Master Chorus Eastside: Rhythm and Community Redux

I can’t resist one more blog on the community that can be created by rhythm, again drawn from the NPR series Rhythm Section: Spending a Week Trying to Catch the Beat. This particular segment concerns probably the most famous marching song in the Army. It first appeared in 1944 near the end of World War II and it is attributed to an African American soldier, Willie Duckworth, who wanted to buttress the spirits of his weary comrades.

It’s an infectious, hypnotic rhythm that keeps people moving together in time, which makes sense since research tells us that rhythm activates the motor areas of the brain as well as auditory areas. But it does more than that. As Bobby Gerhardt, a modern soldier and cadence caller interviewed in the NPR piece observed, it’s great physical exercise because you have to move and chant and manage your breath all at once. But it also kept him moving forward and listening, eager to hear each verse so he would know how to answer back. It motivated him to be a cooperative member of the group!

That’s part of the purpose of work songs, and Sound Off belongs to that tradition. Although the piece refers only to the work songs brought here by slaves, they can be found in folk cultures around the world, for they ease the burden of work by coordinating group activities, and they entertain the heart at the same time. But what appealed to me even more was the notion that impishly playing with the rhythm, creating syncopations, could put a spring in your step, make the work go faster, and set your own group apart from others. As Gerhardt said, he liked to rhythmically push the envelope of what he was allowed to call, and that put a smile on his face.

It was group resistance to the Group through rhythm!

Here are more G.I. marching rhythms, with syncopation that pushes the envelope.