American Vernacular Music Manuscripts, ca. 1730–1910: Digital Collections from the American Antiquarian Society and the Center for Popular Music

Digital Collections from the American Antiquarian Society and the Center for Popular Music1 comprises American music commonplace books, in most cases compilations of single-line treble tunes made by aspiring young musicians working either from published anthologies of the day (or from acquaintances’ own commonplace books). [...]the pop sphere of that time dipped out of the modern commercial cliché by including among the dance tune component a number of fiddle tunes that were already in or were in the process of entering oral tradition, and, on the other end of the social-aesthetic spectrum, hit tunes from the art sphere. [...]a few tunes regularly went by several titles, the commonest example being ‘President’s March’, which is the same melody as the song ‘Hail Columbia’. [...]marches constituted the first substantial assembly of tunes with titles referencing American topics, that is, names of military leaders or organizations or specific battles.