Editing Skiffle (section)

==Origins in the United States==
[[Image:Cannon'sJugStompers.jpg|thumb|[[Gus Cannon]]'s Jug Stompers, c.&nbsp;1928]]
The origins of skiffle are obscure but generally thought to lie in African-American musical culture in the early 20th century. Skiffle is often said to have developed from [[New Orleans]] jazz, but this claim has been disputed.<ref name=Broken2003>M. Brocken, ''The British folk revival, 1944–2002'' (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2003), pp. 69–80.</ref> Improvised [[jug band]]s playing blues and jazz were common across the American South in the early decades of the 20th century.<ref>L. R. Broer and J. D. Walther, ''Dancing Fools and Weary Blues: the Great Escape of the Twenties'' (Popular Press, 1990), p. 149.</ref> They used instruments such as the [[Washboard (musical instrument)|washboard]], [[Jug (musical instrument)|jugs]], [[washtub bass]], [[Cigar box guitar|cigar-box fiddle]], [[musical saw]] and [[comb-and-paper]] [[kazoo]]s, as well as more conventional instruments, such as [[Steel-string guitar|acoustic guitar]] and [[banjo]].<ref>J. R. Brown., ''A Concise History of Jazz'' (Mel Bay Publications, 2004), p. 142.</ref>

The origin of the English word ''skiffle'' is unknown. However, in the dialect of the west of England ''to make a skiffle'', meaning to make a mess of any business, is attested from 1873.<ref>''A Glossary of Provincial Words & Phrases in Use in Somersetshire'' (Longmans, London: 1873), 33.</ref> In early 20th century America the term ''skiffle'' was one of many [[slang]] phrases for a [[rent party]], a social event with a small charge designed to pay rent on a house.<ref>J. Simpson and E. Weiner, eds, ''The Oxford English Dictionary'' (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2nd edn., 1989), cf. "skiffle".</ref> It was first recorded in [[Chicago]] in the 1920s and may have been brought there as part of the African-American migration to northern industrial cities.<ref name=Broken2003/>

The first use of the term on record was in 1925 in the name of [[Jimmy O'Bryant]] and his Chicago Skifflers. Most often it was used to describe [[country blues]] music records, which included the compositions "Hometown Skiffle" (1929) and "Skiffle Blues" (1946) by [[Dan Burley|Dan Burley & his Skiffle Boys]].<ref>J. Minton, ''78 Blues: Folksongs and Phonographs in the American South'' (University Press of Mississippi, 2008), pp. 119–20.</ref> It was used by [[Ma Rainey]] (1886–1939) to describe her repertoire to rural audiences.<ref name=Broken2003/> The term ''skiffle'' disappeared from American music in the 1940s.