The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #19899   Message #4197149
Posted By: GUEST,Julia L
13-Feb-24 - 08:45 PM
Thread Name: Lyr Req: Old versions of Black Velvet Band
Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Old versions of Black Velvet Band
Here's one from Maine. Not terribley different, though the tune is in a minor mode. The conspiracy with the coachman is an interesting twist

Helen Hartness Flanders #293
BLACK VELVET BAND Brackett, Fred?Stacyville, ME?420510 s (D26B07) T 15:59

Collected by Marguerite Olney for Helen Hartness Flanders Collection, Middlebury College VT from Fred Brackett of Stacyville, ME c.1940 Transcribed and adapted by Julia Lane 2016

As I went a walking one evening
'T was just at the close of the day
I spied a fair damsel approaching
Came tripping along the highway

Chorus:?
Her cheeks they were red as the roses
You would think she was queen of the land
Her hair it hung over her shoulders?
Tied up with a black velvet band

To a house of ill fame she betrayed me
Says she "The game ' tis well planned"
Alas, she completely beguiled me
?Bad luck to the black velvet band

'Twas early the next monday morning
?As a coachman was just passing by?
I could see there was something between them
I could tell by the gleam of her eye

A gold watch she slipped from his pocket
She slyly slipped into my hand?
This gave me the charge of the taker
Bad luck to the black velvet band

Before the high judge I was taken
?He says "Young man your case seems quite clear
And if I am not much mistaken
?You'll be sentenced to twenty long years"

Bid adieu to your friends and relations
Likewise to the black velvet band?
For you must now cross the wide ocean
In a ship bound for Van Dieman's land