Newest Songs
Hell Bound Train
A cautionary tale of damnation and redemption
You know about the train that was "bound for glory". Well, this train was going the other way on the opposite track.
Jolly Roving Tar
A sea song from Newfoundland
I found this jolly sea song from Newfoundland on one of the old 'American Folksay' albums produced on Stinson records by Moses Asch, performed by Frank Warner.
No Peas No Rice
A Bahamian jazz song
A Bahamian song recorded in the 1930s by big band leaders such as Mart Brit and Count Basie and in the Bahamas by Blind Blake Alfonso Higgs.
Thorneymore Woods
A song of the noble poacher, and mean gamekeepers
An English poaching ballad as performed by Louis Killen.
La Bruja
Vampire story from Vera Cruz, Mexico. Boo!
La Bruja is a song and traditional dance in the Huapango tradition from the state of Vera Cruz. The dance usually involves a number of women with lighted candles on their heads.
The Devil and Bailiff McGlynn
The devil takes his due
What a fine old Irish tale. But it derives from a history that is not so jolly - the mass evictions and house levelings that took place during the Irish famine of the mid-nineteenth century. No wonder the mother in the story cries "May the devil take that awful Bailiff!".
Spotted Cow
A naughty little English folk song
Here is a traditional English song, at least I think so, I heard it from Steel Eye Span, that parcel of rogues who brought fuzz-tone electric guitar to English folk music.
Italian Carol
A christmas song from Italy
An Italian carol adapted by Pete Seeger from an old tradition in Naples in which shepherds come down from the Calabrian mountains for a festive stay in that city during the Christmas celebration.
Wild Women Don't Have No Blues
A blues for strong women
This song was recorded by Ida Cox in 1924, Ida was one of great, if lesser known, female blues singers in the era of Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey and Sippie Wallace.
Mean Old Bedbug Blues
A blues from Bessie Smith
Each of these are classic blues performance in their own right and provide an interesting contrast between country blues and early jazz band styles. I always favored Bessie's rendition. I think her slower tempo with piano and guitar accompaniment captured the true creepiness of bedbugs.
Uncle Joe Gimme Mo
Calypso from Trinidad
This great Trinidadian Calypso song comes from an early recording by Wilmuth Houdini. I love the way these Calypsonians took "uncle joe and his old ban-jo", a common stereotype in minstrel shows, and transformed him into a rock star.
Monsieur Banjo
A creole song for kids
This children's song in Louisiana Creole. My version is an adaptation of Pete Seeger's English language version on 'American Favorite Ballads' and a French language version from the Magnolia Sisters on their delightful children's album 'Lapin Lapin'
Featured Songs
Hopalong Peter
An old time banjo song
This was recorded by J.E. Mainer's Mountaineers in the 1930's. I learned it from the NLCR.
Woody Knows Nothin'
One of those lovely old animal songs from the mountains
This tender little folk song borrows a number of standard verses from other songs but it has a sweetness all its own. I hope you like it. Eric Darling recorded this version on his 'True Religion' album for Vanguard in 1961 and it showed up on thier folk sampler record where I heard it.
When the Works All Done this Fall
Another cowboy tear-jerker. Get your hankie out pard.
I heard this tear-jerker a aan old 78 by Vernon Dalhard. Dalhart, born Marion Slaughter in Jefferson,Texas, was a hit in the 20's with 'Wreck of the Old 97'/ He event sang light opera when he moved to New York. But early in life he punched cattle around the Texas towns of Vernon and Dalhart. Hmm.
A Short Life of Trouble
A sad old time country song
The earliest recordings of this song were done in the mid 1920's by Burnett and Rutherford (1926), Buell Kazee (1928) and Grayson and Whitter (1928). I first heard it from Hobart Smith. My favorite recent recording is by the Carolina Chocolate Drops.
Sam Bass
A songs about our famous local outlaw
This was one of my daddy's favorite old songs. He was fond of it, I think, because it mentions so many places in Texas that were well known to us - Denton, Terrell, Round Rock.
Mister Rabbit
An old children's song from the American South
Mister Rabbit is an African-American buck dance tune from the American South. It was published in the Lomax's "Best Loved American Folk Songs (Folk Song USA)" with this musical arrngement by Ruth Crawford Seeger. The best known recording is, of course, by Burl Ives. I've included some verses from other sources.
Little Willie's My Darlin
A nice variant of Down in the Valley
This variant of 'Down in the Valley' can be heard on Mike and Peggy Seeger's wonderfully tender album 'Fly Down Little Bird'. It included several songs they had learned as kids, listening while their mother Ruth Crawford Seeger transcribed field recordings for the Lomax's.
Dog and Gun
She hunts and captures her prey.
'Dog and Gun' also known as 'The Golden Glove' comes to us via the folk tradition from English broadsides. I learned the ballad from a recording by Bradley Kincaid that was part of Harry Smith's collection.'
Yo Soy un Pobre Vaquero
A mexican cowboy song
I learned this song from a Folkways album, "Traditional Songs of Mexico." I have not been able to find out more about it but it sounds very old and traditional. The lyrics are too strange to be anything but a folksong.
Eight Hour Day
A labor anthem
The demand for the eight hour day was one of the earliest and most important achievements of the labor movement in Europe and North America. These verses, as sung by Pete Seeger on 'American Industrial Ballads', come from a song by John Hory of the Knights of Labor written in 1886.
Lost Gander
A quiet banjo instrumental
This is a rarity for me, a purely instrumental piece. It has no lyrics and so I guess it doesn't qualify as a song. It sings to me though.
Choucoune
A song from Haiti
This Haitian song started as a poem written by Oswald Durand in 1883. He wrote the poem while jailed for criticizing political leaders in Cap-Haitien. Inspired by a lovely bird that lit on his cell window he was reminded of a girl whom he had met and admired. You may recognize the melody as 'Yellow Bird'