Emmett, Daniel Decatur

Emmett, Daniel Decatur
born Oct. 29, 1815, Mount Vernon, Ohio, U.S.
died June 28, 1904, Mount Vernon

U.S. showman and songwriter.

The son of an Ohio blacksmith, he joined the army at age 17 as a fifer. In 1843 in New York he helped organize the Virginia Minstrels, one of the earliest minstrel-show troupes. He is credited with writing "Dixie" (1859), a minstrel "walk-around" (concluding number) that became the Confederacy's unofficial national anthem. His other songs include "Old Dan Tucker" and "Blue-Tail Fly." He also wrote banjo tunes and music instruction manuals.

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▪ American composer
born , Oct. 29, 1815, Mount Vernon, Ohio, U.S.
died June 28, 1904, Mount Vernon

      U.S. composer of “ Dixie” (q.v.) and organizer of one of the first minstrel show troupes.

      The son of a blacksmith, he joined the army at age 17 as a fifer. After his discharge in 1835 he played the drum in travelling circus bands. He was also a capable violinist, flutist, and singer. In 1843 in New York City he and three co-performers organized the Virginia Minstrels, a troupe that competes with the Christy Minstrels for recognition as the earliest minstrel show troupe. In 1858 Emmett joined the Bryant Minstrels.

      His song “Dixie,” written in 1859, was originally a “walk-around,” or concluding number for a minstrel show. It attained national popularity and was later the unofficial national anthem of the Confederacy during the U.S. Civil War (1861–65) and the South thereafter. Several sets of words, Northern and Southern, were written for the song, but it survives in its version with Emmett's words. Emmett retired in 1888 but subsequently toured in 1895 with A.G. Field's minstrel troupe.

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  • Emmett — /em it/, n. 1. Daniel Decatur, 1815 1904, U.S. songwriter and minstrel show performer and producer: composer of Dixie. 2. a male given name …   Useful english dictionary

  • Dan Emmett — Photograph of Dan Emmett in his later years, taken from the belongings of Ben and Lew Snowden of Clinton, Knox County, Ohio. Daniel Decatur Dan Emmett (October 29, 1815 – June 28, 1904)[1] was an American songwriter and entertaine …   Wikipedia

  • minstrel show — a popular stage entertainment featuring comic dialogue, song, and dance in highly conventionalized patterns, performed by a troupe of actors, traditionally comprising two end men and a chorus in blackface and an interlocutor: developed in the U.S …   Universalium

  • Mount Vernon — 1. the home and tomb of George Washington in NE Virginia, on the Potomac, 15 mi. (24 km) below Washington, D.C. 2. a city in SE New York, near New York City. 66,713. 3. a city in S Illinois. 16,995. 4. a city in central Ohio. 14,380. 5. a town in …   Universalium

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