John Henry Nobles

Bones player from Beaumont, TX

Images

show all 15 images

FOR THE TEACHER

Introduction

Like many traditional musicians, John Nobles learned to play music during childhood. Playing rhythm sticks with other boys inspired him to create a unique sound to earn more money shining shoes and playing in a small combo. Ingenuity helps keep traditions alive. Playing bones has African and Afro-Caribbean antecedents, and the improvisation and syncopation required to play bones are hallmarks of African music. Likewise, as in the song John Nobles sings about Miss Possum and Miss Toad, during the 19th and early 20th centuries, African American stories, songs, and toasts featured animals, which many scholars think is an African influence. John Nobles’s creativity led him to make his own bones and develop a secret salve with which to cure them. His musical gifts led him to mastery and allowed him to play many types of traditional ensembles, from bluegrass to zydeco. Growing up in rural Alabama and Texas as the child of a sharecropper, John Nobles demonstrates how traditional culture enriches life and builds resilience.

Objectives

Students may:

• Improve listening skills and note taking
• Study African American percussion, including improvisation and syncopation
• Discover the “bones,” buck dancing, zydeco, and other musical traditions
• Investigate the music and culture of East Texas
• Consider vernacular speech as a cultural marker
• Explore children’s songs and music of different eras

Big Ideas

African American Musical Traditions

• African musical attributes such as improvisation, call and response, and syncopation have influenced American music since the first importation of slaves.
• British musical traditions also influenced American music.
• The “bones” represent an African antecedent, emphasizing the downbeat.
• John Nobles’s repertoire included African American music styles such as zydeo as well as Anglo American styles such as bluegrass and country and western.

Diversity

• Vernacular, everyday speech is a marker of diversity in a community.
• Economic class, occupation, religion, foodways, and music are also markers of diversity.
• Regions of a state have unique landscapes and culture and add to the diversity of a state.
• Musical diversity includes the music of children.

Material Culture

• Material culture includes both making and playing instruments such as the bones.
• Children and young people make and use material culture in their games, play, and music.
• Material culture traditions are passed along just as are songs, customs, jokes, beliefs, stories, and other types of folklore.

Materials

John Nobles’s story and photos
Radio clip
Everyday Music Field Notes
Traditions Venn Diagram
Everyday Music Interview Worksheet
Audio recorders (optional)
Release Forms (optional)

Time Required

1-2 class periods

Subjects

Texas history, social studies, English language arts, music

Preparation

Review John Nobles’s story and the media clip. Choose Big Ideas that you find relevant to your curriculum and your students. Copy the Everyday Music Field Notes and other worksheets students might use and cue the audio clip. 

Class Discussion

Students may read the story and listen to the audio story independently, in groups, or as a class. Using the Everyday Music Field Notes worksheet will help them focus more closely. In a class discussion, raise some of the Big Ideas above, depending upon your curriculum and students’ needs and grade level. Here are questions to spark discussion:

• Not only drums are percussion instruments. How many kinds of percussion can you name?
• Have you ever heard of playing the bones? Buck dancing? Hambone?
• What hand-clapping games do you know?
• What songs do you remember from childhood? How did you learn them?
• Are you in a band or music group? With whom? What music do you play?
• Do you have jobs at home or in the community? How much are you paid?
• How do you think John Nobles’s music contributed to his resilience?

Suggested Activities

Students may work independently or collaboratively to:

Research African influences on African American music and dance (see Resources). Topics might include the bones, buck dancing, hambone, blues, zydeco, or tap dancing. Present findings in a class report or Web page that includes illustrations and audio.

Identify a drummer in the community or school for a class percussion and rhythm demonstration. The school music specialist may be of help. Everyone should have a chance to play rhythm on blocks, sticks, bones, tambourines, or drums. End with a percussion circle, giving each person a short solo. As a culminating activity, write a poem about what you’ve learned about percussion instruments.

Learn the lyrics of John Nobles’s song “As I Was Walking…” to prompt memories of childhood songs for a survey about childhood songs. Try to interview people of different generations. If possible, record interviewees and be sure to use a release form. You may use a chart to analyze findings, such as number of songs remembered, person they were learned from, age at which they were learned (see “Bullfrog in the Classroom” for a song survey in Resources, below). You may also use recordings for a class presentation or sing-along.

Study a map of East Texas and Southwest Louisiana as a way to launch a regional culture investigation. Consider geographic and economic influences as well as settlement patterns. Topics might include foodways, music, ranching, and farming. Present your findings on an illustrated map for a class presentation that includes music. 

Assessment Strategies

Discussions
Field notes
Venn diagrams
Reports
Percussion solos
Poems
Surveys
Charts
Presentations
Maps

Vocabulary

blues
bones
buck dance
frottoir
improvisation
Jew’s harp
percussion
pitch
race relations
rhythm
rub board
salve
sharecropper
syncopation
tempo
zydeco

Standards

Analyze information
Use and create primary sources
Diversity
Regions
Economics

Resources

Websites

Bullfrog in the Classroom www.alabamafolklife.org/content/bullfrog-classroom

Rhythm Bones Central http://rhythmbones.com 

Publications

Govenar, Alan. Texas Blues: The Rise of a Contemporary Sound. College Station, TX: Texas A&M University Press, 2008.

Wixson, Steve. “John Henry ‘Bones’ Nobles.” Rhythm Bones Player 10, no. 1 (2008): 1, 7.

Films

Burris, J. C. American Folk Blues. Directed by Edward R. Michaels, 49 min., 1989. A black and white video with J. C. singing and playing the harmonica and bones. P.O. Box 460583, San Francisco, CA 94146-0583.