The Hutchinson Family Singers and the culture of reform in antebellum America.
Item
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Title
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The Hutchinson Family Singers and the culture of reform in antebellum America.
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Identifier
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AAI3083662
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identifier
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3083662
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Creator
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Gac, Scott.
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Contributor
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Adviser: Louis P. Masur
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Date
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2003
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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History, United States | American Studies | Music | Biography
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Abstract
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The Hutchinson Family Singers were the most popular performing family in the United States during the 1840s. Their remarkable rise from the backwoods of New Hampshire to fame and riches indicate the mobility, equality, and opportunity that many believed symbolized the heart of the early American republic. As musicians and cultural entrepreneurs the Hutchinsons' accomplishments signified a change in American life. The Hutchinson Family Singers labored at the center of a great phenomenon of their time---the transformation of American culture from a limited urban setting to a regional scale, an unprofitable enterprise to a thriving business, and from the periphery of American society to its contested and vital core. The entertainers launched their career at the high point of the great social reform movements during the late 1830s and 1840s, building audiences by performing temperance and abolitionist songs in church related venues across New England and upstate New York. This rural religious circuit, combined with a burgeoning tourist industry centered around new understandings of nature, provided the Family Singers not only with a chance to hone their musicianship, but with an opportunity to expand their public influence. At a time when political parties began to build voting coalitions through such entertainments as parades and clever songs, these musical reformers became the central attraction for the antislavery movement. In their performances, writings, sheet music publications, and books of lyrics the Hutchinsons established a new space for civic action, a place where socially active cultural production stood at the intersection of culture, reform, religion, and politics in antebellum America. Looking at the advancement of the Hutchinson Family Singers from their early family life in the 1820s to the peak of their celebrity in the late 1840s enhances our understanding how music, in particular, and culture, in general, become integral to antebellum life, shedding new light on the intricacy and influence of antebellum politics, religion, and reform.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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PQT Legacy CUNY.xlsx
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degree
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Ph.D.
