ''

Sweet Baby James ''Sweet Baby James'' is the second studio album by American singer-songwriter James Taylor, released on February 1, 1970, by Warner Bros. Records. The album includes two of Taylor's earliest successful singles: " Fire and Rain", and " Country ...

'', in 1970. In 1963, The Big 3 recorded

Tim Rose Timothy Alan Patrick Rose (September 23, 1940 – September 24, 2002) (unofficial website by long-term correspondent of Rose's) was an American singer and songwriter who spent much of his life in London, England, and had more success in E ...

's composition "The Banjo Song", which sets Foster's lyrics to a completely new melody. Rose's melody was then used for

Shocking Blue Shocking Blue was a Dutch rock band formed in 1967 in The Hague. It was part of the music movement in the Netherlands that was generally known by the name Nederbeat. The band had a number of hits throughout the counterculture movement during ...

's 1969 hit

Venus (Shocking Blue song) "Venus" is a song by Dutch rock band Shocking Blue, initially released as a single in the Netherlands in the summer of 1969. Written by Robbie van Leeuwen, the song topped the charts in nine countries. The song has been covered dozens of times ...

Neil Young Neil Percival Young (born November 12, 1945) is a Canadian-American singer and songwriter. After embarking on a music career in Winnipeg in the 1960s, Young moved to Los Angeles, joining Buffalo Springfield with Stephen Stills, Richie Fur ...

and Crazy Horse covered Rose's version on their 2012 album ''

Americana Americana may refer to: *Americana (music), a genre or style of American music *Americana (culture), artifacts of the culture of the United States Film, radio and television * ''Americana'' (1992 TV series), a documentary series presented by J ...

''.

References

External links

"Oh! Susanna" on Grey Gull record 4125 c.1923 sung by Arthur Fields - Original lyrics

* * ttp://hdl.loc.gov/loc.music/sm1848.450780 First edition(W.C. Peters, 1848) scanned by the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library ...

{{Authority control American folk songs Blackface minstrel songs Songs written by Stephen Foster Songs about Alabama Songs about Louisiana Songs of the American Civil War Polkas 1848 songs American children's songs Music of Cincinnati