[Alternately: “Miss Lucy Long”]

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Music for “Miss Lucy Long” by Billy Whitlock (1813-1878); lyrics by T.G. Booth (dates unknown). This claim, made by Whitlock, is recorded by Hans Nathan (42). Whitlock was a founding member of the Virginia Minstrels while Booth was a member of the Kentucky Minstrels with whom Whitlock performed for a time. While Whitlock claims that he and Booth wrote the song as early as 1838, Mahar records that the song appears in published playbills by 1843 (307). Unlike many other minstrel songs, the music for “Lucy Long” appears to be original as there is no known melodic antecedent for the song. Of the editions surveyed for this entry, there was little difference in the melodic settings. By contrast, there were no two editions with the same lyrical setting. This could be accounted for because of the fact that in contemporaneous programs, “Lucy Long” was generally extended into a longer skit centred on female impersonation. In his discussion of the song, Mahar notes that its basic conceit has more to do with misogyny than racism (309).

The song was extremely popular on both sides of the Atlantic during the period, again, no doubt in part because of its reliance upon cross-dressing. But this popularity might also be attributed to its relatively simple melodic structure (particularly its chorus). While not immensely popular today, “Lucy Long” has endured much better than some others from the minstrel canon. At least fifteen recordings of the song have been made from 1924 to the present day by artists as disparate as Louis Armstrong to The Royal Artillery Band. More recently, two groups attempting to reconstruct minstrel performances have recorded versions of the song with extremely different results.

Select Recording History:

Armstrong, Louis. 1925, Vol. 7 [compilation]. Masters of Jazz, 1995.

The Canebrake Minstrels. Finer Than Frog Hair. The Canebrake Minstrels, 2003.

The Royal Artillery Band. Reflections. Bandleader, 2003.

Winans, Robert, music director and program consultant. The Early Minstrel Show. New World Records, 1998.

Works Cited:

Mahar, William J. Behind the Burnt Cork Mask: Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture. Chicago: Illinois UP, 1999.

Nathan, Hans. Dan Emmett and the Rise of Early Negro Minstrelsy. Norman: Oklahoma UP, 1962.

Mark Turner