University Times

Songwriter Stephen Foster's sketchbook is considered one of the most important 19th-century American music manuscripts in existence, according to Deane Root, director of the Stephen Foster Memorial, where the sketchbook is housed. To make it more readily available to those interested in historical material, Root and photographer Jim Burke from the Center for Instructional Development and Distance Education recently began work on a facsimile edition to be published next summer.

Underwritten by a private donor whom Root declined to identify, the facsimile sketchbook is being timed for release at the same time as the first biography of Foster in over 60 years, "Do-Da: Stephen Foster and the Rise of American Popular Culture" by Ken Emerson.

In addition to facsimile reproductions of Foster's sketchbook, the Pitt project also may include a study of Foster's handwriting currently being conducted by a graphologist in New York City.

Among the items in the sketchbook is a draft copy of "Jeanie With the Light Brown Hair" in which Foster originally used the name "Jennie." The title was changed by the publisher, according to Root, because there were too many songs about women named Jennie. He also thought Jeanie was more modern sounding.

The book also contains a cryptic doodle about "Miss Young asking Miss Nora for an egg." Root does not know the story behind the doodle, but called it a "tantalizing clue" into Foster's later years.

–Mike Sajna