The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #12974   Message #1775062
Posted By: Q (Frank Staplin)
03-Jul-06 - 05:53 PM
Thread Name: Origins: Little Birdie
Subject: Lyr Add: DARK HOLLOW (from Vance Randolph)
Randolph calls the song "Dark Hollow,"

Dark Hollow

Purty woman, purty woman,
Just see what you've done,
You caused me to love you,
Now your husband has come!

Little birdie, little birdie,
Come sing me a song,
I want to live in a dark holler
Where the sun can never shine!

I'd ruther be a sailor
Way out on the sea,
Than to be a married man
With a baby on my knee.

Little birdie, little birdie,
What makes you look so queer?
You've no cause to worry,
No sorrow for to bear.

Mr. Lewis Kelley, Missouri, 1931. From Randolph, Ozark Folksongs, vol. 4, p. 122, A, with music.


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The Traditional Ballad Index compares "Little Birdie" with "Kitty Kline," in Brown, North Carolina Folklore. From the few verses in vol. 5, The Music of the Folk Songs, pp. 175-179, I can't convince myself that "Kitty Kline" is the same song, although there are parallels. The main similarity seems to be in the initial verse:

Take me home, little birdie, take me home;
When the moon is shining bright and the stars are giving light,
Take me home to my momma, take me home.
I'm as free a little bird as I can be;
I'm as free a little bird as I can be;
I'll build my nest in the top of yon tree
Where the bad boys can never bother me.
or:
I'll build my nest on my sweet Kitty's breast
Where the bad boys will never take me down.