Candace Bailey’s exploration of the intertwining worlds of music and gender shows how young southern women pushed the boundaries of respectability to leave their unique mark on a patriarchal society. Before 1861, a strictly defined code of behavior allowed a southern woman to identify herself as a “lady” through her accomplishments in music, drawing, and writing, among other factors. Music permeated the lives of southern women, and they learned appropriate participation through instruction at home and at female training institutions. A belle’s primary venue was the parlor, where she could demonstrate her usefulness in the domestic circle by providing comfort and serving to enhance social gatherings through her musical performances, often by playing the piano or singing. The southern lady performed in public only on the rarest of occasions, though she might attend public performances by women. An especially talented lady who composed music for a broader audience would do so anonymously so that her reputation would remain unsullied. The tumultuous Civil War years provided an opportunity for southern women to envision and attempt new ways to make themselves useful to the broader, public society. While continuing their domestic responsibilities and taking on new ones, young women also tested the boundaries of propriety in a variety of ways. In a broad break with the past, musical ladies began giving public performances to raise money for the war effort, some women published patriotic Confederate music under their own names, supporting their cause and claiming public ownership for their creations. Bailey explores these women’s lives and analyzes their music. Through their move from private to public performance and publication, southern ladies not only expanded concepts of social acceptability but also gained a valued sense of purpose. Music and the Southern Belle places these remarkable women in their social context, providing compelling insight into southern culture and the intricate ties between a lady’s identity and the world of music. Augmented by incisive analysis of musical compositions and vibrant profiles of composers, this volume is the first of its kind, making it an essential read for devotees of Civil War and southern history, gender studies, and music.

Ola Belle Reed (1916-2002) was one of the all-time greatest performers of Appalachian music. Ola Belle Reed and Southern Mountain Music on the Mason-Dixon Line combines Reed's 1960s recordings, some of the earliest she ever made and available here for the very first time, with modern-day field recordings of her descendants and those she inspired within her Appalachian community. This deluxe edition highlights Reed's deep repertoire--folk ballads, minstrel songs, country standards and originals--and traces the impact her music made and is still making today. The two-CD set is accompanied by a luxurious publication tracing Reed's influence and the folklorists who have tracked it: Henry Glassie, who first heard Alex and Ola Belle play in 1966 at the back of the Campbell's Corner general store, and Clifford R. Murphy, who, four decades later, recorded Reed's modern successors in Maryland, Delaware and Pennsylvania.

The breakout star of The Real Housewives of Atlanta, who is known for being the ultimate Southern Belle, advises women on fashion, etiquette, dating and the workplace, giving a modern twist to traditional Southern values.

A Choice Outstanding Academic Title for 2022 Hearing southern women in the pauses of history Southern women of all classes, races, and walks of life practiced music during and after the Civil War. Candace L. Bailey examines the history of southern women through the lens of these musical pursuits, uncovering the ways that music's transmission, education, circulation, and repertory help us understand its meaning in the women's culture of the time. Bailey pays particular attention to the space between music as an ideal accomplishment—part of how people expected women to perform gentility—and a real practice—what women actually did. At the same time, her ethnographic reading of binder’s volumes, letters and diaries, and a wealth of other archival material informs new and vital interpretations of women’s place in southern culture. A fascinating collective portrait of women's artistic and personal lives, Unbinding Gentility challenges entrenched assumptions about nineteenth century music and the experiences of the southern women who made it.

lively southern belles, one a bride, each with 5 elegant ensembles. 16 plates.

An examination of the influential role music played in the lives of elite southern women during the antebellum period In Charleston Belles Abroad, Candace Bailey examines the vital role music collections played in the lives of elite women of Charleston, South Carolina, in the years leading up to the Civil War. Bailey has studied a substantial archive of music held at several southern libraries, including the library in the historic Aiken-Rhett House, once owned by William Aiken Jr., a successful businessman, rice planter, and governor of South Carolina. Her skill as a musicologist enables her to examine the collections as primary sources for gaining a better understanding of musical culture, instruction, private performance, cultural tourism, and the history of the music industry during this period. The bound and unbound collections and their associated publications show that international travel and music education in Europe were common among Charleston's elite families. While abroad, the budding musicians purchased the latest music publications and brought them back to Charleston, where they often performed them in private and at semipublic events. Through a narrow exploration of the collections of these elite women, Bailey exposes the cultural priorities within one of the South's most influential cities and illuminates both the commonalities and discrepancies in the training of young women to enter society. A noteworthy contribution to southern and urban history, Charleston Belles Abroad provides a deep study of music in the context of transatlantic values, interpersonal relationships, and stability and tumult in the South during the nineteenth century.

To know the Sweet Potato Queens is to love them, and if you haven't heard about them yet, you will. Since the early 1980s, this group of belles gone bad has been the toast of Jackson, Mississippi, with their glorious annual appearance in the St. Patrick's Day parade. In The Sweet Potato Queens' Book of Love, their royal ringleader, Jill Conner Browne, introduces the Queens to the world with this sly, hilarious manifesto about love, life, men, and the importance of being prepared. Chapters include: • The True Magic Words Guaranteed to Get Any Man to Do Your Bidding • The Five Men You Must Have in Your Life at All Times • Men Who May Need Killing, Quite Frankly • What to Eat When Tragedy Strikes, or Just for Entertainment • The Best Advice Ever Given in the Entire History of the World From tales of the infamous Sweet Potato Queens' Promise to the joys of Chocolate Stuff and Fat Mama's Knock You Naked Margaritas, this irreverent, shamelessly funny book is the gen-u-wine article.