Lyr Req: Tapioca (from 'Siege at Red River')

Subject: Tapioca - lyrics and origin
From: GUEST,Jim
Date: 06 Dec 07 - 12:19 PM

I remember as a teenager seeing a movie a song that had the words:

          Workin' on the railroad, twenty cents a day
          Johnnie pick a tune on your banjo      [ plunk , plunk ]
          Listen to the wheels go clackin' on their way
          Tapioca, tapioca, tapioca they seem to say.

          Tapioca, tapioca, all I ever eat is tapioca,
          Tapioca, tapioca, all I ever eat is tapioca.         

I can't remember the movie nor the singer, but the tune and song still pop into my head regularly. Can anyone help? Google doesn't seem to have anything.

Subject: RE: Tapioca - lyrics and origin
From: GUEST
Date: 06 Dec 07 - 12:47 PM

Siege at Red River, Van Johnson. An interesting story, I remember it, too. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0047488/

Subject: RE: Tapioca - lyrics and origin
From: GUEST,DWR
Date: 06 Dec 07 - 12:48 PM

That was me above, it went before I could get my initials in.

Subject: RE: Tapioca - lyrics and origin
From: GUEST,Jim
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 01:35 PM

Thanks DWR, I'll have to get that movie.

Subject: RE: Tapioca - lyrics and origin
From: GUEST
Date: 10 Oct 08 - 06:55 AM

the siege at red river is the movie

Subject: RE: Tapioca - lyrics and origin
From: Joe Offer
Date: 10 Oct 08 - 04:01 PM

There are sound and movie files here (click), but I can't get it to play on Windows Media Player. Works in Quicktime.

TAPIOCA (songwriter unknown)

Tapioca, tapioca, all she ever learned to cook was tapioca,
For my dinner, for my supper, tapioca I ate 'til I couldn't see straight.

Oh, workin' on the railroad, twenty cents a day
Johnnie pick a tune on your banjo      [ plunk, plunk ]
Listen to the wheels go clackin' on their way
Tapioca, tapioca, tapioca they seem to say.


from recording by Milburn Stone on the 1954 movie Siege at Red River

-Joe-

Subject: RE: ADD: Tapioca - lyrics and origin
From: Charley Noble
Date: 10 Oct 08 - 09:34 PM

Does anyone know what tapioca is actually made of? When I was growing up we were served "pearl tapioca" with big round gobs that were supposed to be pearls. I think the pearls had something to do with the roots of the tapioca tree and that the Japanese, according to my parents, destroyed all those trees during the latter part of World War 2. The tapioca that we're served today is very different. So maybe my parents were correct.

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: ADD: Tapioca - lyrics and origin
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 10 Oct 08 - 10:48 PM

Tapioca is derived from roots of Manihot esculenta, a South American plant, which became widely grown in the tropics, esp. SE Asia.
It has several names- cassava, manioc, yuca (not yucca), and others.

No way the Japanese could have destroyed it everywhere; in SE Asia they used large quantities to feed their soldiers, so it was hard for civilians to get until new crops were planted after the War.

Tapioca is gluten-free and almost protein- free.
It is used to make pearl tapioca (various sizes of 'pearls') and, when powdered, used for thickening.

We prefer tapioca starch to corn starch when we thicken soups or sauces; to us, corn starch has a flavor that sometimes clashes with the other ingredients in a sauce so we substitute tapioca starch, which is easy to get in our multicultural city.
Pearl tapioca is a favorite dessert of ours, but the supermarket deli in our neighborhood makes it now, so we buy it there rather than prepare it in the kitchen.

Green-branched manioc has a toxin which must be removed; the natives of Brazil knew how to remove it, and cassava or manioc was an important food to them before the Europeans came.

'Pearl' tapioca can be made from the sap of the sago palm, but is not the same thing, although it can be used in similar ways.
Arrowroot is sometimes confused with pearl tapioca.

Subject: RE: ADD: Tapioca - lyrics and origin
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 10 Oct 08 - 11:06 PM

There is a calypso band called Caribbean Tapioca; they have recorded some beauts inc. Big Bamboo, Hot, Hot, Hot Tiny Whiny, etc

Subject: RE: ADD: Tapioca - lyrics and origin
From: Charley Noble
Date: 11 Oct 08 - 09:44 AM

Thanks, Q!

Mudcat is at times a better information service than Goggle.

I wonder now if one could make pearl tapioca out of a sow's ear?

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: ADD: Tapioca - lyrics and origin
From: GUEST,Scott
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 08:56 AM

It's annoying. I can't find this song anywhere apart from the film :(
I do love it though

Subject: RE: ADD: Tapioca - lyrics and origin
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 20 Oct 08 - 06:21 PM

ASCAP.com lists a song called SIEGE AT RED RIVER CUES with alternative title TAPIOCA. It says it was written by Ken Darby and Lionel Newman, and the publisher is W B Music Corp c/o Warner Chappell Music Inc.

I still can't find any recordings or lyrics.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Tapioca (from 'Siege at Red River')
From: GUEST,Bill Kerby
Date: 18 Aug 10 - 04:23 PM

Thank ya, Jesus!

This song has lodged in my mind's craw for sixty years: all my friends thought I was nuts as I would sing it out (along with another old fave, "Grandma's Lye Soap,") at the odd time. I tried to explain it to them. You know That Movie We Saw, the western, the one with Van Johnson and (maybe) Jack Carson, where they were spies and singing "Tapioca" in their medicine show would signal...something...I forget just what.

Nobody remembered this AT ALL. They accused me of dreaming it, imagining it, making it all up.

Now, vindication. And no small relief. I was on the cusp of agreeing with them. Tapioca, tapioca, all we had to eat was tapioca...

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Tapioca (from 'Siege at Red River')
From: GUEST,Eliezer Pennywhistler
Date: 14 Dec 11 - 08:34 PM

test

Subject: Lyr Add: TAPIOCA (from 'Fibber McGee and Molly')
From: GUEST,Eliezer Pennywhistler
Date: 14 Dec 11 - 08:35 PM

The King's Men (sic) sang it on a "Fibber McGee and Molly" show. I don't have the date, but I would guess the late 1930s. I jumped on my minidisc recorder and got everything but their first verse. Here it is, exactly as they sang it ... in 4-part harmony:

TAPIOCA

Tapioca, Tapioca,
Mammy, won't you let me pick upon the polka?
If you let me-oka, Tapioca,
Come on, we'll have a jubilee!

Working on the railroad, twenty cents a day,
Johnny pluck a tune on the banjo.
Oh me, my oh my,
Mammy Mammy Mammy, don't you hear the baby cry?

Working on the railroad, never get a pay,
Johnny pluck a tune on the banjo.
Oh me, my oh my,
Mammy Mammy Mammy, don't you hear the baby cry?

See the chillun rollin' in de cotton,
Sun pouring down upon their heads;
Somebody got to make a living,
Chillun got to have a little bread.

Tapioca, Tapioca,
Won't your mammy let you pick upon the polka?
Tapioca, Tapioca,
Come on, we'll have a jubilee!

Working on the railroad, twenty cents a day,
Johnny pluck a tune on your banjo.
Oh me, my oh my,
Mammy Mammy Mammy, don't you hear the baby cry?

Subject: Lyr Add: TAPIOCA (Edward Warden, 1860?)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 16 Dec 11 - 05:10 PM

You can see the sheet music at The Library of Congress American Memory collection:


"Buckley's Comic Songs as sung by R. Bishop Buckley of Buckley's Serenaders"
TAPIOCA
Edward Warden
Boston: Henry Tolman & Co. [c1860?]

1. When I used to work upon the levee,
Many happy darkies there you see.
Cotton coming in so very heavy,
Oh! jolly, there was lots of work for me!
Black man hauling in the cargo.
Sun am very hot upon the head.
When he done, he dance a jolly jargo,
Rum, tum, on the banjo and then to bed.

CHORUS: To my oakum, to my chokum,
Oh! Pompey, can't you pick a peck of oakum?
Ah! ah! ah! Golly, ain't the Levee nigger free?
Working on the cotton boat, ten shilling a day,
Johnny, can't you pick upon the banjo?
Oh! me, Oh! my,
Mamma, mamma, mamma, don't you hear the baby cry?
Oh! me, Oh! my,
Ah! mamma, mamma, mamma, don't you hear the baby cry?

2. When I used to work off in the river,
Satin wood and water all the day,
Chilly wind he come, and make me shiver.
O glad this child he was to get away.
White man he gave me silver dollar,
Ev'ry day I work upon the dock;
Then I get some whiskey and I holler,
"Blom 'e, blom 'e, Caterrego rock."

3. This child is fond of fried 'tato,
Catfish and coffee oh! it's nice!
It make him feel just like an alligator
When him just about to catch a mice.
When the bell he rings, I go to dinner,
Den I goes and see my Dinah dear.
I'll marry her as sure as I'm a sinner,
And love her all the days that's in the year.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Tapioca (from 'Siege at Red River')
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 16 Dec 11 - 05:17 PM

There is another edition of the sheet music for the same song, also at American Memory: TAPIOCA by Edward Warden, (Boston : Oliver Ditson & Co., [c1860?])

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Tapioca (from 'Siege at Red River')
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Feb 14 - 08:43 PM

Pretty close:   See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMoI8PENG-I begins about about 3:40 minutes   not very long

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Tapioca (from 'Siege at Red River')
From: GUEST
Date: 03 Aug 15 - 07:59 PM

I think the choru is
tapioca, tapioca, tapioca I ate 'til I couldn't see straight
(not, all I ever eat is tapioca).
Ruth, Montreal