Lyr Add: Night Before Christmas in Texas (Autry)

Subject: Lyr Add: NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS IN TEXAS (Autry)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 24 Dec 04 - 12:36 AM

I couldn't find a suitable thread to add this to, so I'll just create one. (I'm surprised there's not a thread called "Gene Autry songs" or "'Night Before Christmas' variants and parodies.")

Transcribed from an archived radio program which you can hear (for a limited period) at this page. (Under "Wednesday, December 22, 2004" click "Listen to the show." The song begins at 1:34:45 into the show.)

This is sung, not recited.

THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS (IN TEXAS, THAT IS)
(Leon Harris, Bob Miller)

'Twas the night before Christmas, in Texas, you know,
Way out on the prairie without any snow.
Asleep in their cabin were Buddy an' Sue,
A-dreamin' of Christmas like me and you.
Not stockin's but boots at the foot of their bed,
For this was in Texas. What more need be said?
When all of a sudden from out the still night,
There came such a ruckus it gave me a fright.

An' I saw cross the prairie like a shot from a gun,
A loaded-up buckboard come out at a run.
The driver was geein' an' hawin' with will,
An' hosses, not reindeer, he drove with such skill.
"Come on, Buck an' Pancho an' Prince, to the right.
There'll be plenty trav'lin' for you-all tonight."
The driver, in Levi's and a shirt that was red,
Had a ten-gallon Stetson on top of his head.

As he stepped from his buckboard, he was really a sight:
A beard and a mustache so curly an' white.
As he burst in the cabin, the children awoke
And were both so astonished that neither one spoke.
And he filled up their boots with such presents galore
That neither could think of a single thing more.
When Buddy recovered the use of his jaws,
He asked in a whisper: "Are you Santa Claus?"

"Am I the real Santa? Well, what do you think?"
And he smiled as he gave a mysterious wink.
Then he leaped in the buckboard an' said in his drawl:
"To the children of Texas, merry Christmas, you all."

[Sung by Gene Autry with the Cass County Boys on "Goin' Back to Texas," Varèse Sarabande CD #066272, 2001; and on several other albums.]

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Night Before Christmas in Texas (Autry)
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 24 Dec 04 - 01:00 AM

Also on "Rudolph Red Nosed Reindeer & Other Christmas Classics," a sound clip at Amazon.