though not so musical. He also tells me that the calls have a
meaning there. There are calls and responses for those lost in the
forest, for fire, for the approach of enemies, etc. These Alabama Negro
calls, however, had no meaning, and yet the calls and responses so
fitted into each other as to make a little complete tune.

Now, I had heard "field" calls all during my early childhood in
Tennessee, and these also were answered by men in adjoining fields. But
the Tennessee calls and responses which I remembered had no kinship
which would combine them into a kind of little completed song as was the
case with the Alabama calls and responses.

Again, in Tennessee when a musical call was uttered by the laborers in
one field, those in the other fields around would often use identically
the same call as a response. The Alabama calls and responses were short,
while those of Tennessee were long.

I am listing an Alabama "call" and "response." I regret that I cannot
recall more of them. I am also recording three Tennessee calls or
responses (for they may be called either). Then I am recording a fourth
one from Tennessee, not exactly a call, but partly call and partly song.
The reason for this will appear later. By a study of these I think we
can pretty reasonably make a final interesting deduction as to the
general origin of "call" and "sponse" in the form of the types of Rhyme
not already discussed.

In the Alabama Field Call and response one cannot help seeing a
counterpart in music of the "call" and "sponse" in the words of the
types of Rhymes already discussed.

ALABAMA FIELD CALL AND RESPONSE

[music]

TENNESSEE FIELD CALLS OR RESPONSES

[music]

If one looks at Number 1 under the Tennessee calls or responses, there
is nothing to indicate especially that it was ever other than the whole
as it is here written. But when he looks at Number 2 under Tennessee
calls or responses he is struck with the remarkable fact that it changes
right in the midst from the rhythm of the 9/8 measure to that of the 6/8
measure. Now if there be any one characteristic which is constant in
Negro music it is that the rhythm remains the same throughout a given
production. In a very, very few long Negro productions I have known an
occasional change in the time, but _never_ in a musical production
consisting of a few measures. The only reasonable explanation to be
offered for the break in the time of Number 2, as a Negro production, is
that