Composition
Written for performance by the New York blackface troupe Christy's Minstrels, the song has E. P. Christy, the troupe's leader, appearing as its creator on early printings of the sheet music. Christy had paid Foster to be credited, something Foster himself had suggested though later regretted.
Foster had composed most of the lyrics but was trying to give a name to the river of the opening line and asked his brother to suggest one. The first suggestion was "Yazoo" (in Mississippi), which despite fitting the melody perfectly, Foster rejected. The second suggestion was "Pee Dee" (in South Carolina), to which Foster said, "Oh pshaw! I won't have that." His brother then consulted an atlas and called out "Suwannee!" Foster said "That's it exactly!" He wrote it in immediately (misspelling it "Swanee" to fit the melody).
Foster himself never saw the Suwannee or even visited Florida, but the popularity of the song initiated tourism to Florida to see the river and since 1935 it has been the official state song of Florida, although in 2008 the original lyrics were expurgated.
- Dvorak's Humoresque Number 7, written in the 1890s, is musically similar and is sometimes played along with "Old Folks at Home". The Library of Congress's National Jukebox presents a version with soprano Alma Gluck and violinist Efrem Zimbalist.
Read more about this topic: Old Folks At Home
Famous quotes containing the word composition:
“Give a scientist a problem and he will probably provide a solution; historians and sociologists, by contrast, can offer only opinions. Ask a dozen chemists the composition of an organic compound such as methane, and within a short time all twelve will have come up with the same solution of CH4. Ask, however, a dozen economists or sociologists to provide policies to reduce unemployment or the level of crime and twelve widely differing opinions are likely to be offered.”
—Derek Gjertsen, British scientist, author. Science and Philosophy: Past and Present, ch. 3, Penguin (1989)
“It is my PRIDE, my damn’d, native, unconquerable Pride, that plunges me into Distraction. You must know that 19-20th of my Composition is Pride. I must either live a Slave, a Servant; to have no Will of my own, no Sentiments of my own which I may freely declare as such;Mor DIE—perplexing alternative!”
—Thomas Chatterton (1752–1770)
“The proposed Constitution ... is, in strictness, neither a national nor a federal constitution; but a composition of both.”
—James Madison (1751–1836)