The phenomenon of British R&B is most often understood in terms of young, white, middle-class British men turning to the ‘down-home’ sounds of black American men for musical motivation. This article offers a revision to this dominant narrative by reinserting ‘slim, lively Irish girl’ Ottilie Patterson, the UK's most popular blues singer before 1963. I analyse the content and context of Patterson's 1961 album, Rhythm and Blues with Ottilie Patterson, drawing from contemporaneous mass-media discourse as well as Patterson's own notebooks held at Britain's National Jazz Archive. Patterson's performances captured on this record demonstrate how R&B was first publicly (re-)presented and understood in the UK. I argue that Patterson's work challenges the assumptions that (a) British R&B began with the formation of Alexis Korner's Blue Incorporated and (b) the R&B revival was predominately motivated by the appropriation and vicarious expression of African-American hypermasculinity.

中文翻译：

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“妈妈，他对你女儿很刻薄”：与 Ottilie Patterson 重新评估英国 R&B 的叙事

英国 R&B 现象最常被理解为年轻、白人、中产阶级的英国男性为了音乐动机而转向美国黑人男性的“家庭”声音。本文通过重新插入 1963 年之前英国最受欢迎的布鲁斯歌手奥蒂莉·帕特森 (Ottilie Patterson) 对这一主导叙事进行了修正。我分析了帕特森 1961 年专辑的内容和背景，节奏与蓝调与奥蒂莉帕特森，从同时代的大众媒体话语以及帕特森自己在英国国家爵士档案馆保存的笔记本中汲取灵感。Patterson 在这张唱片中的表演展示了 R&B 是如何首次公开的（回覆-）在英国呈现和理解。我认为，帕特森的工作挑战了以下假设：（a）英国 R&B 始于 Alexis Korner 的 Blue Incorporated 的形成，以及（b）R&B 的复兴主要是由非裔美国人的超男性气质的挪用和替代表达所推动的。