I'm researching songs for a friend, and coming across some real puzzles. "Vandy, Vandy" is in the Digital Tradition, attributed to Science fiction/fantasy writer Manly Wade Wellman (1903-1986). Wellman wrote a 1953 short story titled Vandy, Vandy, and the song text was apparently included in the story.

Intended tune was "Drowsy Sleeper," but one singer recorded it to the tune of "Oh, No John" - the song shares a couple of verses with "Oh, No John."

Here's what's said in a Mudcat Thread:
http://www.mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=2162 -
The "Silver John" books by Manly Wade Wellman: fine short fantasies set in Appalachia about a roving musician whose guitar is strung with magic; he encounters Evil in many guises and tries to fight back. NOT cutsie like the Scarboroughs; Wellman actually includes both traditional Appalachian songs and wrote a few trad. sounding ones for these stories. Bob Coltman, a fine American folk musician, set one of these, "Vandy, Vandy" to music and recorded it.



Or maybe it IS traditional:

Fascinating article by Joe Christopher about Manly Wade Wellman's songs. I knew Wellman--I drove him to DeepSouthCon one year--and my recollection is that he always insisted that the song "Vandy Vandy" was collected in the Sand Hill country in North Carolina. Of all the songs quoted, this and the published version of "The Desrick on Yandro" seem to me to be the ones that may be older than Wellman himself. I have the Betancourt tape, and a much older record where Hoyt Axton sings "Vandy Vandy", but I don't really find either of them satisfactory. I am curious as to why the spelling "AMERIKA" appears in the title of this article. It is not historical and had a certain political connotation in the 60s - but what does it have to do with fantasy folksongs?

Source: http://www.efanzines.com/ERM/veh29.htm


So, is it traditional, or did it really originate in a 1953 fantasy story?

-Joe Offer-