When I performed the song to the class there were a few ideas for development which I have taken onboard. Musically it was suggested to me that I should add a second guitar part, perhaps slide guitar. This was something I had already considered but hadn't started developing yet. When writing the second guitar part I tried utilising the slide but felt it was too intrusive over the melody of the lyrics. I would describe the songs style as folk/country, which I think is good for a story telling song as the music doesn't detract in any way from the lyrics. As this was a lyrical brief I didn't then want to compromise this by adding a complicated guitar part. Instead I opted to add country style guitar licks which sit in the background so that the lyrics have room to breathe. It was also suggested that the instrumental section gave the perception that the song was heading in a different direction and not back into the verse. On reflection I can understand why this might have been the case as the rhythm and pitch changed significantly. I feel I have addressed this problem by continuing the verse chords with a second guitar part over the top. Finally it was suggested that I consider my pronunciation of words and accent when singing in terms of delivering an authentic performance. As was mentioned, growing up listening to American singers can result in singing with an American accent or pronunciations different from your native language (Harrison, 2014). I'll be honest, I'm not sure this is something I can easily change, or feel comfortable changing. I've sung this way for so long now that it feels completely natural, and to change it would be ironically foreign...
I decided to develop the concept of the song being about two brothers fighting against each other in the civil war. Influenced by the poem the song was constructed to communicate feelings of sadness and respect between the two brothers whilst reiterating their divided loyalties to the "Blue" and to the "Grey."
Brother Blue Made my bed in the devil’s den The black snake’s home and the grave of young men Upon the hill my brother blue He fired and shot me dead Won’t be marching south again Brother’s tears make the morning dew See my heart is grey but my blood runs blue And in his arms my lifeless stare It tells a story true Oh goodbye brother blue Underneath the southern stars I sleep Blue and grey its here we lay Our souls are hers to keep A silence she once knew Until you came marching through I still love you brother blue In the dusty heat my mama did wait But not one of her sons made it to her gate By the silver creek, the willows weep As my mama she found my name And my brother blue beside me once again Underneath the southern stars I sleep Blue and grey its here we lay Our souls are hers to keep A silence she once knew Until you came marching through I still love you brother blue The story is told from the point of view of the confederate brother after his death. The first verse was written to set the scene at the battlefield where this first brother was killed. I did some research into some of the most prolific battles of the Civil War for inspiration for the imagery in this verse. In fact this verse points specifically to the battlefield at Gettysburg, one of the bloodiest battles of the Civil War. The "Devil's Den" was a defence position used by the confederate soldiers, a small hill littered with large boulders which they used for cover. They were being attacked by the Union army from "Little Round Top," this is is the hill I am referring to in the verse when the confederate soldier is shot dead by his brother (Tilberg, 2008). The second verse is intended to reveal to the listener that these are in fact brothers by blood and hints at how it came to be that they were fighting one and other on the battlefield. The line "my heart is grey but my blood runs blue" communicates that the confederate brother was fighting for his cause in the south despite coming from a family with loyalty to the union. As I mentioned in the last post, divided loyalties between families wasn't uncommon in the Civil War. In my research I came across letters written from brother to brother, giving their best wishes but affirming their loyalty to their respective sides. One letter read "I was...doing my best to beat you but I hope you and I will never again meet face to face bitter enemies in the battlefield (Campbell, 1862). The final verse and the chorus reflects the equal sadness and respect for both sides that was expressed in the poem. By the last verse the listener learns that "Brother Blue" has also lost his life in the war as neither brother returns home to their waiting mother. The story ends with the mother visiting the graves of the brothers who are buried side by side. I closed the final verse in this way to highlight the circumstance of the war, much like the poem does, in that it was people killing their own people. Some were dressed in grey, some were dressed in blue. The final line of the chorus "I still love you brother blue" reiterates the fact that in this war soldiers' loyalties were so strong that they would kill their own blood for their cause. I adapted many of the performative aspects of "The Blue and the Gray" to fit within the context of the song. The repetition of "blue" and "grey" that is central to the poem is also the focal point in this song. In the poem however these sections fall in an orderly fashion in the last two lines of each verse. I decided not to mimic this structure for two main reasons. Firstly this song has a progressive narrative which I feel would be impacted by this type of structured repetition. Secondly the rhyming structure would be interrupted and possible rhymes would be limited. Instead then the verses are littered with references to the blue and to the grey in a less structured form of repetition. The chorus' are the only sections of the song where the references to blue and grey is repeated identically. As well as repetition much of the imagery technique is borrowed from the poem. The author makes use of other colours in the poem "rivers be red" and "mellowed with gold." In the song I describe "the black snake's home" and "the silver creek." There is also frequent reference to tears and sadness in the poem. I incorporated this into the song in the lines "brothers tears make the morning dew" and "the willows weep." The poem for me communicates an equal sadness and respect for the fallen soldiers of the Confederate and Union armies during the American Civil War. The piece suggests throughout that the cost in human lives far outweighed any gains to be made by either side in the war, with lines like;
"These in the robbing's of glory, Those in the gloom of defeat, All with the battle-blood gory, In the dusk of eternity meet:" Perhaps what appealed to me most about this poem however is the refrain at the end of each verse. The author dictates one scenario for "The Blue" and then a comparable scenario for "The Gray." "Love and tears for the Blue, Tears and Love for the Gray" "Under the roses, the Blue, Under the lilies, the Gray" To me this conveys that they are the same people under the same circumstances, yet they are defined purely by the army they fought for. I came up with the idea of writing the song about two brothers, fighting for opposite sides in the war, when I considered the relationship between the "Blue" and the "Gray" in this poem. After some research I discovered that this situation wasn't all that uncommon, especially in border states like Kentucky where families with divided loyalties were torn apart by the war (Brother Against Brother, 2015). The first task in the Performance: Context and Practice module is to create two new songs that are to be developed for inclusion in a live performance. This first brief requires us to use a published poem as stimulus material to write a song that focuses on lyricism. We have been given one week to produce a version of the song for performance in class next week and will be expected to discuss how the piece relates to our chosen poem as well as the overall theme of our final performance.
The poem I have selected is titled "The Blue and the Gray," written by Francis Miles Finch. http://www.civilwarhome.com/blueandgray.html. I have chosen this poem because i feel the subject of the American Civil War fits well in the context of my planned performance which will explore themes of darkness, sadness and betrayal. |
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