Jim Snyder - Needed Time

Topic: Movement - Foot Taps
The relationship between music, dance, and ritual intrigues historians, but the merger occurred thousands of years before the first evidence was left on Greek vases. One can only speculate that using the feet as a rhythmic accompaniment to singing began as soon as there was a concept of recurring beats. African-American stepping may be an elaboration on some older practice that, in western Europe, survived in the form of tapping the toe or heel.

When I was in high school in Michigan in the late 1950s, our band director criticized the lead trumpet player for using his foot, even though it could not be heard. [1] We were given to understand good musicians were the ones who read sheet music and took their beat from the right hand of the conductor; marking time was like playing by ear, something not done.

He was not merely expressing some personal animosity. He had inherited this prejudice from Lowell Mason, who, in the very first graded text for use in public schools in this country had warned teachers: "do not tolerate beating or stamping with the foot under any circumstances." [2]

The fear of social stigma has become so universal in this country that few people who uploaded versions of "Kumbaya" to YouTube used their feet, or patted their thighs as a substitute. Jim Snyder tended to tap his toe when he was standing and raise his heel when he was sitting. He did this on all his videos, including a slow song sung in church at Christmas and the Carter Family’s "Keep on the Sunnyside." [3]

He adapted Lightnin’ Hopkins’ "Needed Time" for a Methodist Church concert to raise funds for the relief effort after the 2010 earthquake in Haiti by adding verses in Haitian Creole. It was built around the line "now is the needed time," which he repeated six times in the first stanza. In the last sestet, he repeated it five times with "Jesus won’t you come by here" as the concluding line.

His technique differed from that of African Americans who begin stepping as soon as instruments begin to establish the rhythm before they sing. He always played the tune through once without moving his foot. Once the melody was set, he began singing with an instrumental accompaniment and beating time with his foot.

When he was singing "Needed Time" in English he used rhythm and blues patterns, but when he was singing the French-influenced creole verses he used motifs borrowed from French-influenced Cajun music. Instrumental rhythm then became part of the texture he added to give meaning to the text. It was not critical to the music, which was regulated by his foot.

Performers
Vocal Soloist: Jim Snyder
Vocal Group: none
Instrumental Accompaniment: small acoustic guitar
Rhythm Accompaniment: his foot was not heard

Credits
"Needed Time" (Traditional) arranged and new lyrics in Haitian Creole (c) 2009 Jim Snyder.

Notes on Lyrics
Language: English and Haitian Creole
Verses: needed time and Haitian Creole verses

Vocabulary
Pronoun: none
Term for Deity: Jesus used once
Special Terms: none in English sections

Basic Form: six-line verses
Verse Repetition Pattern: AxxxA
Ending: repeated final line "now is the needed time"
Unique Features: none


Notes on Music
Opening Phrase: Lightnin’ Hopkins
Tempo: moderate

Basic Structure: alternated sections for guitar and voice
Singing Style: unornamented

Voice-Accompaniment Dynamics: there was none of Hopkins’ melodic exchange between the instrument and the voice. In the introduction and instrumental interlude after the second Haitian Creole verse, the guitar played the melody. When Snyder was singing, the guitar played the rhythm.

Notes on Performance
Occasion: Haiti Benefit Concert sponsored by United Methodist Committee On Relief. 5 February 2010

Location: stage of the LeBelle Theatre, South Charleston, West Virginia

Microphones: two floor mikes, one for the guitar and one for his voice

Clothing: Snyder was dressed in worker’s clothes like those associated with Jimmie Rodgers in his Singing Brakeman photographs. [4] He wore gray slacks and a poplin jacket or overshirt with a darker shirt underneath and a taupe-gray baseball-style hat.

Notes on Movement
Snyder was seated on a kitchen chair with the seat at the height of his knee. He usually was leaning over the guitar, and rarely raised his head to face his audience. He shook his head a few times when he began the first Haitian Creole verse, and hunched then raised his shoulders while singing the last English verse. During the interlude, he moved his guitar, but stopped as soon as he resumed singing.

Notes on Audience
No response while he was playing; applause at the end

Notes on Performers
He was "from a long line of musicians and teachers in the woods of West Virginia," [5] and studied music in college. [6] He decided he did not want to be music teacher, because of the way he had behaved in band, and, instead, specialized in therapy. He made his living as a solo performer and managing music festivals in West Virginia. [7]

Availability
YouTube: uploaded by sunvalleymusicgroup on 6 December 2012.

End Notes
1. The trumpet player was white. Both he and the director had German last names. I suspect the trumpeter found a way to move his toe within his shoe.

2. Lowell Mason. The Song-Garden. New York: Mason Brothers, 1864. 1:7. His basic idea, borrowed from Pestalozzi, was to begin with children imitating an XxXx pattern. When they could reproduce it, they then were to be weaned from their natural response and shown how it was transcribed in measures in sheet music.

3. YouTube videos for "Joseph’s Song," uploaded 25 December 2015, and "Keep on the Sunnyside," uploaded 14 November 2012. The Carter Family was an early country music group from southwestern Virginia who incorporated traditional Appalachian music in their style.

4. Jimmie Rodgers was the first very popular country music singer; his way of singing with a guitar establishing the genre’s basic form.

5. Jim Snyder. Quoted by Cindy Lamb. "Front & Center: Jim Snyder: Journeyman." Louisville Music News website. April 1997.

6. "Jim Snyder." LinkedIn.
7. Lamb.