Gee, I like it when you get involved in studying a song, Bob. Anybody know if there is a CD recording of Buell Kazee singing "Whisker Bill, the Old Moonshiner"?
I didn't know how to group these songs. I have a group for Wild Rover, and another for Moonshiner / I'm a Rambler, I'm a Gambler, but they all seem to me to be more-or-less the same song.
Stewie's transcription of Daw Henson's "Moonshiner" is in this thread, and Stewie always does a good job of transcription. This particular recording, though, is very difficult to understand.
-Joe-

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Here's the Traditional Ballad Index entry on this song:

Moonshiner

DESCRIPTION: "I've been a moonshiner for sev'nteen long years, I've spent all my money for whiskey and beer, I'll go to some holler, I'll put up my still...." "I'll eat when I'm hungry and drink when I'm dry; If moonshine don't kill me I'll live till I die...."
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1927 (Sandburg)
KEYWORDS: drink nonballad floatingverses
FOUND IN: US(Ap) Ireland
REFERENCES (7 citations):
BrownIII 291, "Cornbread When I'm Hungry" (2 fragments; the "A" text combines "Moonshiner" with "Make Me a Pallet on Your Floor"; "B" mixes "Moonshiner" with what appears to be a minstel song)
Sandburg, pp. 142-143, "Kentucky Moonshiner" (1 text, 1 tune)
Combs/Wilgus 187, p. 189, "Moonshiner" (1 text)
Ritchie-Southern, p. 38, "God Bless the Moonshiners" (1 text, 1 tune)
Lomax-FSNA 134, "Moonshiner" (1 text, 1 tune)
Silber-FSWB, p. 229, "Moonshiner" (1 text)
ADDITIONAL: _Sing Out_ magazine, Volume 29, #3 (1983), p, 1, "God Bless that Moonshiner" (1 text, 1 tune, from Currence Hammons)
ST San142 (Full)
Roud #4301
RECORDINGS:
The Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem, "The Moonshiner" (on IRClancyMakem01)
Daw Henson, "Moonshiner" (AFS, 1937; on KMM)
Roscoe Holcomb, "Moonshiner" (on Holcomb-Ward1, HolcombCD1)
New Lost City Ramblers, "Moonshiner" (on NLCR08)
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Country Blues" (words)
cf. "The Wagoner's Lad" (floating lyrics)
cf. "Wild Rover No More" (floating lyrics)
NOTES: An early 1960s recording of this song by Bob Dylan, long circulated as a bootleg but released in the 1990s, became justly famous in the folk revival as one of his finest performances, and inspired multiple covers of his version. Listening to the Daw Henson field recording, it seems very likely that this was Dylan's source. - PJS
Last updated in version 2.4
File: San142

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