Dance You Hippies, Dance

   Dance You Hippy (Hippie) Dance is a delightful song concocted by Tim O'Brien and Jesse Lamb, well known to the Morgantown Old Time scene for his other sogs such as "Let's Go Hunting," most famously performed by Keith McManus and crew at the Wednesday Night Jam at the Morgantown Brewing Company.  

    Dance You Hippy Dance is based upon an old fiddle tune known variously  as Brown Eyed Rabbit or Big Eyed Rabbit.   Doubtless it comes to us from Scotland or Ireland as a foot-stomping fiddle melody and probably the lyrics were added in America in the 19th or early 20th century, but I have no direct proof of that process.  

   Tim and Jesse have created a great variant, with a catchy refrain. I can imagine that at a wedding or bar setting, this song might get everyone up and dancing, kind of an Old Time version of the Electric Boogie.         

     The video shows shows both young and old playing music, dancing and having fun.  It's not some kind of fantastic clever dance, just a simple improvised shuffle that virtually anyone can do  
     That really is the way that this music and dance are passed down from one generation to the next.   At our jam there are at least 4 families with multigenerational representation (the Shanks with Bob and Robert;  the Eddy's with papa Richard and daughters Rachel and Libby; the Halls with Mike and Mitch;  and the McManuses with Keith and Shane).  

You see?  The family what plays Old Time together, stays together! Where else do you find kids and parents partying together like this? That is part of the unique appeal of Appalachian music and culture. 

If Tim and Jesse will permit me one editorial suggestion, however, I would sing "Dance you hippies dance" which in other words encourages everyone to dance, just like in the video.  If there is just one "hippie"   we are left to imagine that there may be only one particular guy being asked to dance. But okay.    

     Another thing that I thought was cool about the video is the bagpipes player.  In Old Time music, we usually do not have a bagpipes player, but somehow, musically speaking, we all have Scottish Irish ancestry, and there seems to be some dormant gene that is activated by bringing in a bagpipes.  On rare occasion we have been fortunate enough to have  a bagpipe player in the Morgantown jam.  It brings an audience to its feet, absolutely spectacular if done well.  

A Part:  A A A D   
              D A A E    E A

B Part:  A E E A 
              A E E A 

Dance You Hippy Dance by Tim O’Brien and Jesse Lamb ©2013 No Bad Ham Music / ASCAP / administered by Bluewater Music.

Yonder comes a hippy, how you think I know?

See that long hair hangin’ down, smell patchouli oil

Chorus:

Dance you hippy dance, dance you hippy dance

Dance you hippy dance, dance you hippy dance

Once I was a hippy back when I was young

I still dance the same way, I still dance in tongues

Chorus

Do you have a hackie sack, are you wearing dreads?

Follow Yonder Mountain? You heard what I said

Chorus

Do you go to Delfest, Hardly Strictly too?

In between is Telluride, bring your hula-hoop

Chorus

Dirk is on the fiddle, Michael’s on the flute

Johnny’s on the guitar, but where’s my hula hoop?

Chorus

I love this little farm girl, she dance the best she can

Through her daddy’s wheat field, I call her “Kansas Jan”

Chorus

I knew her for a long time, but now she lives with me

In the town of Nashville, call her “Janessee”

Chorus

(Swing, cha-cha-cha, huckelbuck,

noodle dance, swim to Atlantis now

get up offa that thing, and feel better,

jam)

I dress in a special style, flannel derby weird

I call it “Lumbersexual”, grow a big old beard

Chorus

If you’re up in Glasgow, here’s what they all say

If you like good dancin’, look for Molly Mae

Chorus

(Dance in your own style)

Yonder comes a hippy, how you think I know?

See that long hair hangin’ down, smell patchouli oil

Chorus

Credits:

Recorded Groundhog Day 2015, Gorbel’s Sound, Glasgow Scotland

Jim Neilson engineer

Mixed by David Ferguson at the Butcher Shoppe, Nashville

Dirk Powell – fiddle

Michael McGoldrick – whistle

John Doyle – guitar

Jan Fabricius – mandolin and vocal

Tim O’Brien – banjo, bass and vocal

Dance You Hippy Dance video filmed and edited by Graham Maciver

Little Georgia Rose

Little Georgia Rose is a Bill Monroe song which tells the story of a beautiful young lady who lived in Georgia.   It is really a great bluegrass song if you can forgive the somewhat unenlightened view of adoption portrayed in the lyrics. 

Most of the versions that I sampled on line are in a higher key than G usually around B-flat to C.  People like to emulate Bill Monroe's fabulous tenor singing voice and style. For example, I like the way he slides up to the pitch  on "way dow---wn in the Blue Ridge Mountains."     Bill Monroe's version .  That to me is a characteristic of Bill's vocal style.  

Ricky Skaggs and Travis Tritt also have a great version:  Ricky Skaggs and Travis Tritt version .

I believe that at the Tuesday Bluegrass jam at McClafferty's, we play this song in the key of G, which makes it a little easier for most of us.

My Little Georgia Rose  
Written and recorded by Bill Monroe

G                   C     G
Now come and listen to my story
                       D7
A story that I know is true
        G         C         G
About a rose that blooms in Georgia
                          D7       G
With a hair of gold and a heart so true

    C                      G
Way down in the Blue Ridge Mountains
                              D7
Way down where the tall pines grow
G                          C
Lives my sweetheart of the mountains
G        D7             G
She's my little Georgia rose

                    C     G
Her mother left her with another
                         D7
A care free life she had planned
    G        C    G
The baby now is a lady
                   D7        G
The one her mother could not stand

Repeat #3

                      C       G
We'd often sing those songs together
                          D7
I watch her do her little part
      G                C       G
She'd smile at me when I would tell her
                D7       G
That she was my own sweetheart

Repeat #3

Why Do We Have to Have Murder Songs?

   In Old Time Music we generally like to stick to the traditional lyrics for a song.  But what do we do when there are lyrics that are really, truly objectionable?

   There are many, many song lyrics that deal with committing murder.  Not to pick on an American Institution, but one prominent set that comes to mind is from Blue Yodel No 1 (T for Texas):

      I'm gonna buy me a pistol

      Just as long as I'm tall, Lawd, Lawd 

      I'm gonna buy me a pistol

      Just as long as I'm tall

      I'm gonna shoot poor Thelma

      Just to see her jump and fall.

Now if these songs were from a rap song we might go wild and write a nastygram to the radio station for playing it, but this is an industry standard song, one of the (otherwise) greatest songs in history.  Or how about the Bill Monroe standard, Banks of the Ohio:

    

     I held a knife against her breast

        As into my arms she pressed

     She said Willie "Don't you murder me

        I'm unprepared for eternity."

     I took her by her lily white hand,

       And dragged her down that bank of sand

     There I throwed her in to drown.

        I watched her as she floated down.

Less objectionable to me are lyrics that are about repentance.  Johnny Cash's Folsom Prison Blues comes to mind:

     When I was just a baby, 

        My mama told me, Son

     Always be a good boy, 

        Don't ever play with guns.

     But I shot a man in Reno 

        Just to watch him die.

    When I heard that whistle blowing,  

        I hang my head and cry

So, performers are faced with the decision about whether to keep the traditional lyrics or drop those that seem to promote insidious evil.  

What is the purpose of putting these lyrics in a song?  Indeed, there is kind of a tradition that says a good performing set should include a Civil War song, a train song, a love song and a murder song. I'm not sure why that is, but many bands deliberately compose song sets that contain at least one murder song. 

I don't think that Jimmie Rodgers or Bill Monroe or any of the others wanted to inspire a generation of women killers.   Perhaps it is intended to be a sort of catharsis,   much like a Shakespearean murder play such as MacBeth or Hamlet.  By experiencing horrible crimes in a song, perhaps the listeners will be warned to avoid it in the future.  But is that really the way it works?

I don't know of any scientific study that says listening to this song or others like it will increase the probability that the listener will resort to gun violence.   Nevertheless, I think advertisers will vouch for the power of song in advertising, and if you create songs about, for example, eating at McDonalds,  and get enough people to listen to it, you will create a higher chance that people will actually eat at McDonalds.  So it makes sense that if you have a tremendously popular song about offing your girlfriend, there is a risk that such crimes will increase.  

For that reason my preference would be to avoid lyrics that seem to promote behaviors that would be considered felonies, especially when they seem unrepentant.  For example, in "T for Texas" after murdering Thelma in cold blood, the guy gets a shotgun to do in Thelma's new boyfriend as well. 

In the Morgantown Wednesday Night Jam, the lead singer has been known to tweak the lyrics when they suggest wrongdoing or violence to women.    It's just a little thing, but to me the world is just a bit better place when the lyrics about violence or wrongdoing are left out.     

But I can kind of understand why people feel the need to sing about murder and other almost unspeakable crimes, since unfortunately it is a part of our everyday lives.   There is no clear cut answer, but I would like to ask my performer friends to at least reflect on the lyrics before automatically going with them.  You never know what influence you might have on someone.  

.   

Sail Away Ladies

    Sail Away Ladies is an incredible song, but one which for some reason few people have ever heard of.  Vinnie Farsetta performs this as a banjo solo and it is also a mainstay for the Morgantown Brewing Company Wednesday Night Jam.    

    Sail Away Ladies has a leader/response format, in which the leader (Vinnie) sings a line, and the group sings back a response ("Sail away ladies, sail away.").  In the recording from the Gardner festival below, Vinnie sings both parts.

Vinnie Farsetta at the Gardner Worley Music Festival.  Thank you Kathryn Madison for the shoot.  

In Morgantown, every time Vinnie does this song it about brings the house down.  Some people might assume that it is a modern composition, but in fact it has a distinguished history.  Uncle Dave Macon recorded a great version of the song back in 1927.   I don't know where Dave picked it up; however, his family operated the old Broadway Hotel in Nashville, which housed many travelling entertainers including Vaudeville performers and minstrel show performers.  No doubt this was a perfect place to pick up banjo songs, and perhaps this is where he might have heard Sail Away Ladies.  According to the Fiddler's Companion (Andrew Kuntz) Uncle Bunt Stevens won the title of World Champion Fiddler in 1926 playing this tune beating 1,876 other fiddlers in auto magnate Henry Ford’s series of contests, held at dealerships through the East and Midwest. 


     Paul Wells  of Middle Tennessee State University believes that the song dates from at least the turn of the 20th century and seems to have been common to both black and white traditions. 
   Nobody is really sure what is meant by the refrain "Don't you rock him Daddio" and there are many variants.  Some early versions were known as "Dineo" or "Dideo" in the Sesotho language, which kind of makes sense since one of the primary verses is about gifting a house to the singer's son. The call/response structure to the song also suggests African structure. 

Uncle Dave Macon produced an inspired version of Sail Away back in 1927.  

The lyrics from the Vinnie version are transcribed below.  Note that Vinnie often skips singing the first "Don't you rock my Daddy-o" but plays it on the banjo.  You need to have all four lines for it to come out right :).    
***Postscript***  I originally wrote this blog circa 2014, but more recently (2019) I found another version that I really like, from Nobody's Darlin, an all-female band that unfortunately is inactive these days as far as I know. At first I couldn't figure out why it sounded different, but then I realized, this is syncopated! 

This video won't play in my blog but you can boot it up on youtube via this link: 

Nobody's Darlin' Sail Away Ladies

That is, it is just four chords, four beats each,
G   C  G   D
but you start the sequence on beat 3, not on 1.  
So the rhythm is
boom chick a diddle boom chick boom, 
but each chord is  played
boom chick boom, boom chick a diddle.

Vinnie's version: 

Sail Away Ladies

G                      C               G

If ever I get my new house done,

G              D         G   
(Sail away ladies, sail away)

G                      C               G

I'll give the old one to my son,

G              D       G  

(Sail away ladies, sail away)

G                            C

Don't you rock my dad-dy-0,
                              G

Don't you rock my dad-dy-0

                              D

Don't you rock my dad-dy-0

                                   G

Sail away ladies sail away.

I’ll chew my tobacco and spit that juice
(Sail away ladies, sail away)

I love my woman, but it aint no use
(Sail away ladies, sail away).

Don't you rock him dad-dy-0,
Don't you rock him dad-dy-0



Sail away ladies sail away.

If ever I get my new house done,
(Sail away ladies, sail away)
I'll give the old one to my son,




(Sail away ladies, sail away)

Don't you rock him dad-dy-0,
Don't you rock him dad-dy-0



Sail away ladies sail away.








Don't you rock him dad-dy-0,
Don't you rock him dad-dy-0



Sail away ladies sail away.

*1000 extra verses optional*

What's Really Wrong with American Idol

What's Really Wrong with American Idol

     Ratings for American Idol are far below what they were a few years ago.   A number of theories have been put forward to explain that.  One is that they miss the sarcastic but talented and witty Simon Cowell. Another is that the show has lost its edge--they no longer insult the less talented contestants as they used to.  

     

"Ha!  I knew Idol wouldn't be as big a success without me!"

      But I don't think all those theories are off the mark. I think the judges (Keith Urban, Jennifer Lopez and Harry Connick Jr) are incredibly talented.  And the contestants are way better than back in the day.  

     I think that the audience is the problem.  Over the years, the show has managed to program them, so that they have become typecast and campy, totally predictable and dull.  Every time a contestant takes the stage, the audience treats him/her like they are a new singing sensation, a la Susan Boyle.  The have this mindless dull cheer:  "Waaaaaaahhhhhh!!"

     Then one of the judges says something nice, "You have an impressive star quality.  I really like you."

      "Waaaaaaahhhhhh!!"

     "You're just what this show is looking for!"

      "Waaaaaaahhhhhh!!"

     If, on the other hand, a judge says something not quite complimentary, the audience has a corresponding canned boo.  

     "I didn't think this was a good song choice for you." 

   

     "Booooooooooooo!!"

      "This key might have been a little too high for your voice."  

     "Booooooooooooo!!"

     It doesn't seem to matter which contestant it is, the audience reaction is basically the same.  It seems totally preprogrammed and dull.  

Has the American Idol audience lost its edge?  Yup. 
  

I would like to see the audience having some more important role with the show rather than mindless cheering and booing.   Perhaps they could be given some kind of on-the-air voting responsibility so that the live audience reaction could be compared with the at-home audience.  The judges can probably do a better job if each negative comment is not booed, even if it means not cheering for each positive comment.   

     I think it might be more interesting if the live audience reaction were a little less predictable. 

Films of Leadbelly (Huddie Ledbetter)

As far as I know, Leadbelly appears in a grand total of four or five separate films or film clips, four of which are all available via Youtube. I've compiled them together in this blog for your enjoyment or study.  

Brief bio:  Leadbelly was born Huddie Ledbetter in 1888 in Morningsport, Louisiana.  Leadbelly was a nickname, based on his last name.  On biography.com, Leadbelly's first occupation is listed as "murderer" as he is known to have killed two men, one in Texas and another in Louisiana.  His life has been portrayed in a 1976 movie, excerpts of which can be seen on youtube.com.  Leadbelly was "discovered" by John Lomax, who was the greatest folk music historian of the first half of the 20th century.  He more than anyone else is responsible for recordings of Leadbelly as well as his film appearances. Leadbelly also came to know Pete Seeger of the Weavers, but became more appreciated after his death, with songs like Midnight Special,  Goodnight Irene,  Rock Island Line, Easy Rider, Black Snake Moan, Green Corn, and many others.  

To me, one of the main characteristics of his playing is the walking bass line, or "boogie-woogie" which he uses in many of his songs.   Midnight Special is a good example. 

Perhaps the most famous of his film appearances is in the 3 Songs video, which purports to be the only film of Leadbelly (but of course that is not true).   Leadbelly plays Pick a Bale of Cotton,  Grey Goose (Lord, Lord, Lord), and Take This Hammer.  Also in the introduction he is humming to the tune of Black Girl (In the Pines). The lyrics of Black Girl would probably have strained social sensibilities of 1945 (white folks, especially, please promise not to try to sing these, okay?):

Black girl, black Girl, don't lie to me
Tell me where did you sleep last night?
In the pines, In the pines, Where the sun never shine
I shivered the whole night through.

My Husband was a Railroad man
Killed a mile and a half from here
His head, was found, In a drivers wheel
And his body hasn't never been found.

With those lyrics, it is probably just as well for the film that Leadbelly just hums along.  

   By the same token, Leadbelly's "Pick a Bale of Cotton" was acceptable to audiences of the 1940s, but today modern Americans, particularly African Americans, might not appreciate hearing a song that brags about how much cotton the singer and his wife can pick.  But more importantly, this cut shows both  Leadbelly's right and left hand, giving us some idea of his complex playing style.  Sometimes I think that "Pick a Bale a Day" may derive from some West African dialect (like "Polly Waddle Doodle all the day," or "oh dee do da day") which not be nonsense syllables but rather corrupted West African song lyrics), but I'll need some help from an African languages scholar to see if there is any merit to that thought.  If anyone out there has such a resource, please send them my way!   

Leadbelly typically played his 12 string guitar tuned down five half steps from standard:  BEADF#B.  In addition, his Stella guitar used a "ladder" bracing system rather than the more popular cross braced system used by the rest of the guitar world.  That is why Leadbelly has a much different sound from his instrument  (see also   Why You Can't Sound Like Leadbelly   elsewhere in this blog).  

There was also a newsreel documentary of Leadbelly, which re-enacts the story of John Lomax finding Leadbelly in prison, and then later becoming his benefactor.  Although Leadbelly himself used to write his nickname as two separate names, i.e. "Lead Belly," in the video it is clear that Lomax pronounced the nickname "LEADbelly, not "Lead...BELLy" as some have tried to do to match the spelling.   His first name was pronounced "HOO-dee" by Lomax, although Pete Seeger referred to him as HYEW-dee.

In any case, Leadbelly went to jail twice for murder, but was able to secure a pardon both times by writing a song for the governor, once in Texas and once in Louisiana.  One of those songs was "Midnight Special" which has been covered by a number of groups over the years, notably Creedence Clearwater Rival.

There are also two video versions of Leadbelly singing Goodnight Irene, which would later be popularized by Pete Seeger and the Weavers.  The first of these seems to have an overdubbed soundtrack.  It also ends somewhat peculiarly, as Leadbelly's wife Martha seems to be drifting off to sleep, and Leadbelly abruptly grabs her jaw. My interpretation is that Leadbelly was probably irritated, perhaps due to the importance and expense of being recorded on film.  Lomax gets him to calm down.   In any case, the "second take" appears to be less edited, with Leadbelly actually playing and singing.   

      I also found a short clip of Leadbelly filling up John Lomax's car...

http://www.criticalpast.com/video/65675042913_Lead-Belly_refueling-a-car_gas-station_John-Lomax

    

    I am not the greatest of Leadbelly historians, but these are the only video footage that I am aware of that have actual footage of Leadbelly.  There are, however, a large number of audio recordings, thanks in no small measure to John and Alan Lomax for preserving them for us.  In some, Leadbelly shares his invaluable insights about his songs, his music and their origins. In particular, I am very taken by his discussion of John Henry. Leadbelly and Lomax believed that John Henry was a real person, born in Newport News Virginia, and he died working on the Big Bend Tunnel in Talcott West Virginia in the 1870s.  If you like, you can read about my discussion of this issue here:   Did John Henry Really Exist? .  

Leadbelly's opinions are expressed here:

Double Dixie, Dixie Twins (Battle of Jubilo)

At the Trolley Stop jam in Dayton, we often play a song which we call Double Dixie or Dixie Twins.  It's actually a medley of two Civil War songs:  Dixie and the Battle of Jubilo, one from the South and one from the North.  

Neither song is particularly correct politically.  Musically, they are great songs, but within certain sectors of the African American community, for example, they may not be as well received (musician beware!).  Dixie in particular is politically charged.  I remember in college one of my classmates, an African American from Cleveland's east side, told the story of how his predominantly black high school had "Dixie" as its school fight song.  He played in the marching band because he loved music, but they all hated the song.  He had us howling with laughter as he recounted having to play that song at halftime and being booed by everybody in the stadium including their own parents.  Finally, though, the students got together and petitioned the administration to change it and everyone was happy. 


      Dixie is still heard regularly among Old Time musicians, most often as an instrumental these days.    Here's a nice version by Sam Gleaves and Jory Hutchens of Berea, KY.   

DIXIE

G - - - C - - -

G - - - D - G -

G - - - C - - -

G - - - D - G -

CHORUS 

G - C - G - D - 

G - C - G - D - 

G - C - G - D G 

G - C - G - D G  

   It seems appropriate to follow Dixie with a Union song to kind of counterbalance it.  The Battle of Jubilo (also "Year of Jubilo" or "Kingdom Coming") is often heard as an instrumental; for example, you may have heard it on Ken Burns documentary of the Civil War.  This is a northern song, composed during the war by Henry C. Work, and like Dixie was originally sung in (false) dialect.  The idea was that the Union army was scaring away all the southern slave owners, leaving behind the slaves to celebrate. Hillar Bergman knocks out a great version on fiddle here.  However he is in the key of E, so if you would like to play it the Trolley Stop way, you will need to capo up on 7.   

BATTLE OF JUBILO (KINGDOM COMING)

G - - - G - D -

G - - - D - G -

G - - - G - D -

G - - - D - G -

CHORUS 

C - - - G - D - 

G - - - D - G -

C - - - G - D - 

G - - - D - G -