Origin: Kiss Me Quick and Go (Ga. Yellow Hammers)

Subject: Kiss Me Quick & Go - origin ?
From: GUEST,Les B.
Date: 19 Dec 01 - 05:42 PM

I'm trying to find where an old-timey group from the late 1920's, the Georgia Yellow Hammers, got their version of the song "Kiss Me Quick and Go". The liner notes on County records says they found it in an early American songsheet. I can find a version of the song on Levy's sheet music site, dated 1856, and although the chorus is similar enough to see it is the same song, the verses are quite different (although somewhat the same in general theme).

The 1856 verses start out with "The other night while I was sparking Sweet Turlina Spray..." and the 1920's version starts, "The other night while we sat spooning, softly whispering and our love crooning..."

In the 1920's song there is a "big white English bulldog on my track..." which is one of the more memorable images of the later version. I don't know if the Yellow Hammers totally re-wrote the earlier song, or if it had changed before they found it and recorded it. Can anyone point me to any versions betweeen 1856 and circa 1926 ?

Subject: RE: Help: Kiss Me Quick & Go - origin ?
From: Butch
Date: 19 Dec 01 - 06:30 PM

You will find the original sheet music in the Buckleys' banjo instruction manual of 1860. This was a minstrel stage song of the period that I am sure the Buckley's did in their shows of ther period. I have not found the 1856 version either, but the words you quote are also the first words in the Buckley version. Hope that helps.

Subject: RE: Help: Kiss Me Quick & Go - origin ?
From: Butch
Date: 19 Dec 01 - 06:56 PM

To be more specific: Buckley's New Banjo Method, Oliver Ditson & Co., Boston 1860 Page # 44.

Subject: RE: Help: Kiss Me Quick & Go - origin ?
From: Stewie
Date: 19 Dec 01 - 07:44 PM

The Buckley and Steele composition is printed in a more readable form here:

Click

The Georgia Yellow Hammer lyrics may be found Motoya's songbook:

Click here

Les, in respect of your specific question, the only information I have is as follows (Dale is a devotee of GYH material and may be able to provide more). The Georgia Yellow Hammers recorded 'Kiss Me Quick' at a Victor session on 18 October 1928 [Vi V-40091]. Eight recordings were made at this session and, according to Gene Wiggins ('Hell Broke Loose in Gordon County Georgia' - Old Time Music #25, Summer 1977), Bud Landress was credited with the composition of all 8 titles albeit they included 'Big Ball in Memphis' and 'Old Hen Cackled' which was hiding under the title 'Warhorse Game'. Wiggins noted that 'Kiss Me Quick' has been traced back to an English broadside (but gives no details), and he also printed in his article a version from a Such songbook of the very late 1800s or early 1900s - more or less the Steele/Buckley lyrics. In the absence of other printed or recorded earlier versions, it seems Landress may have seized upon the refrain of the old song and refashioned the rest.

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: Help: Kiss Me Quick & Go - origin ?
From: Les B
Date: 19 Dec 01 - 08:57 PM

Butch & Stewie - thanks for the info - this fills in some areas that I was only guessing about. I've got the Yellow Hammers doing it on an anthology - Times Ain't Like They Used to Be: Vol. 4 - and it also only gives the reference that it "was derived from a 19th century printed broadside".

Besides finding the early version in Levy's Sheet Music, I've also found two broadsides (both the same)at the America Singing Nineteenth-Century Song Sheets site, and they are all the Steele/Buckley version.

I'm beginning to think the Yellow Hammers re-wrote it extensively. It's a good song that a friend has been singing for several years, and now I've decided to learn it, and wondered if it could pass for a Civil War era piece. I suspect not, now.

Subject: Lyr Add: KISS ME QUICK AND GO (Steel/Buckley)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 06 Feb 11 - 10:28 PM

From the sheet music at The Lester S. Levy Collection of Sheet Music:
(Click for a PDF.)


KISS ME QUICK AND GO
Words, Silas S. Steel. Music, Fred Buckley.
"Sung with great success at the concerts of Buckley's Opera Troupe at their new Opera House, Broadway, N.Y."
New York: Firth, Pond & Co., 1856.

1. The other night while I was sparking sweet Turlina Spray,
The more we whispered our love talking, the more we had to say.
The old folks and the little folks we thought were fast in bed.
We heard a footstep on the stairs and what d'ye think she said?

CHORUS: O! Kiss me quick and go, my honey. Kiss me quick and go.
To cheat surprise and prying eyes, why, kiss me quick and go.

2. Soon after that I gave my love a moonlight promenade.
At last we fetched up to the door, just where the old folks stayed.
The clock struck twelve. Her heart struck, too, and peeping overhead,
We saw a nightcap raise the blind, and what d'ye think she said?

3. One Sunday night we sat together, sighing side by side,
Just like two wilted leaves of cabbage in the sunshine fried.
My heart with love was nigh to split to ask her for to wed.
Said I, "Shall I go for the priest?" And what d'ye think she said?

Subject: RE: Origin: Kiss Me Quick and Go (Ga. Yellow Hammers)
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 07 Feb 11 - 01:28 AM

Stewie's links are dead, unfortunately. Presumably Jim Dixon has the same as his first link.

These might be the other set? How does this compare to the Yellow Hammers'?

It's from http://www.rockabilly.nl/lyrics2/k0019.htm

KISS ME QUICK AND GO
(Landress - Moody)
MADDOX BROS. & ROSE (COLUMBIA 21181, 1953)

(Yeah, let's go man...)

On the porch while we sat spoonin'
Softly whispering', always coonin'
Thought the old folks and the children were in bed
I heard footsteps softly walkin'
And you bet I then quit talkin'
And she hist a little and squivered up and said

Kiss me quick and go away
And no-one will ever know
It's too late to longer stay
Kiss me quick, my honey
Oh, kiss me quick and go

(Just a little more love, kiss me quick)

And I thought that I was cheatin'
And my heart it was beatin'
When I saw her old man peepin' through the crack
Through the window I had business
Around the house I went wizzin'
With that big white angry bulldog on my track

Kiss me quick and go away
And no-one will ever know
It's too late to longer stay
Kiss me quick, my honey
Oh, kiss me quick and go

(Just one more time now, mighty pretty)

Ridin' bushes, jumpin' ditches
And I almost lost my britches
When that big white bulldog got me by my leg
Up the hill and down the level
I can outrun that big devil
With those words a-rangin' softly in my ears

Kiss me quick and go away
And no-one will ever know
It's too late to longer stay
Kiss me quick, my honey
Oh, kiss me quick and go

(Kiss me...)

Subject: RE: Origin: Kiss Me Quick and Go (Ga. Yellow Hammers)
From: GUEST,Suzy T.
Date: 07 Feb 11 - 04:39 AM

It's very similar, but not identical. The last verse, as I remember, was something like:
Riding bushes (??) climbing fences
And I almost lost my senses
But this is just from memory -- it's definitely the same song. I never knew that Rose Maddox recorded it, I can just imagine her singing it!

Subject: RE: Origin: Kiss Me Quick and Go (Ga. Yellow Hammers)
From: GUEST,Felk
Date: 02 Jan 23 - 02:18 PM

This is close
The other night while we sat spoonin'
Softly whispering', our love crooning
Thought the old folks and the children were in bed
I heard footsteps softly walkin'
And you bet I then quit talkin'
And she set a little bit closer up and said

Kiss me quick and go away
Then no-one will ever know
It's too late to longer stay
Kiss me quick, my honey
Oh, kiss me quick and go

Then I felt that I was cheatin'
And my heart it did quit beatin'
When the old man spied me peepin' through the crack
out the window then I had business
Around the house I went wizzin'
With a big white English bulldog on my track

Kiss me quick and go away
Then no-one will ever know
It's too late to longer stay
Kiss me quick, my honey
Oh, kiss me quick and go

Ridin' bushes, and jumpin' fences
And I like to of lost my senses
When that big white English bulldog caught my rear
Up the hill and down the level
I couldn’t outrun that big devil
With those words a-rangin' softly in my ears

Kiss me quick and go away
Then no-one will ever know
It's too late to longer stay
Kiss me quick, my honey
Oh, kiss me quick and go

Subject: RE: Origin: Kiss Me Quick and Go (Ga. Yellow Hammers)
From: GUEST
Date: 04 Feb 23 - 11:37 PM

Those are exactly the lyrics as sung at http://www.reverbnation.com/open_graph/song/23901740 by Jim Watson