Between 1619, when the first slave ship arrived in North America, and the 1860s when slavery was abolished, hundreds of thousands of Africans were kidnapped from their homeland, sold on the open market in America, and forced to live as slaves. Initially, slavery was introduced throughout the nation, but it only took hold in the South where cheap labor was needed to work the expansive plantations. After the American Revolution, slavery ended within a generation in every state north of the Mason Dixon line. Meanwhile, a pattern of society was emerging in the South, which included wealthy plantation owners and slaves who were denied the human freedoms guaranteed in America's Bill of Rights.
Enslaved African Americans created a varied body of music that included work songs, leisure songs, and spirituals. The sound was rooted in African traditions and informed by the European American music to which they were now being exposed. Likewise, African rhythms, harmonies, and vocal styles had a great influence on the music of European Americans. The words to the spiritual Many Thousand Gone conveyed various messages depending on whether the singer was a slave, runaway slave, African American Union soldier, or emancipated former slave.
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