The African American fife and drum tradition in north Mississippi stretches back to the 1800s and blends the Euro-American military tradition with distinctly African polyrhythms, riff structures, and call-and-response patterns. Although fife and drum ensembles are closely associated with military marches, African American bands in north Mississippi long used fifes and drums for entertainment at picnics and other social events, and scholars believe many such groups formed in the wake of the Civil War, perhaps using discarded military instruments. In this tradition, Otha, or Othar, Turner became its best known exponent and eventually its patriarch. Born in Rankin County around 1908 and moving to northern Mississippi as a child with his mother, Betty Turner, he learned to make his own bamboo cane fifes and spent most of his life as a farmer. He presided over annual fife and drum picnics and goat roasts on his property in nearby Gravel Springs, performed at numerous festivals, recorded as leader of the Rising Star Fife and Drum Band for American and European labels, and appeared in documentaries and films including Gravel Springs Fife and Drum, Land Where the Blues Began, and Martin Scorsese’s Feel Like Going Home. His music was also featured in Gangs of New York. The broader black fife and drum tradition included repertories ranging from spirituals and minstrel songs to instrumental pieces and blues adaptations, was documented in Mississippi and neighboring regions by folklorists and researchers, and continued after Turner’s death in 2003 under the leadership of his granddaughter and protégé Sharde Thomas.