The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #81179 Message #1515494
Posted By: Q (Frank Staplin)
05-Jul-05 - 01:28 PM
Thread Name: African American Secular Folk Songs
Subject: RE: African American Secular Folk Songs
Bronson, in "The Singing Tradition of Child's Popular Ballads," remarked that the English variants have a "prickly bush burden" which has been lost in America. See also the long entry in "The Traditional Ballad Index."
The song variants of "The Maid Freed from the Gallows" has been collected from many singers in America, mostly white, although Bronson noted that "among the Negroes the ballad is still sung and said in the form of a cante-fable" (writing in 1976).
I presume that the Lead Belly version, like other American versions, lacks the 'prickly bush' lines.
Since the song has been so widespread, it would be hard to say where Lead Belly got his version, although I can see that the subject of hanging could influence the attitude of African-Americans to the ballad.
The note by Lloyd is not helpful. The version given in the writeup is not American.