The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #112697   Message #2387711
Posted By: GUEST,Bob Coltman
13-Jul-08 - 07:57 AM
Thread Name: Origins/Lyr Add: Workin' on the Levee
Subject: Origins/Lyr Add: Workin' On the Levee
"Workin' On the Levee (Levee Song)" crops up briefly among the threads on "I've Been Workin' on the Railroad."

I quote from Masato Sakurai in thread http://www.mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=50253#763018:

"James J. Fuld writes in The Book of World-Famous Music, 4th ed. (Dover, 1996, p. 309): "The first known appearance in print of I've Been Working on the Railroad is under the title Levee Song, in Carmina Princetonia (8th ed., Martin R. Dennis & Co., Newark, N.J., 1894), p. 24." This version doesn't have the "Someone's in the Kitchen" part. It would be interesting to quote the whole song, from my copy of Carmina Princetonia: The Princeton Song Book, 21th ed. (G Shirmer, 1927, pp. 70-71).

LEVEE SONG
(copyright, 1894, by Martin R. Dennis & Co.)

1.   (SOLO) I once did know a girl named Grace--
      (QUARTET) I'm wukkin' on de levee;
      (SOLO) She done brung me to dis sad disgrace
      (QUARTET) O' wukkin' on de levee.

Chorus:
I been wukkin' on de railroad
All de livelong day ...... "

But it is more than just a piece of "I've Been Workin' ... "
I've found four verses to it, which I'll quote in the next message.