Books
Coleman, Billy. Harnessing Harmony: Music, Power, and Politics in the United States, 1788–1865. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2020.
Lohman, Laura. Hail Columbia! American Music and Politics in the Early Nation. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020.
Schoening, Benjamin S., and Eric T. Kasper. Don’t Stop Thinking About the Music: The Politics of Songs and Musicians in Presidential Campaigns. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2012.
Scott, Derek B. “The US Presidential Campaign Songster, 1840–1900.” In Cheap Print and Popular Song in the Nineteenth Century: A Cultural History of the Songster, edited by Paul Watt, Derek B. Scott, and Patrick Spedding, 73–90. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017.
Articles
Campbell, Gavin James. “He Put His Thumbs Up to His Nose, And Twirl’d His Fingers at His Foes: Presidential Campaign Songs in 1844.” Southern Cultures 4, no. 1 (Spring 1998). https://www.southerncultures.org/article/put-thumb-nose-twirld-fingers-foes-presidential-campaign-songs-1844/.
Coleman, William. “Music in the American Democratic Process: The 1840 and 2008 Presidential Elections.” Australasian Journal of American Studies 29, no. 2 (December 2010): 1–23.
Larson, Jodi. “American Tune: Postwar Campaign Songs in a Changing Nation.” Journal of Popular Culture 42, no. 1 (February 2009): 3–26.
Nicoll, Janet I., and G. Douglas Nicoll. “Political Campaign Songs from Tippecanoe to ’72.” Popular Music and Society 1, no. 4 (Summer 1972): 193-209.
Wood, Kirsten E. “‘Join with Heart and Soul and Voice’: Music, Harmony, and Politics in the Early American Republic.” American Historical Review 119, no. 4 (2014): 1083–1116. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43695886.
Bibliographies
Crew, Danny O. American Political Music: A State-by-State Catalog of Printed and Recorded Music Related to Local, State and National Politics, 1756–2004. 2 vols. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2006.
Crew, Danny O. Presidential Sheet Music: An Illustrated Catalogue of Published Music Associated with the American Presidency and Those Who Sought the Office. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2001.
Miles, William. Songs, Odes, Glees and Ballads: A Bibliography of American Presidential Campaign Songsters. New York: Greenwood Press, 1990.
Sheet Music
Silber, Irwin. Songs America Voted By: With the Words and Music That Won and Lost Elections and Influenced the Democratic Process. Harrisburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 1971.
Recordings
Brand, Oscar. Election Songs of the United States. Smithsonian Folkways Recordings, FW05280, 1960.
Brand, Oscar. Presidential Campaign Songs, 1789-1996. Smithsonian Folkways Recordings, SFW45051, 1999.
Digital Lectures/Podcasts
Coleman, Billy. Music and Politics in the Early United States. Podcast. Ben Franklin’s World, 2022. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62LIHXCdy7Y.
Gorzelany-Mostak, Dana. Songs in the Key of President C: Music on the Campaign Trail. Digital Lecture. Society for American Music, 2018. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6F4_E1l0w1s.
For a more complete bibliography on the topic of election music see here.
