Two little ...

Subject: Two little ...
From: Mo the caller
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 05:52 AM

The thread on Shortning Bread which has been revived by a scammer includes a post from 2005 by Q
Lyr. Add: SHORTENED BREAD

Run hyeur, mammy, run hyeur quick!
Shord'n bread make baby sick!
My! don't 'e love shord'n shord'n shord'n
Don't 'e love shord'n bread!

Oh, give me sump'n, I don't kyeur what
Tuh cyore this awful pain I got!
My! don't 'e love shord'n etc.

Two little n...s layin' in bed;
One turned over, en the tother one said,
"My! don't yer love," etc.

Two little n...s layin' in bed;
They sent fer the doctor, en the doctor said,
"Feed them niggers on shord'n," etc.

Two little n...s black ez tar
Tried to go ter heaven on a 'lectric car.

Two little n...s dressed in black
Tried to go to heaven on a railroad-track.

Two little n...s dressed in white
Tried to go to heaven on the tail of a kite.

Two little n...s black as hell
Tried to go to heaven in a pea-nut shell.

Two little n...s in a pea-nut shell
Tried to go to heaven but they went to hell.

From East Tennessee. mountain whites, collected in 1912.
No. 22, with music, an adaptation of that of "Run, N..., Run!"
E. C. Perrow, 1915, "Songs and Rhymes from the South," Jour. American Folklore, III, section VII, Songs of the Plantation.

And further back in the thread it was suggested they (v5 ->) were floating verses.
They floated to me at my daughter's Guide camp (in the 1980s) as

3 little angels all dressed in white
Tried to go to heaven on the end of a kite.
Kite it broke and down they all fell
Instead of going to heaven they all went to ... (the last word was not sung, straight on without a pause to the next verse)

3 little Devils...red
... bed
etc

there may have been more verses, you could make up anything that rhymed

3 little girl guides all dressed in blue
Tried to go to heaven on the end of a shoe
etc

Don't get excited don't turn red
Instead of going to heaven they all went to bed.

Subject: RE: Two little ...
From: cnd
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 09:44 AM

Mo, are you wishing to discuss the problematic past of the song, or the floating verses in general?

Shortening Bread is an interesting song in terms of history. According to Sigmund Spaeth, in American Mountain Songs, "'Shortenin' Bread' is... distinctly an Afro-American song, yet very few Negroes actually live in the mountains. The mountain poet finds humor in the Negro and sings to him in a kindly vein of amusement, often attributing to the darkey what could as easily be found in the cabin of the mountaineer."

Racist implications of Speath's analysis aside, I've read before about how several mountain songs, Shortening Bread in particular, showed that mountain whites were willing to accept and embrace black culture in a way inland whites often weren't willing to.

I suppose your could take that same argument and apply it to other verses if discussion on those floating verses is what you're going for.

I think the nature of the lyrics is part of why Shortenin Bread is now primarily performed as an instrumental tune, at least in my experience.

Subject: RE: Two little ...
From: Mo the caller
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 02:42 PM

No, I wasn't discussing Short'nin Bread. I would have posted on that thread if so. I was just surprised to find the song I'd heard at guide camp in England had that parentage. A different tune, though there are similarities. I suppose I've only heard 'concert' version of S B, cleaned up for the BBC. In fact I imagined it came from Porgy & Bess.