While I was driving today to deliver instruments, I head a radio article that I thought was rather interesting. It was about the cakewalk and its popularity across the globe in the early jazz era. The story went that it was originally a prize dance performed by enslaved or newly emancipated black musicians in southern plantations that took inspiration from the European Grand March. The winner of the competition would get the prize, the cake. It was debuted in Philadelphia and went mainstream shortly thereafter, becoming a routine part of minstrel shows. From there it spread to Paris, where it became a very popular and heavily copied style of music. As the narrator put it, “It marked the first time in American history that the French considered American music to have developed enough of an identity of its own that they wanted to emulate it, in contrast with the past, where European music was eagerly imported to America.”
Claude Debussy was so enthralled with it that he wrote his own piece, Golliwog’s Cakewalk, which masterfully combined the cakewalk style and the Tristan theme from Wagner in a classical setting. That piece has been one of my favorites since childhood. There is a string quintet arrangement of it in my favorite music video.
The interest in the African roots of the music led to a lot of exploration of African music in French music and ballet.
It’s fascinating to see the passage of themes or ideas among different areas of the world and their treatment in the different styles.
Edited by - The Violin Beautiful on 08/03/2026 18:39:34
Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Privacy Consent (EU/GDPR Only)
Copyright 2026 Fiddle Hangout. All Rights Reserved.
