Great (Musical) Scots – George (Mammee) Mitchell

[Lachlan09]

George Mitchell, known for inventing the Supermarine Spitfire and saving Britain from a future of live performances of Lili Marlene at the Albert Hall (okay I’m kidding), was Scottish and also a musical impresario. He will best be remembered for importing to our British TV’s what became a mainstay of Beeb light entertainment in the 50’s and 60’s, I’m talking about the "multi-cultural" Black & White Minstrel Show. At first, it innocently imitated the minstrel genre popular at some time in USA history. But if it was popular in 20th Century post-WW2 America, I do not know. So what on earth it was doing in Britain in the 1950’s, God only knows !

But it was really popular ! Okay, Britain was starved of good entertainment at that time but were we really that badly off ? For the young ‘uns in the forum, the BBC concept was based on the old minstrel shows which were popular in the USA through most of the 1800’s. A few American musical impresarios had hit on the idea of musical stage shows showcasing the jolly life on a typical Southern plantation of the time. There would be jolly dances, banjo playing, singing and buffoonery in the style of the African American, then known by other names, as America still had slavery at the time. I believe the shows didn't include chains or whipping though. The entertainment used white male performers in black-face make-up with frizzy wigs, gaudy clothes and exaggerated behavior and language. To emphasise the impression to white people of large eyes and rows of white teeth set in a dark face, white make-up was applied around their eyes and mouths. One of the most successful impresarios and performers of the genre was Daniel Decatur Emmett, from Ohio. He introduced new musical forms which saw performers in a walkabout-dance around the stage. One day, whilst depressed and writing new songs in dull, cold, raining, impersonal New York, he thought about his happy days performing in the balmy, friendly South. Bang ! A new song was soon written and became a smash show-hit, especially popular in New York. The song was “Dixie” aka “I wish I were in the land of cotton” and ironically, in a couple of years, when the American Civil War started, it became the unofficial anthem of the slaveholding Confederacy. The genre didn’t quite die out after the war, through vaudeville and indeed made it onto the silver screen courtesy Al Jolson, who attempted to give a certain nobility to his painted-face.

Anyway, nearly 100 years and a war-which-freed-slaves later, George Mitchell brought it to British TV screens. I still don’t know why. Okay, Britain was clueless about segregation in the USA and South Africa and thought we were the pillar of civilization and fair-play, what what ? Harmless fun ! If anyone (Caribbean or African origin for instance) complained, they must have a chip on their shoulder !

Initially, it was faithful to the genre:- white men in complete black face with white surrounds to mouth and eyes, frizzy wigs, gaudy clothes and white gloves, singing about Camptown Races to beautiful white women in Tiller-Girl costumes.

Anyway the series ran through the 1960’s and bit by bit, the original straw boaters, huge bow ties and candy stripe trousers gave way to more sophisticated songs and clothes. In 1965, they did a 25th tribute to the RAF and Battle of Britain (that man Mitchell again), dressed in stage-style RAF blues with scarves etc, singing White Cliffs of Dover etc, but still in black-face !! I wonder what the Germans would have thought if they’d shot down and captured any of these pilots !!

Times changed, however and embarrassment in the later 1960’s made the public uncomfortable, or else they just got bored. I wonder what would have happened if The Supremes or Sly and The Family Stone had been invited on the show ! Anyway, the B&W minstrels gave up on the black paint and the Al Jolson voices for good. Then they were, I guess, just the Minstrels. Then they were off the screens for good.

So did they leave a legacy, such as Ready Steady Go ! left a legacy or Coronation Street left a legacy (what ? you mean Corrie's still going ??? How old are Ena Sharples and Minnie Caldwell now ?? Bloody Hell !!!) or was it a hiccup gone and forgotten ? I hope so.

I just wished it had survived long enough to satisfy a fantasy of mine. I imagined The Black & White Minstrels Re-Union Show 1981, all in make-up and in the team bus, going across London to perform, when the bus breaks down in Brixton ! Priceless !

Actually Little Britain did a skit on two black-faced minstrels being turned away from bedsits and B&B's because they were minstrels and there were even signs saying "No Minstrels". I think they were having a dig at Britain in the 1950's when Jamaicans and Trinidadians etc were invited to settle in the UK by the British Government and were turned away by landladies the length and breadth of the country in just the same way.