There is zero chance one can honestly represent this song as anything other than a "coon shout." It's roots (the comedic lecture ie: Locomotive ? Bulgine Lecture) go back to the very beginnings of American minstrelsy - Stephen Foster's De History Ob De World, 1847.

Updated as Bible Stories in 1903 by the Queen of the Coon Shout herself, Canadian May Irwin (Mrs. Black is Back).

The Irwin sisters picked up where the Western Sisters left off in American minstrelsy. May Irwin was nearing the end of her career here and so was minstrelsy.

She did not perform in corkface but Irwin did more to promote the "razor totin' bull nigger" stereotype than anyone that comes to mind (eg: The Bully Song). Better change those bits as well hmmm?

She was as popular in England as America, so it's no surprise the song made the jump across the pond as it did. Probably the last real minstrelsy "superstar."

As Modernist-v-Fundamentalist mudslinging, the lyrics, at the time, would be more daring for their sacrilege than racism, (conservative Baptists & Presbyterians hate them!)

I think "Darkies" got moved to the title proper by Kentuckian "Blind" Charlie Oaks (The Oaks Family), Adam and Eve or "Darkies' Sunday School", Vocalion, 15342, 1927.

fyi: Other Oaks titles on Vocalion included The Death Of William Jennings Bryan & The John T. Scopes Trial.

One can put lipstick on a pig...