Tennessee music is full of sounds and styles and some are more well known than others. Fife and drum music is a style of African-American music with its roots in African drumming, military fife and drum corps and blues influences. Along the Tennessee-Mississippi border are black communities where musicians are keeping the fife and drum tradition alive. They are going to events for the Fourth of July, Labor Day and many other parties and barbecues. They are also going to old time music and jazz festivals to highlight this rare version of the blues.
To hear audio files from the Tennessee State Parks Folklife Project Records of attendees at Chester County’s West Tennessee Folklife Festival that include fife and drum performances, please listen to the following audio file in the Tennessee Virtual Archive (TeVA): http://teva.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/compoundobject/collection/p15138coll21/id/481/show/477/rec/11
Fife and drum groups gather to play at events with a fun drumming feel. The music of a cane fife cut with five or six fingerholes for notes and a base or snare drum bring out the rhythms of the past. Students of the sound consider it to have several unusual characteristics: African polyrhythmic undertones, drum marches of the military and the blues style of “call and response.” How do those combine? The music does sound a bit sharp at first, but the blues sound definitely comes through. This style of music was often the backdrop of the 1920s dance style of the “shimmie” of old juke joints and house parties.
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| West Tennessee fife and drum members performing outdoors. Ed Harris plays the fife while Emanuel Dupree sings “Hurry Down Sundown.” James Tatum is also a member of this group. 1980. Tennessee State Parks Folklife Project Records, Tennessee State Library & Archives |
The tradition of fife and drum originated with instruments left behind by Union troops that former slaves used for their own choices of music. There are traditions of military and state militias using slaves and former slaves as the fife and drum corps for marching of the troops in the late 18th century and continuing into mid-19th century.
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| Ed Harris plays the fife. 1980. Tennessee State Parks Folklife Project Records, Tennessee State Library & Archives |
The Tennessee State Parks Folklife Project, an oral history project launched by the Library & Archives, found several fife and drum musicians in Fayette County in the 1970s and 1980s. The main fife leader there was Ed Harris, along with his friends James Tatum, Anne Valentine and Emanuel Dupree. Harris taught many younger players who had a feel for the music. Dupree was a talented musician and basket maker. He loved the old ways and was eager to lead a group of folks in fife and drum songs for the project.
To hear audio files of Dupree from the Tennessee State Parks Folklife Project Records, please listen to the following audio file in the Tennessee Virtual Archive (TeVA): http://teva.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/compoundobject/collection/p15138coll21/id/146/show/142/rec/20
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| West Tennessee fife and drum members performing outdoors. Ed Harris plays the fife while Emanuel Dupree sings “Hurry Down Sundown.” 1980. Tennessee State Parks Folklife Project Records, Tennessee State Library & Archives |
North Mississippi fife and drum musicians have become more prominent through the years. Otha Turner and Sid Hemphill and their families have been documented through many research programs in Mississippi. Alan Lomax began recording these North Mississippi fife and drum groups in the 1940s.
Today Turner’s granddaughter continues to perform with Rising Star Fife and Drum band. She also records with Luther Dickinson, a musician and historian of Delta blues music. She keeps the sound alive and ready for another generation to play music in West Tennessee and in the North Mississippi flatland.
Additional Resources
- To explore more examples of fife and drum music, please take a look at items from the Tennessee State Parks Folklife Project materials in the Tennessee Virtual Archive (TeVA): http://teva.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/search/searchterm/fife%20and%20drum/order/nosort
- To learn more about Fife and Drum Blues see and read: Folkstreams.net http://www.folkstreams.net/context,86
- Library of Congress American Folklife Center articles and recordings: http://www.loc.gov/folklife/LP/AfroAmFolkMusicMissL67_opt.pdf
- Search “fife and drum blues” on YouTube. Hear and see music by Sharde Thomas, Turner’s granddaughter, as well as the Rising Star Fife and Drum, North Mississippi All-Stars, Luther Dickinson and “the Wandering” and several other blues groups.
- For more information on fife and drum blues, take a look at the Tennessee State Parks Folklife Project Records at the Tennessee State Library & Archives: http://sos.tn.gov/products/tsla/tennessee-state-parks-folklife-project-records-1979-1984
The Tennessee State Library and Archives is a division of the Tennessee Department of State and Tre Hargett, Secretary of State
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