Scholars of early twentieth-century sheet music and records are often bemused by the large number of titles they encounter labeled “blues” that do not sound anything like classic Delta or city blues—”The Alcoholic Blues,” “Left All Alone Again Blues,” “I'm Sorry I Ain't Got It, You Could Have It if I Had It Blues.” They're just ordinary pop songs, for crying out loud! Or are they? Peter C. Muir is sure to ruffle a few feathers in the Blues Establishment with this new study of the earliest published “blues,” as he opens a fascinating new field of inquiry into early twentieth-century vernacular music. Literally hundreds of tunes called blues were published before most Americans heard Mamie Smith's recording of “Crazy Blues” (1920), which is usually taken as the start of the “blues explosion.” Muir limits his study to pre-1921 and to “titular” blues—songs explicitly titled as blues (e.g., “The St. Louis Blues”)—or those that contain the construct “I've got the blues” (e.g., “I've Got the Weary Blues”). These songs, he asserts, “were clearly considered to be blues by the culture that produced them” (2). He does not include songs about the blues (e.g., “Blues My Naughty Sweetie Gives to Me”). Even with such limitations Muir identifies about 450 titular blues published between 1912 and 1920, the year when Ms. Smith kicked off the recorded blues craze (and large-scale African American participation in the recording industry) with her best-selling Okeh recording.

The blues changed character dramatically in the 1920s, and this study of the decade before that change took place looks at largely unexplored ground. What changed? The author uses medical terminology to distinguish between homeopathic and allopathic blues. The former are slow and sad and address depression by treating a “depressed state of mind with depressed music” (88). In other words, they encourage a kind of catharsis, or “having a good cry.” This type of blues is the one most familiar to us today, on which most blues scholarship has focused. However, the blues published before 1921 are largely allopathic, that is, upbeat and lively. This form did not disappear entirely in later years, but it was largely superseded. Allopathic blues address depression with its opposite, “a good laugh,” so to speak.

Muir is a musicologist (Long Lost Blues is adapted from his Ph.D. dissertation), and he relies primarily on published sheet music for a thorough analysis of words and music. Refreshingly, though, he also takes into account contemporary sound recordings, which sometimes shed light on performance practice. In the interests of full disclosure, I should say that I had long discussions with him about sheet music versus recordings, and, although we may not agree entirely on the relative importance of those two media, Long Lost Sounds clearly takes them both into consideration. Published music can be performed in different ways, of course. The earliest recordings of “St. Louis Blues” are instrumentals by Prince's Band on Columbia and the Victor Band on Victor (both 1916) and are in march tempo. The first vocal version, by the black band from Ciro's Club in England (1918), is a banjo-strumming affair that sounds like a party in progress. The well-known early version by The Original Dixieland Jazz Band (1921) is in Dixieland style. Even composer W. C. Handy's own recorded versions (1922 and 1923) were upbeat. It was not until white vaudeville singer Marion Harris recorded the song for Brunswick in 1920 that it was done slowly, in the homeopathic style we would now identify as “blues.”

Muir devotes an entire chapter to Handy and his work. Although Handy was hardly a classic bluesman, his sobriquet “Father of the Blues” is not entirely misplaced, as it was he who was primarily responsible for popularizing the twelve-bar blues form and other blues elements during the period 1912–20. Many of his most famous works drew from, or in some cases were straight adaptations of, folk material. This book gives us perhaps the most insightful musical analysis of Handy's work to date.

Long Lost Blues explores many aspects of pre-1921 blues. Chapter 1 is an overview of the popular blues “industry” of the 1910s, which began with the publication of four titular blues in 1912 (the most successful of which was Handy's “Memphis Blues”) and exploded with hundreds of additional titles during the remainder of the decade. The role of vaudeville, musicals, and minstrel shows in spreading this “new” (to white America) music is explored, as is the impact of records and piano rolls. Chapter 2 analyzes this body of work in depth from a musical perspective. We even get rough percentages of the frequency of appearance of “distinctive components of the popular blues idiom” (66)—the twelve-bar sequence is found in slightly less than half of the examples studied, blue notes in nearly all, the “barbershop ending” in about a third, the four-note chromatic motif in over half, and the lyrical phrase “I've got the blues” (or something similar) in four-fifths. One of the most remarkable discoveries is the unfortunately named “Nigger Blues” by white minstrel performer Lasses White. Published in 1913, it is a pure twelve-bar blues compromised by virtually no Tin Pan Alley elements. How have previous blues scholars missed this work? The author uses musical examples to illustrate his points, but the text is written so clearly that even a nonmusician should be able to follow the discussion. In addition, the author has helpfully provided audio clips of all examples on his accompanying Web site, www.longlostblues.com.

I expected the book to include a list of the 450 blues Muir identified, but only those from 1912 to 1915 are listed, in an appendix. For the rest, one must visit the Web site, and even there they are accessible only chronologically, not alphabetically. The book is not so long (254 pages) that space would seem to have been a problem. One is also forced to go to the Web site for a list of pre-1921 blues recordings and piano rolls. For the serious scholar the Web site will be an important adjunct to this book. Let's hope it remains available for a long time.

Perhaps the most fascinating, and unexpected, chapter is the one titled “Curing the Blues with the Blues.” Here the author explores the etymology of the word “blues” and how it came to be associated with an affliction of the industrial age known as neurasthenia, a kind of depression. Dr. Muir is director of the Institute for Music and Health, which advocates the use of music for physical well-being, so it is perhaps not surprising that he would emphasize this aspect of the music. He spends a full chapter discussing this “medicinal” aspect of early blues music, citing claims by many early sheets that their songs were “a cure for the blues.” However, I find this assertion at best a novel hypothesis and not entirely persuasive. The supposed curative aspect might explain the mass popularity of blues music in the 1910s, or it might not. The author offers no solid evidence in this regard. It could be equally argued that all manner of entertainment, and even physical activity (including social dancing, which was quite popular at the time), served as a “cure for the blues,” and that even those without cause for depression were attracted to the music.

Another chapter focuses on early blues published in the South, which were presumably closer to the folk roots of the music than those from the North. Euday Bowman, George Thomas, and Perry Bradford are singled out, and numerous interesting titles are unearthed, including “1913 Medley Blues” and “New Orleans Hop Scop Blues” (1916). One of the most endearing aspects of this book is the author's obvious enthusiasm when he uncovers another underappreciated song from this era and explains why it warrants our attention.

The final chapter explores “proto-blues,” songs from before 1912 that were either called blues but were not, or that were not called blues but nevertheless embody blues elements. In addition to justifying the book's subtitle (yes, there was a song in 1850 called “I Have Got the Blues Today”), it presents some surprising findings. Blues elements are found in the “Frankie and Johnny” and “Bill Bailey” song families, as well as in the well-known “Bully” song; but how many would have expected them in the rollicking “Oh, You Beautiful Doll” (1911)? (They're in the verse, not the sing-along chorus.)

Long Lost Blues is a fascinating and ground-breaking exploration of largely unexplored musical terrain, an intelligent, well-documented, and highly readable journey through the intersection of popular and folk music in the early 1900s. I haven't read anything as thought-provoking about music of this era since David Wondrich's less well-written Stomp and Swerve.Footnote ¹ It is highly recommended.