Work Songs

The place of music in different forms of work from the earliest hunting and planting to the contemporary office.

Library Journal

In this unique companion to his Healing Songs, noted scholar Gioia (cofounder, jazz studies program, Stanford Univ.; The History of Jazz) poignantly tells the story of work songs sung by everyone from prehistoric hunters to today's consumers. His task involved drawing on multilayered and diverse resources that include travel literature, slave narratives, historical accounts and personal journals, myths and legends, biographies, and labor union writings; the focus is on the rhythms, melodies, and lyrics of music that has accompanied such tasks as raising and lowering sails, felling trees, and weaving and sewing garments. Readers will learn about sailors' shanties, Persian Gulf pearl-diving songs, and field hollers and corn-shucking songs from the American South. In describing how workers in all societies have used music to increase efficiency, measure time, relay commands, maintain focus, and alleviate drudgery, he succeeds in making the broader connections of the big picture: that music exists for us all. This book provides an opportunity to re-experience the history and dignity of our human toils. Highly recommended for public and academic libraries.-Elizabeth M. Wavle, Elmira Coll. Lib., NY Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Ted Gioia, pianist, composer, and one of the founders of Stanford University’s Jazz Studies program, is the author of Healing Songs, also published by Duke University Press, as well as several celebrated books, including West Coast Jazz: Modern Jazz in California, 1945–1960. His book The History of Jazz was selected as one of the best books of the year by Jonathan Yardley in the Washington Post, chosen as a notable book of the year by the New York Times, and honored with the Bay Area Book Reviewers’ award for best nonfiction work of the year. His book The Imperfect Art won the ASCAP–Deems Taylor Award and was named a Jazz Book of the Century by the Jazz Educators Journal. He has recorded several compact discs as a leader, including The End of the Open Road and Tango Cool.