Drawing from the traditional background and diaspora of two oppressed peoples, enslaved Africans and indentured Irish immigrants, Mick Moloney and Lenwood Sloan explore the curious and tumultuous journey of the banjo, fiddle, jig, joke and jump dance, riddle, rhyme, song, shuffle and clog.
Their cultural dialogue begins at the departure point of two diverse cultures in the eighteenth century; their early nineteenth century encounter in the Caribbean, amalgamation in New Orleans’ Congo Square, entry into America along the Mississippi after 1803, the 1840’s escape to Appalachia, and their arrival and confrontation in America’s urban cities by the beginning of the Civil War.
Moloney and Sloan analyze the fractured alliances of post war Black and Irish communities as they challenge each other for land, jobs, and status. They demonstrate the collision of African and Irish cultures as they encounter each other on the American stage through examples from pre and post war minstrelsy, the Jim Crow era, burlesque and vaudeville, turn of century Tin Pan Alley and film and Broadway between the two world wars.
This event will be held at the museum. Purchase Tickets Here!