Christy's Minstrels

For the 1960s folk revival group, see The New Christy Minstrels.
1844 sheet music cover for a collection of songs by Christy's Minstrels. E. P. Christy appears in the circle at top.

Christy's Minstrels, sometimes referred to as the Christy Minstrels, were a blackface group formed by Edwin Pearce Christy, a well-known ballad singer, in 1843,[1] in Buffalo, New York. They were instrumental in the solidification of the minstrel show into a fixed three-act form.[2] The troupe also invented or popularized "the line", the structured grouping that constituted the first act of the standardized three-act minstrel show, with the interlocutor in the middle and "Mr. Tambo" and "Mr. Bones" on the ends.

  1. ^ Or possibly in 1842: In 1855 the New York Times reported a law case in which Christy took out an injunction against the troupe continuing to call themselves "Christy's Minstrels" even though he no longer had a connection with them; in it the 1842 date is given. "In 1842 Edwin P. Christy established in this city the band, which since has become so celebrated as "Christy's Minstrels".New York Times September 14, 1855.
  2. ^ New York Times, September 14, 1855: during a legal dispute about the continuing use of the name 'Christy's Minstrels' after the departure of E.P.Christie, the surviving members of the troupe admitted to giving a performance at the Athenaeum hall, Brooklyn, on September 10, 1855 which "consisted of musical, terpsichorean and humorous exhibitions of an Ethiopian character."