User:Ghmyrtle/black

"Black, Brown, and White" is a song written by American musician Big Bill Broonzy. A protest against racism, and a staple of Broonzy's live performances, it was published and first performed by him in 1946. The song was recorded in 1947 by Brownie McGhee and the following year by Pete Seeger, though Broonzy himself did not record it until 1952 and his recording was unissued until 1958.

Origins

Broonzy wrote the song about his experiences of racial discrimination. The song contains the lines: If you're black and gotta work for a living This is what they will say to you. They say if you's white, should be all right, If you's brown, stick around, But if you's black, well, brothers, get back, get back, get back.

Similar lines are known to pre-date Broonzy's verse. Bernard W. Bell of Pennsylvania State University wrote that, during World War II, his grandfather used a "popular black folk saying": "If you're white, you're all right, If you're brown, stick around, But if you're black, oh brother, get back, get back, get back!"

Although Broonzy played the song to John Hammond, then of Columbia Records, in 1946, it was not recorded at the time. Broonzy said that he had attempted to have it recorded by several record labels, but they refused to do so, telling Broonzy: "when you write a song and want to record it with any company, it must keep the people guessing what the song means... and that song comes right to the point, and the public don't like that." The song was published in the Bulletin of People's Songs in October 1946, and was soon recorded by both Brownie McGhee and Pete Seeger. Broonzy eventually recorded it for Mercury Records in 1952, but his version was not released until after his death.

One of Broonzy's best known songs, the protest song, "Black, Brown, and White", addressed the experiences of black war vets and the painful issue of preferential treatment by gradations of skin color:

This little song that I'm singing about, Brother you know it's true.

I was in a place one night, They was all having fun. They was all buyin' beer and wine But they would not sell me none.

Me and a man was workin' side by side. This is what it meant: He was making a dollar an hour, They was paying me fifty cent.

I helped build this country, I fought for it too. Now I guess you can see What a black man have to do

(Lyrics from a previously unreleased recording issued on Blues in the Mississippi Night, Rounder CD, [1999], in the Alan Lomax Collection. A slightly different fragment is quoted in Lomax's Land Where the Blues Began, 1993, pp. 442-43).

Though this song became a staple of his live repertoire, Bill reported that for years no company would record it, giving as a reason that it wouldn't sell, "after I had played it, they would refuse," he said./p>

"What's wrong with it, I would like to know? What I say is just about the way the working Negro is treated in this country on all jobs in the North, in the East and in the West, and you all know it's true."

"Yes," they would say to me, "And that is what's wrong with that song. You see, Bill, when you write a song and want to record it with any company, it must keep the people guessing what the song means... And that song comes right to the point and the public don't like that." One day I got a letter from the Mercury Recording Company that told me to get ready with about eight songs for a recording session. That was in January 1952. I recorded "Black Brown and White" that time, but it hasn't been released. Of course I know that the Mercury Company recorded it because of Mr. John Hammond [who was then vice president of Mercury]. I played it to him once in 1946. Him and Alan Lomax both liked it. Mr. Hammond said to me: "Bill, that's a good song you've got there, why don't you record it?" "I've tried nearly all the companies, but they don't like it." He smiled and said, "They will." So that's why it has finally been recorded in the States, too... Of course there's nothing wrong with the song... this song doesn't mean for a Negro to get back, it just tells what has happened on jobs where Negroes goes to." - Big Bill Broonzy, quoted in Marion Barnwell, A Place Called Mississippi: collected narratives (University Press of Mississippi, 1997), pp. 317-318.

When venerable 87-year-old Civil Rights leader Reverend Joseph Lowery quoted it during President Obama's inauguration, rightwing commentators denounced him as "racialist" and "divisive," provoking much "is-he-or-isn't he?" handwringing in the media.

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Racist+school+song+made+my+boy+try+to+scrub+himself+white%3B+Anguish+of...-a060226826

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/10480580/Big-Bill-Broonzy-legacy-of-a-musical-pioneer.html

http://archive.adl.org/education/curriculum_connections/winter_2005/get_back.html

http://www.npr.org/2011/06/25/137398692/big-bill-broonzy-historys-musical-chameleon

http://www.45worlds.com/78rpm/record/v2077

http://www.45cat.com/record/nc858531uk

http://www.barrypopik.com/index.php/new_york_city/entry/if_youre_white_its_all_right

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=jUbT6GvTGhEC&pg=PA3&dq=%22+%22If+you%27re+white,+that%27s+all+right,+if+you%27re+brown,+stick+around,+but+if+you%27re+black,+oh+brother+get+back,+get+back,+get+back.%22%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CDAQ6AEwA2oVChMIvoS96pWcyAIVxDkaCh2g0AU3#v=onepage&q=%22%20%22If%20you're%20white%2C%20that's%20all%20right%2C%20if%20you're%20brown%2C%20stick%20around%2C%20but%20if%20you're%20black%2C%20oh%20brother%20get%20back%2C%20get%20back%2C%20get%20back.%22%22&f=false

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=tRPKAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA78&dq=%22Black,+Brown+and+White%22+song&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CCUQ6AEwAWoVChMI7ouRmOibyAIVQrUaCh2v_ghn#v=onepage&q=%22Black%2C%20Brown%20and%20White%22%20song&f=false

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=agTpGiHKvgwC&pg=PA44&dq=%22Black,+Brown+and+White%22+song&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CCsQ6AEwAmoVChMI7ouRmOibyAIVQrUaCh2v_ghn#v=onepage&q=%22Black%2C%20Brown%20and%20White%22%20song&f=false

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=YxquCAAAQBAJ&pg=PT89&dq=%22Black,+Brown+and+White%22+song&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CDEQ6AEwA2oVChMI7ouRmOibyAIVQrUaCh2v_ghn#v=onepage&q=%22Black%2C%20Brown%20and%20White%22%20song&f=false

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=XPJjqKuZYSAC&pg=PA572&dq=%22Black,+Brown+and+White%22+song&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CDcQ6AEwBGoVChMI7ouRmOibyAIVQrUaCh2v_ghn#v=onepage&q=%22Black%2C%20Brown%20and%20White%22%20song&f=false

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=ShbksjUcH5YC&pg=PA113&dq=%22Black,+Brown+and+White%22+song&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CFIQ6AEwCWoVChMI7ouRmOibyAIVQrUaCh2v_ghn#v=onepage&q=%22Black%2C%20Brown%20and%20White%22%20song&f=false

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/260025.stm Boy withdrawn over 'racist' song

Elliott's school: Anti-racism idea is said to have backfired

A mother has withdrawn her son from primary school, saying that - as the only black pupil - he is suffering when other children chant a song they learned in a talk about racism.

Elaine Ramsay, 33, from Radcliffe, Greater Manchester, said she caught her son, Elliott Stephens, trying to scrub his skin in an apparent attempt to change its colour. Elliott: "I just don't think it's right" The song, Black, Brown and White, is a heavily ironic 1930s number from the American Deep South - a black man's account of the prejudices he faced. It has the refrain: "If you're white, that's all right, if you're brown stick around but if you are black, buddy get back, get back."

It has been sung at Radcliffe Junior School for the past three years, since the children were given a 10-minute talk on racism.

"The mother has taken it completely out of context," said the headteacher, George Purcell. "My intention was the reverse of what I have been accused of."

'Wrong message'

Miss Ramsay thinks the song is no longer relevant.

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Fury+at+%60National+Front'+song+in+assembly.-a060551354 A mother has withdrawn her nine-year-old son from his school, saying that he is the only black pupil and is being tormented by children who sing a chant they learned after a talk on racism. Mrs Elaine Ramsay, aged 33, from Radcliffe, Greater Manchester, said she caught her son, Elliott Stephens, trying to scrub his face white after the song, adopted by the National Front, was sung in his school assembly. Mr George Purcell, headteacher at Radcliffe Junior School, said that for the past three years the song has been sung at the school after the children were given a ten-minute talk on racism. The song, Black, Brown and White, was a black man's account of the prejudices he faced. He said: "The mother has taken it completely out of context. My intention was the reverse of what I have been accused of." Mrs Ramsay said Elliott had told her that his classmates would chant the chorus - "If you're white, that's all right, if you're brown stick around but if you are black, buddy get back, get back" - in the playground. The song, written in the deep south of the United States in the 1930s, was not relevant today, she said. "School should be a secure and safe environment for children, not somewhere they are frightened to go," she said. "I think any kind of anti-racist message is good - but what happened 50 years ago doesn't apply now. It's saying that all white people are racist, but I have never encountered any problems. "Were the children who have bullied Elliott thinking like that before the song? Or has the seed been planted by the song?" Mrs Ramsay said she first noticed problems when Elliott joined the school, which she said was predominantly white, with a few children of Asian or mixed-race origin, two years ago. "I thought Elliott was being bullied, but never dreamed it was a racist thing," she said. "Then he started to say he hated being black and that he wanted to be white. He took knives from the kitchen and said he wanted to kill himself. "And once I found him scratching at his skin with a nail brush to try to make himself white. A spokesman for Bury Education Authority said: "We are aware of the matter and we are looking into it. "We are going to meet the pupil's mother to discuss his future schooling."

"School should be a secure and safe environment for children, not somewhere they are frightened to go," she said.

Elaine Ramsey: "It's out of place" "I think any kind of anti-racist message is good - but what happened 50 years ago doesn't apply now.

"It's saying that all white people are racist, but I have never encountered any problems.

"Were the children who have bullied Elliott thinking like that before the song? Or has the seed been planted by the song?"

A spokesman for Bury Education Authority said they were looking into the matter and had arranged to meet Miss Ramsay on Monday, after which they would be speaking to the headteacher. Until then they were unable to comment further.