Lyr Req: Sarah Jane (Jazz Gillum)

Subject: 'Sarah Jane' by Jazz Gillum
From: Lepus Rex
Date: 24 Oct 00 - 12:15 PM

I heard this song, and it's prety damned funny. I think Gillum wrote it, but I can't find the lyrics anywhere.

Hope someone knows this one. My sister's name is Sarah Jane, and I really want to annoy the Hell out of her... >:)

Thanks... :)

---Lepus Rex (Say, this is the first thread that I've ever created...)

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Sarah Jane' by Jazz Gillum
From: Stewie
Date: 24 Oct 00 - 08:51 PM

I have it. Parts of its first stanza turn up in versions of 'Hungry Hash House' [recorded versions of which I am currently trying to track for a proposed posting that seems to grow longer every day] and other old-timey songs in the white tradition. I do not have time to transcribe it at the moment, but I will do so later - hopefully later today.

--Stewie.

Subject: Lyr Add: SARAH JANE (from Jazz Gillum)
From: Stewie
Date: 25 Oct 00 - 01:56 AM

Here is Jazz Gillum's version. It is what Mark Humphrey has called 'hillbilly hokum', a genre which was popularised at the time by groups like the Prairie Ramblers and Patsy Montana on Chicago's WLS Barn Dance. It is thought that this and the second song that Gillum recorded in 1936 - 'I Want You By My Side' which is set to the tune of 'Careless Love' - could well have been in response to Eli Oberstein's [Victor A&R man]coaching him to play 'something appropriate for white audiences'. Whatever, Gillum didn't write it. Parts of the first verse were in a number of 1920s old-time pieces.

SARAH JANE

She's my cock-eyed, consumptive Sarah Jane
Oh she's my darlin', my daisy, she's knock-kneed and she's crazy
She's bandy-legged, pigeon-toed - she don't wear no underclothes
Some folks say her breath smells sweet, but I would rather to (sic) smell her feet
She's my darlin' consumptive Sarah Jane (Yeah!)

She's a-puffin' and a-blowin' Sarah Jane
She's a-puffin' and a-blowin' Sarah Jane
She's a-puffin' and a-blowin' and a- sweatin' and a-goin'
She's my darlin' consumptive Sarah Jane

She's all-pushed-out Sarah Jane
She's all-pushed-out Sarah Jane
And her head pushed out and her belly pushed in
She looks very well for the shape she's in
But she's my darlin' consumptive Sarah Jane

She's a-puffin' and a-blowin' Sarah Jane (Yeah!)
She's a-puffin' and a-blowin' Sarah Jane
She's a-puffin' and a-blowin' and a- sweatin' and a-goin'
She's my darlin' consumptive Sarah Jane

Source: transcribed from Bill 'Jazz' Gillum 'The Bluebird Recordings 1934-1938' RCA 97863 66717-2. Recorded in Chicago on 4 April 1936.
PS.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Sarah Jane' by Jazz Gillum
From: Lepus Rex
Date: 25 Oct 00 - 02:09 AM

Wow, thanks alot, Stewie! You've got the history and everything. I really appreciate it:)

---Lepus Rex