Samuel Mordecai, Richmond in Bygone Day (Richmond, 1856), 296.
Item
Title
Samuel Mordecai, Richmond in Bygone Day (Richmond, 1856), 296.
Includes music itself or text of song
no
Identity of singers; solo/group
free?
Voice/instrument
voice
voice
Space/room
factory
activity
working in a factory
genre
sacred music
Geographical location
Richmond, Virginia
Excerpt
On the spot where it stood, is now erected a tobacco factory large enough for a Cathedral, and not only by the belfry which surmounts it, but also by the sounds that proceed from within its walls, might it be mistaken for one, as might several other similar establishments; for many of the negroes, male and female, employed in the factories, have acquired such skill in psalmody and have generally such fine voices, that it is a pleasure to listen to the sacred music with which they beguile the hours of labour. Besides the naturally fine voice and ear for music which seems to have been given to the black race, (perhaps to enable them "to whistle and to sing for want of thought,") many of the slaves in Richmond have acquired some knowledge of music by note, and may be seen, even in the factories, with their books of psalmody open on the work-bench. How much worse off are they than operatives in a factory in Old, or even in New England?
Context
Mordecai writes about the music that he heard coming out of a factory from Black workers.