DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker in Marshall has to say — and friend, this one is something else entirely. Now, every now and then you roll into a town and the marker out front is carrying a secret so big it's a wonder the whole world doesn't already know it. Marshall, Texas, Harrison County — this is that town.
Because if the oral tradition and the documented evidence are to be believed, and the marker says both are, what was born out here in the early 1870s would eventually shake every juke joint, ballroom, and recording studio from New Orleans to Chicago. We're talkin' about Boogie Woogie. But hold on.
Don't go picturing some glamorous moment of inspiration. The real story starts with railroad iron and timber and hard, dangerous work. In that same decade, the 1870s, Marshall became the headquarters of the Texas and Pacific Railway Company.
A hub for moving cotton, timber, and passengers by rail. And with all that industry came employment — employment taken up in large part by recently emancipated African American laborers. Men who had just come through the worst chapter in American history and were now swinging axes in East Texas logging camps, cutting trees, loading logs onto locomotives bound for sawmills.
Now here's the detail that changes everything. Most of those logging camps had a piano. Kept it in the barrel house — the camp's gathering place — to keep the workers entertained and, more practically, to keep them in the camps at night.
Think about that room for a second. Loud. Chaotic.
Often dangerous. A crowd of working men who'd spent all day in the timber. And up front, a piano player — largely untrained — trying to hold the room.
You can't hold that room with something delicate. You hold that room by driving. You hold it with your left hand laying down a bass pattern so relentless, so insistent, that it gets up under a man's feet before his mind even knows what happened.
And that, right there in those East Texas barrel houses, is where the first Boogie Woogies were played. Now the marker makes a point worth savin' — that driving left-hand bass, the thing that makes Boogie Woogie sound like nothing else on earth, is highly suggestive of a steam locomotive chugging over iron rails. Inspired and influenced by the sounds of the logging camp and the rail yard.
The music was born surrounded by that rhythm, soaked in it from the very first note. And then — and this is where Boogie Woogie gets its wings — itinerant piano players rode the rails. Often performin' in exchange for free rides.
The music moved with them. First to the red-light districts of Texarkana and Shreveport. Then Houston and New Orleans.
Then gradually reaching African American neighborhoods in St. Louis, Kansas City, and Chicago. A sound that started in a barrel house in East Texas logging country traveled the same iron rails that inspired it.
Brothers George and Hersal Thomas were among the first to publish sheet music for Boogie Woogie — and they said they first heard it in East Texas. Said it right out loud. And the Marshall area?
It gave the world Boogie Woogie masters. Huddie Ledbetter, known as Lead Belly. Floyd Dixon.
Dave Alexander, who went by Omar Sharriff. All from right around here. An East Texas original, the marker calls it.
And it says you can still find it today, folded into many genres of music, still moving, still driving, still carrying that left-hand thunder that was born in the noise and the dark and the hard-workin' life of a Harrison County logging camp. Something about that feels right. The music rode the rails out of Marshall.
And the rails are still humming.
What the marker says
According to oral tradition and documented evidence, the Boogie Woogie musical genre, with its driving, iconic left-hand rhythm, originated in the area of Marshall, Harrison County, in the early 1870s. During that decade, Marshall became the headquarters of the Texas & Pacific Railway Company and a hub for railroad transportation of cotton, timber and passengers, creating employment for recently emancipated African American laborers. Many African Americans worked in logging camps cutting trees and loading logs for locomotives to haul to sawmills, and most logging camps had a piano in the barrel house to keep the workers entertained and in the camps at night. It was in these barrel houses of East Texas logging camps where the first Boogie Woogies were played as largely untrained piano players developed techniques to entertain working-class audiences under loud, chaotic and often dangerous conditions. The driving left-hand bass patterns that are uniquely characteristic of Boogie Woogie piano, so highly suggestive of a steam locomotive chugging over iron rails, clearly are inspired and influenced by the sounds of the logging camp and the rail yard. Itinerant piano players rode the rails, often performing in exchange for free rides, and the music traveled with them, first to red-light districts of Texarkana and Shreveport, followed by Houston and New Orleans, then gradually reaching African American neighborhoods in St. Louis, Kansas City and Chicago. Brothers George and Hersal Thomas were among the first to publish sheet music for Boogie Woogie, which they said they first heard in East Texas. Boogie Woogie masters Huddie “Lead Belly” Ledbetter, Floyd Dixon and Dave Alexander (Omar Sharriff) grew up in the Marshall area. An East Texas original, Boogie Woogie may still be found in many genres of music today. (2013)