Written in the late 19th century, Paul Lawrence Dunbar’s poem “When Malindy Sings” evokes many wonderful images of the effects of music. The poem itself gives a wonderful insight into the power of music, and the eternal life granted by sound; however, this longevity is only a partial component of the importance of “When Malindy Sings”. The poem-turned-song has proved itself capable of both encapsulating and affecting jazz and the culture surrounding it. Looking at the adaptation by Abbey Lincoln, and company later on, it is clear that the poem has proven to have a powerful impact on not only enjoyers of poetry, but also music listeners and musicians themselves. The translation of a poem about music into music itself is a profound insight into Black expression.
Crafted by Paul Lawrence Dunbar in the late nineteenth century and then published in a collection of the same name in 1904, “When Malindy Sings” spans nine stanzas, interspersed with photographs in the collection. The tone almost allows for the poem itself to sound like the blues; the swing of the AAVE, the signifyin’ through repetition with a change (“You ain’t got de….”), and the rhythmic movement of the stanzas. A prominent theme in much of Dunbar’s writing and an important notice within “When Malindy Sings” is the use of African American Vernacular-English, also known as AAVE. From the first line “G’way an’ quit dat noise, Miss Lucy–”, it is clear that the spelling is not that of standardly received English, with three of first four words using an apostrophe to shorten the word. The use of AAVE gives the poem a specific tone immediately, conveying the manner in which the words are spoken. Many of Dunbar’s readers might have been hearing this type of speech for the first time in this poem, so it is an interesting choice to write it almost in code, but in doing so, to draw intrigue from more people. With added information of the tone, the readers are given contextual information about the setting and characters.
While the actual singing is not described in particular, the poem works to draw focus sound as a whole: that of Malindy’s singing as well as that of the spoken poem. With the use of AAVE, the reader is able to come to the conclusion that the unnamed narrator is black, yet through the conversation the speaker has with other characters, it becomes clear that, as much as the poem is a connection between the worlds of sound and literature, the narrator is also between these worlds in a sense. While race is never expressly explained, it seems likely that the “Miss Lucy”, who is so immediately criticized and instructed to stop her music, is white. Miss Lucy is both addressed with the more formal prefix “miss” and is told to put away her book, implying a certain literacy and higher social status than the narrator or Malindy who is simply addressed with no prefix. Malindy’s music is then described as “a-flyin’… F’om de kitchen to de big woods,” which conjures up an image of Malindy employed as perhaps a house servant or something of the sort. Creating a very self-referential piece of work, Dunbar’s unnamed narrator describes how incredible Malindy’s singing is as a work of Black expression and of the impact Malindy has as a Black artist. The narrator’s sort of “between” status also applies to Dunbar and the later musical adaptors, who also all exist in a place where their expression of the Black experience is widely applauded and acknowledged by the white population. The message of the poem encapsulates this sense of jazz and the difficulty behind the feat of being a successful musician;“When hit comes to raal right singin’,/ ‘T ain’t no easy thing to do.” The poem’s relevance to musicians and the similarity in energy to jazz music tied it closely to the jazz movement years later, when singer Abbey Lincoln and Oscar Brown Jr. led a group of musicians to develop and record the poem as a jazz piece in 1961.
During this shift from the work as a poem to a piece of music, the adaptors cut the piece down from nine stanzas to four. While this could be interpreted as the result of time constraints due to the recording formatting and material of the time, it is notable to see which stanzas of the original poem were not included in the musical treatment by Brown and Lincoln. Of the nine original stanzas, the second and fourth through seventh are excluded from the composition. The second stanza continues the introduction’s critique of character Miss Lucy, thus making its exclusion and the swift turn to the third stanza all the more of a focus on the impressive nature of Malindy’s singing than the Miss Lucy’s pathetic music. The fourth through 7th stanza are also exempt from the musical translation, where there is instead an instrumental interlude. These stanzas evoke a strong image of religion, particularly institutions of religion, drawing a strong image of Malindy’s singing as spiritual and almost godly.
As the music Malindy is actually singing is never truly described, it is interesting to consider the adaptation and how Lincoln would plan to sing and perhaps emulate Malindy. With the poem directing such focus to ask “don’t you hyeah de echoes callin’”, Lincoln’s singing has an inherent highlighting from its own lyrics. Throughout the song, Lincoln sings melodically to the backing music, in a sort of wordless vocalese. This sound is particularly clear in the beginning, after the solely instrumental prelude when Lincoln joins and prefaces her own lyrical singing (0:20-0:40). Considering the meta nature of this work, it becomes clear that Lincoln is in some ways acting as both the unspecified speaker and perhaps Malindy herself, or at least giving a sense of what Malindy could possibly sound like. This filling in of the silence emphasized by the original poem is fascinating, and showcases how Brown has made clever use of the backing soundtrack, which becomes especially clear in the last two stanzas.
Within the forgotten fifth stanza, it is described how instrumentalists and hummingbirds alike recognize their own inferiority to Malindy and stop playing, an interesting cut to consider when there is full musical backing in Brown and Lincoln’s version. This is an interesting paragraph to have lost, when considering the moment in the song during which Lincoln sings “Oh, hit’s sweetah dan de music/ Of an educated band”. At this point (1:45-1:53) during the recording, the backing music swells and seems to almost groan slightly creating a dissonance. This paired with the lyrics suggests the change is stemming from a discomfort in their playing behind a line that seems to critique them. A sort of awkwardness arises at this moment. Continuing into the final stanza, after a long instrumental break with notably absent vocalese, Lincoln returns with a gruff voice, a talking tone used while she addresses “Towsah” to stop barking, and Mandy to calm a child. During this time, in contrast to her harsh voice, a flute seems to imitate a child laughing or puppy whining (3:10-3:30). Lincoln’s tough tone is a stark juxtaposition to the voice used beforehand, as well as the voice moved to for the rest of the poem– a call for the audience to listen. The final two lines are as gentle as their word choice and religious connotation; “Sof’ an’ sweet, ‘Swing Low, Sweet Chariot,/ Ez Malindy sings.” Further encouraging the blues form while emphasizing the sense of Malindy’s gentle cradling of the words, the piano can be heard emphasizing the notes to a short callback to the music of the referenced spiritual.
Considering the overall impact of this morphing art piece mixing the aspects of sound and literature, the continuation of certain themes are clear. With Lincoln’s bravado in her vocalese at the end (3:40-4:00), it becomes clear she has claimed the persona of Malindy and is at once the narrator “between” the worlds, and the creator of the Black artist’s expression at once.
Bibliography:
Oscar Brown Jr; Paul Lawrence Dunbar, When Malindy Sings, with Abbey Lincoln, 1961, disc 1, track 15.
Dunbar, Paul Laurence. When Malindy Sings. United States: Dodd, Mead, 1904.
