Being Called Black

Recently, I finally mustered enough courage to ask Mr. Johnson a question that had been burning in my mind for years. He has been sending our Janet Emails off and on, each one identifying him as a "Black Yodeler." I kept wondering why?

As timidly and non-offensively as I knew how, I asked Mike just that. Here is his kind response.

Howdy Paul,

In regards to the persona question, I’d actually like to be called "talented, and innovative and funny" also. And I really appreciate and respect your directness and candor. For the record, I don’t think that [a particular city] is any more or less racist than any place in the world. Unfortunately general racism and religious bigotry are two of mankind’s biggest short-comings. However I will agree that we Americas have made the greatest progress in trying to correct and reconcile many of our past indiscretions.

Since we are from the same generation, you can probably guess how some of that "Black Yodeler" moniker developed, given the history of America’s checkered past. When I started out in music I got flack and support from both Blacks, Whites, family and friends. Some were for it and others thought that I had lost my mind! "How come you want to do Country Music?" and "Black people don’t do that hillbilly stuff!"

Well, I knew otherwise and I liked that hillbilly stuff! Plus, I was an independent cuss who did his own thinking, so I set out to do my thing. I was a fair singer and a half-baked guitar player who only knew three chords. But I knew the lyrics and the rhythms to the songs and I could yodel like nobody in the area. It was most definitely the yodeling that put me where I am today! Along the way I learned to improve my vocals and guitar work, overcome my stage-fright and began to take my songwriting seriously.

It was others who labeled me the "Black Yodeler" because the great majority of them had never heard, or heard of, a black yodeler. I had no reason to label myself as anything other than a Country Music singer because I thought it was quite obvious to the naked eye that I was indeed, Black, Colored, Negro, etc. Ha! Some people have to label you and make distinctions.

And of course I got my share of comments like "I didn’t know black people could yodel?" and "Do you really yodel?" Which is where I got the idea for the T-SHIRT YODEL song. I’ve never referred to myself as the Black Yodeler. I was also called the "Best Yodeler In The South" by the Bowery employees and their House Band in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, and the "Best Yodeler East of the Mississippi" in southern Maryland, and few other similar names. So I began to use them on my promotional flyers.

It was this and Jimmie Rodgers title as the "Blue Yodeler" that made me take a closer look at myself to see if there was anything unique about my yodeling. I noticed that all the Black Yodelers only did the Jimmie Rodgers style whereas I combined the Rodgers and Swiss styles. I was also writing a lot of yodeling songs and constantly experimenting with various combinations! Plus I was always out there "in your face" yodeling and singing whenever and where ever I could! I wasn’t going away and people were beginning to buzz. That’s how Country Music’s Number One Black Yodeler, aka Black Yodel No.1 was born.

Along the way some have challenged and doubted that position and my response was and is, bring me some recordings of a Black Yodeler[s] with the same diverse combinations of the Jimmie Rodgers and Swiss styles. Nada! Quite frankly, they couldn’t even name a Black Yodeler, and they didn’t know that difference in the two styles! They were also equally shocked to learn that Charley Pride is not a Yodeler.

African Americans have been involved in country music long before Charley Pride was even born. Numerous String Bands and Minstrels, both black and white shared their music and techniques and were yodeling long before Jimmie Rodgers made it his trademark and country music became a commercial commodity. The African-American yodeler, however went virtually unnoticed, and none but a very few ever received any notable recognition. Stoney Edwards, Slim Gaillard, and McDonald Craig, to mention a few. Craig, a Korean War Veteran is a superb Jimmie Rodgers yodeler. He is also the only black yodeler to ever win First Place [1976] at an Annual Jimmie Rodgers Yodeling Championship held in Meridian, Mississippi. I have never entered or attended that
estival.

A close study of our music history will show that it was the recording companies, record labels and the media that separated the black and white musicians and their music. The media also, and continues to dictate what "they" think that we want to, and should, listen to!

DeFord Bailey, the last founding member of the Grand Ole Opry was finally inducted into the Country Music Hall Of Fame this past November 2005. He was Country Music’s first African-American star. Those with no real in-depth knowledge of Country Music history believe that Charley Pride [the first and only Super-Star] is the first African-American Country Star. A number of those of our generation and older who do have that knowledge, chose to ignore, and/or suppress it.

Because of this, subsequent other Black Country artists and writers were given modest recognition, if any recognition at all. The American mind-set of that era dictated this long before we were born, so I don’t see it as a cross we have to bear. We and successive generations just need to acknowledge it and pass it on to help improve our future. Like Jim Stanton once told me, "... Nashville isn’t ‘looking’ for another Charley Pride! They are still mad at Jack Clements and Chet Atkins over that!

I’ve had my share of "encounters" along the way. But the good ones far outweigh the bad ones. And along the way I’ve met some mighty precious and irreplaceable friends!

No, I don’t mind being identified as a country singer and yodeler without the "black" part. That’s all I’ve always wanted.

Take care, amigo.

Mike

-o-