About Southern Roots: The Delta Blues and Songs of Gee's Bend

Southern Roots: The Delta Blues and Songs of Gee’s Bend teaches African American students about the traditional music and arts practices in Southern African American culture, with a focus on the Mississippi Delta and Alabama. The curriculum takes students on the migration paths of African Americans: from West and Central Africa to the American South, and from the American South to urban centers in the North, Mid - West and West Coast. Students learn the African roots of black culture and blues music by tracing the West African origins of traditional African American instruments, like the diddley bow, the banjo and blues guitar techniques. They also trace the West African origin of the African American quilting tradition throughout the South and in Gee’s Bend through oral history and cross cultural studies.  Using children’s literature, documentary film and sound recordings, students engage with blues music, songs and legends from the Mississippi Delta, as well as the blues foundation of American popular music.  They also learn the history of the women quilters/singers of Gee’s Bend, Alabama through children’s literature, sound recordings and historical film footage. Students learn to perform African American congregational songs from Gee’s Bend, arrangements of blues songs and create a classroom museum of Black American instruments.

Digital and printed versions of this curriculum will be available for the 2019 – 2020 school year.
Each Ethnomusicology in Action Curriculum includes detailed teacher’s guides, step by step lesson plans, sheet music, printed and online children’s books with narration, online videos, downloadable music recordings, accompaniment tracks for performances and scholarly background readings for educators.