rss
mobile
Feeds
"It is a time of high emotions for both the servant and the master," said Anita Joyce Singleton Prather, who shares history through performing arts through her alter ego, Aunt Pearlie Sue.
Prather brings Gullah holiday traditions, goods and art to life along with the Gullah Kinfolk performance of "Christmas Wish ... Freedom Comin' " on Friday at the University of South Carolina Beaufort's Performing Arts Center.
The historically accurate accounts are also shared through Prather's work as an artist-in-residence at area schools. At a recent visit to St. Helena Elementary School, Prather stood barefoot in a lace-edged skirt. A floral-print apron topped her red-and-white-checked dress. A white head wrap and dangling earrings completed the costume she usually wears to become Aunt Pearlie Sue. The call-and-response songs of the slaves were popular with the children during two recent music classes with fourth- and fifth-graders. A little hip-hop beat was added to Prather's songs to create a modern twist.
In one song, Prather tells the students how work on the plantations has slowed as winter has come and many servants take advantage of the lack of work to get married or "jump the broom."
"The servants cannot read and write and must depend on the masters to provide them with passes to allow them to travel from one plantation to another to visit friends and family," she said. "Servants create pits where they can secretly be taught to read and write by certain slaves."
She also taught the students about the importance of crops to the lives of those on the plantations -- especially rice.
"Before you could go to the store to buy Uncle Ben's rice, they had to grow rice. Before you could eat it, the servants had to pound the husk off of the rice with a pestle by digging out the middle of a tree trunk and making it into a bowl." She leads the students in singing "Peas and Rice" using her cane, "Deacon" in the dance to keep the beat.
Prather, a former middle school teacher who holds a master's degree in education, has recently recorded a children's CD and DVD. She has narrated several ETV documentaries and her Aunt Pearlie Sue character can frequently be see on ETV hosting specials about Gullah traditions as well local ghost stories.
In Beaufort, she is one of the associate ministers at New Covenant Fellowship Ministries, where she organizes the music ministry and praise team as well as the kitchen ministry. The mother of two and grandmother of six enlists the entire family to sing.
During Prather's visit to the music classes, a history lesson is subtly woven into her songs and stories: "It is the last Christmas before the Civil War. What do you think the masters are talking about?" Prather asked. "The Northerners have already said there should be no more slaves on the Southern plantations and the South has said, 'Don't tell us what to do. We need slaves to help us raise our Carolina Gold (rice), indigo and cotton.'
"The masters were in the Big House talking about war while the slaves were in the quarters talking about freedom."
