Barrelhouse Words: A Blues Dialect Dictionary

Front Cover
University of Illinois Press, 2009 - Music - 286 pages

This fascinating compendium explains the most unusual, obscure, and curious words and expressions from vintage blues music. Utilizing both documentary evidence and invaluable interviews with a number of now-deceased musicians from the 1920s and '30s, blues scholar Stephen Calt unravels the nuances of more than twelve hundred idioms and proper or place names found on oft-overlooked "race records" recorded between 1923 and 1949. From "aggravatin' papa" to "yas-yas-yas" and everything in between, this truly unique, racy, and compelling resource decodes a neglected speech for general readers and researchers alike, offering invaluable information about black language and American slang.

 

Contents

A BLUES DIALECT DICTIONARY
1
Appendix
273

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Common terms and phrases

About the author (2009)

Stephen Calt is the author or coauthor of the blues biographies I'd Rather Be The Devil: Skip James and the Blues and King Of The Delta Blues: The Life and Music of Charlie Patton.

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