Musical Offerings ⦁ 2026 ⦁ Volume 17 ⦁ Number 1 37 Sicilian Collaboration in Black Performing Arts Because of their shared discrimination, Italian Americans were often forced to live in the same communities as black people, which led to Italian Americans performing in black artistic traditions. Sicilian barber and musician Anthony Maggio composed the 1908 ragtime piece “I Got the Blues,” which is credited as one of the first published blues songs featuring the 12-bar form that later became standardized in the blues genre. Maggio later claimed the melody was inspired by an interaction with an old black man playing the guitar on a New Orleans ferry.10 In addition to drawing inspiration from black music, Italian Americans actively partook in black culture to show solidarity with African Americans. On March 24, 1896, Italians protested a suffrage amendment intended to disenfranchise Louisiana’s black voters by performing in a New Orleans parade while marching with an Italian flag behind them.11 While jazz originated in New Orleans’s African American and Creole communities, there was a great deal of interaction between black and Sicilian musicians as the art form developed.12 One of the first prominent jazz trumpeters was Nick LaRocca, the son of Sicilian immigrants, whose Original Dixieland Jazz Band made the first jazz recording. LaRocca was also the composer of “Tiger Rag,” which remains one of the most recorded jazz compositions.13 The drummer of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band, Tony Sbarbaro, was also of Sicilian descent. While not belonging to the same culture as the genre’s original creators, these Italian American musicians helped establish jazz as an important American cultural icon. Louis Prima Born in New Orleans, LA, on December 7, 1910, Louis Leo Prima was the son of two Italian American parents. His father, Anthony, was the son of an immigrant from Sicily, while his mother, Angelina, hailed from the nearby island of Ustica. Prima mentioned on multiple occasions that 10 Hobson, Creating Jazz Counterpoint, 79. 11 Allured, Louisiana Legacies, 169. 12 Cinotto, Making Italian America, 238. 13 “Tiger Rag” was inducted into the U.S. Library of Congress National Recording Registry in 2003. Tim Gracyk’s essay on the Library of Congress website states that this tune had already been recorded over 100 times by the 1930’s.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTM4ODY=