I have read serious speculation that "popular music" in the sense of "music of the people" (and I agree with you completely on this meaning) COULD NOT have existed in class-divided and class-conscious Europe, and therefore, as a musical art form that cut across all societal classes, was indeed a new and essentially North American phenomenon.
This kind of reasoning can only function in the absence of any examination of the actual music. The dance collections of Attaignant and Susato, English madrigals and glees, the songs collected in Thomas D"Urfey's _Wit and Mirth_, and those borrowed for _The Beggar's Opera_--all, and much, much, else are examples of European popular music predating the founding of the United States. Hell, "To Anacreon in Heaven," whose melody serves "The Star Spangled Banner," is pre-US pop music. So is "Yankee Doodle." So is "Hail to the Chief" (originally sung at boat races).
As for "class-divided and class-conscious Europe," 19th-c. America was just as highly divided in this way--but our classes were defined by skin color and immigration status.
Wherever there are cities (i.e., in any civilization), there is popular music. This is true worldwide and throughout history.
see Ch. 4 of Charles Hamm's _Yesterdays_ for the great popularity of Italian opera in the US in the early 19th c.
I look forward to seeing it, but remain for the time being convinced that this would have been in the seaport cities that maintained close connections to Europe, and not in the interior heartland.
In 1820? *What* interior heartland? There was an interior alright, but it was very sparsely populated and could hardly be considered the heartland of anything.
A. P. Heinrich's experiences in Kentucky 1817-23 are instructive. This was a brand new state, as far West as American civilization extended at that time. Heinrich ended up in Kentucky because he'd been hired to conduct opera in Pittsburgh, but found when he got there that the job had fallen through, so he pushed on down the Ohio. The music in the KY towns he visited was typical pop music of the time: waltzes, schottisches, cotillons, and pop songs imported from Philadelphia and New York. The basic 19th-c. American pop song form consisting of solo stanzas interspersed with an ensemble ("chorus") refrain was already present, even in this remote area.
And BTW, note that this standard form requires "the people" not only to be able to read music, but to sing in harmony.
(Oh, and while I was on the Amazon website I realized why I had not ordered another book that you recommended. With a list price of $175 and no discounted copies available, it's just a little too rich for my blood!)
John
Yeah, sorry about that. I got my copy of _The Birth of the Orchestra_ at a prepublication price of $70.00, which looks like more and more of a bargain to me as time goes by.
Those of you who missed out--well, that's what libraries are for :-)
Andrew Stiller Kallisti Music Press http://home.netcom.com/~kallisti/
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