Texas fiddle tunes in 1900

Subject: Texas fiddle tunes in 1900
From: Lighter
Date: 19 Dec 21 - 08:56 PM

On February 10, 1900, the Dallas Morning News published this list of 107 tunes played on banjo and fiddle at a fiddlin' convention at Brenham.

This may be the most extensive list of tunes played by traditional fiddlers to have appeared print before the 20th century – at a time when scholars had barely discovered fiddle music in the Appalachians. So a list from Texas is doubly interesting.

The Civil War had ended only 35 years earlier, so many of the titles must date back that far or farther. Many are still familiar, but many familiar favorites are conspicuously absent – “Old Joe Clark” and “Durang's Hornpipe,” for example. Of course, titles like Stephen Foster’s “Oh! Susanna” (1848), “Camptown Races” (1850), and “My Old Kentucky Home” (1853) are also missing. (Foster was the composer of “Old Folks at Home” – or “Swanee River” – [1851] and “Massa’s in the Cold, Cold Ground” [1853], both on the list.)

I've alphabetized the titles.

All Jine Hands
Arkansas Traveler
Big Sis
Billy in the Low Ground
Black Cat’s Foot
Black Eyed Susie
Black Jack Grove
Black Satin
Bonaparte's Retreat
Bonnie Blue Flag
Brannigan’s Pup
Brindle Steer
Buffalo Girls
Bulldog’s Eye   
Bull-Frog's Eye
De Cackling Hen
Campbell's are Coming
Catfish and Minnow
Cat Slept in the Shavings
Cheatem
Chicken in the Bread Tray
Cinda [sic], Fare You Well
Clear the Track
College Hornpipe
Coonie on the Ground
Cotton Eyed Joe
Dan Tucker
Dat Gal is So Deceivin’
Devilish Mary
Devil’s Dream
Dixie Land
Dog Eat a Rye Straw
Downfall of Paris
Drunken Hiccoughs
Eighth of January
Farewell Whisky
Faulkey Dear [i.e., “Forked Deer”
Fine Time at Our House
Fisher’s Hornpipe
Forked Ear [i.e., “Forked Deer”]
Fuss in the Family
Gal on the Log
Getting Upstairs
Get Up in the Cool
Give the Fiddler a Dram
God Speed the Plow
Gray Eagle
Green Brier
Hell Broke Loose in Georgia
Hog-Eyed Man
Hop Light Ladies
Irish Washwoman
Jennie on the Railroad
Jennie Put the Kettle On
John’s Got a New House
Killy Crankie
Kitty is the Gal for Me
Leather Breeches
Little More Cider
Liza Jane
Lost Indian
Massa’s in the Cold, Cold Ground
Methodist Preacher
Miss Sawyer
Mollie Put the Kettle On
Molly Hare
Money Musk
Nancy Roland
Natchez Under the Hill
N----r in the Woodpile
Off to Georgia
Old Gray Horse
Old Hen Cackle
Old Muse and Pups
Old Straw Bonnet
Old Uncle Ned
One Eyed Riley
Pop Goes the Weasel
Possum Up the Gum Stump
Pretty Polly Ann
Rare Back, Davy
Ricker’s [sic] Hornpipe
Ringtail Coon
Rocky Road to Dublin
Ryan’s Buck Scrap
Rye Straw
Saddle Old Spike
Sallie Hamilton
Sally Gooden
Sally Johnson
Sandy Land
Shoo Fly
Soap Suds Over the Fence
Soldiers' Joy
Stump Tail Dog
Sugar in the Coffee
Sugar in the Gourd
Suwanee River
Tailor in the Loft
Tom and Jerry
Two-Eyed Jane
Wagoner
Walk Along, Jawbone
Walk Along, John   
Walls of Jericho
Want to Go to Meetin’ but Got No Shoes
Young Gal So Deceivin’

Subject: RE: Texas fiddle tunes in 1900
From: GUEST,Mike Yates
Date: 20 Dec 21 - 09:00 AM

Lighter, thank you for this. This is fascinating. Of course, just because a title is not there doesn't mean that the tune didn't exist at that time. I can see people arguing in the future about which tunes some of these titles refer to. But again, many thanks.

Subject: RE: Texas fiddle tunes in 1900
From: Lighter
Date: 20 Dec 21 - 09:59 AM

You're most welcome, Mike.

Many of the titles don't appear in Traditional Tune Archive, and some of the others have been applied to more than one.

Obviously traditional fiddling was going strong in the Southwest by the 1890s.

Subject: RE: Texas fiddle tunes in 1900
From: Lighter
Date: 23 Dec 21 - 07:36 PM

For comparison, here's the program for a more structured contest in Iowa in 1899, far from Appalachia (from the Waterloo "Courier," Aug. 18, 1899, p. 1):


“Each contestant must confine himself to no less than two of the following tunes: ‘Sugar in the Gourd,’ ‘Arkansas Traveler,’ ‘Devil’s Dream,’ ‘Boney Crossing the Alps,’ ‘Buckwheat Cakes and [']Lasses,’ ‘Hell on the Wabash,’ ‘Leather Breeches,’ ‘Irish Wash Woman,’ ‘Pop Goes the Weasel,’ ‘Old Dan Tucker,’ ‘Old Mother Flannigan.’”

Presumably these were the most popular at that time and place.

The one title I don't recognize is "Buckwheat Cakes and 'Lasses." The Traditional Tune Archive, however, offers a tune called "Buckwheat Batter," reported from northern states. It was recorded in 1926.

"Hell on the Wabash" presumably originated in Indiana.

Subject: RE: Texas fiddle tunes in 1900
From: leeneia
Date: 24 Dec 21 - 11:15 AM

Not necessarily. The Wabash River forms part of the boundary between Illinois and Indiana, so if it was composed by a local, s/he could have been an Illinoisan. Though actually it could have been written by anybody from anywhere.

I toyed with the idea that "hell" might mean a wild party, but apparently it doesn't. So what could "Hell on the Wabash" mean? All I can guess is that somebody was travelling down the river and there was a flood.

I came across that tune accidentally one day, and despite its hellish name, it's a charmer, old-fashioned sounding even for a old tune. I pencilled in "Helena Warbanks" as a more fitting title.

If you want to play it, it is at abcnotation.com as "Hell on the Wabash" version no. 6.

Subject: RE: Texas fiddle tunes in 1900
From: GUEST,cnd
Date: 24 Dec 21 - 12:15 PM

There are quite a number of fiddle tunes with Hell in the name -- Hell Amongst the Yearlings, Hell Broke Loose In Georgia, among others. I'm speaking offhand here, but they tend to be faster songs. Maybe it was a sort of informal denominator, like adding Waltz or Quadrille?

Subject: RE: Texas fiddle tunes in 1900
From: leeneia
Date: 24 Dec 21 - 03:38 PM

I think it means 'burn up the fiddle strings.'

Subject: RE: Texas fiddle tunes in 1900
From: Lighter
Date: 25 Dec 21 - 10:33 AM

Of interest:

"Holmes County Farmer" (Millersburg, O.) (Aug. 27, 1863), p.2: “In one carriage, we noticed two violinists, one playing ‘Fisher’s Hornpipe’ and the other 'Hell on the Wabash.'"

"Courier-Jounal (Louisville, Ky.) (May 21, 1866), p.1: “My stay in ‘Hell on the Wabash,’ as railroad men facetiously term Logansport [Ind.] was brief."

Another (or the same) tune was played during the Civil War as "Hell on the Potomac."

Subject: RE: Texas fiddle tunes in 1900
From: leeneia
Date: 25 Dec 21 - 11:14 AM

Logansport, eh? I found it on Google Maps, halfway between Indianapolis and the southern tip of Lake Michigan. It has a beautiful carousel and and a junior college, both good things.

Google even informs us that there's a bend in the Wabash there called Miami Bend, so that's another occurrence of the name Miami to add to my collection.

Somehow the title "Hell on the Potomac" fails to resonate. Something wrong with the meter.

Subject: RE: Texas fiddle tunes in 1900
From: Lighter
Date: 25 Dec 21 - 12:11 PM

A little farther west:

Carlsbad [New Mexico] Current-Argus (Feb. 28, 1902), p. 8:

Arkansaw Traveler
Black-Eyed Susan
Cotton-Eyed Joe
Forked-Head Deer [sic]
George Booker
Gray Eagle
Jennie-on-the-Railroad
Mollie Put the Kettle On
Money Musk
Natchez Under the Hill
Old Zip Coon
Possum Up a Gum Stump
Rabbit, Hunt Your Holler
Sallie Johnsing [sic]
Snowbird on the Ash Bank
Some Bony Pots [sic] Retreat
"Etc."

Subject: RE: Texas fiddle tunes in 1900
From: Lighter
Date: 29 Jan 26 - 11:47 AM

From the San Antonio Express (Apr. 1, 1949):

"Calling himself 'the only old cowboy fiddler living,' [Alton M.] Mead [of Kingsville] ...emphasized that he was a Texan and a cowboy 60 years ago 'before barbed wire got my job.'...Mead said he played [tunes] as he had heard them 'from the old fiddlers 65 years ago: nothing added to them or taken away.' Here are the tunes [he recorded privately, apparently in the '20s or '30s]: 'Sally Goodin,' 'Dig a Hole to Put the Devil In,' 'John Booker,' 'Rio Grande Valley,' 'Knocking on the Door of the Pearly Gates,' 'Where the Dogwood Blooms,' 'LeaRay [sic] Wolf,' 'Texas Waltz,' 'Queen of Hearts,' 'Rye Whiskey,' 'The Prairie Girl,' 'Dollie With the Wooden Leg,' 'Cotton-Eyed Joe,' 'Jack O' Diamonds,' 'Natchez Under the hill,' and 'Liza Jane.'"

Subject: RE: Texas fiddle tunes in 1900
From: Jack Campin
Date: 30 Jan 26 - 02:53 AM

There are a lot of guesses about Hell on the Wabash and what the phrase means on the web - Wikipedia lists a bunch. May date as far back as the 1790s. I first saw in the Scottish collection of danceband standards "Kerr's Merry Melodies for the Violin" from 1880.

Subject: RE: Texas fiddle tunes in 1900
From: GUEST,gillymor
Date: 30 Jan 26 - 05:01 AM

Very cool thread. I had forgotten about Possum Up a Gum Stump.

Subject: RE: Texas fiddle tunes in 1900
From: Lighter
Date: 30 Jan 26 - 12:55 PM

The invaluable Traditional Tune Index contains no less than five tunes that have been called "Hell on the Wabash."

Various memoirists around 1900 say it (i.e., one or more of them) was one of the most popular fiddle tunes in California, Missouri, and Virginia in the 1850s, so as a title it must go back to the '40s at least.

The most familiar tune of this title seems to have been composed by minstrel man Daniel Emmett, composer of "Dixie."

Subject: RE: Texas fiddle tunes in 1900
From: Lighter
Date: 01 Feb 26 - 08:39 AM

Here's a similar list from Missouri a few months earlier. It includes minstrel, vaudeville, and parlor songs, but most of the titles belong to old fiddle tunes.

Overlaps with the Texas list of a year later are significant.

"Times" (Bowling Green, Mo.) (Nov. 23, 1899):

“SOME REAL OLD TUNES…

Cindy,
Dixie,
Shaken,
Cuckoo,
Melindy,
Shoo Fly,
Ben Bolt,
Chinkapin,
Lily Dale,
Sorrel Hen,
Greenbrier,
Gray Eagle,
Nellie Gray,
Rock Candy,
Lead Creek,
Old Virginia,
Lone Indian,
Moneymusk,
Soldier’s Joy,
Ocean Wave,
Buffalo Girls,
Bay Rooster,
Forked Deer,
Who, Emma!,
Mockingbird,
Old Zip Coon,
Captain Jinks,
Eastern Texas,
The Wagoner,
Bowling Green,
Old Uncle Ned,
Old Dan Tucker,
Suwanee River,
I Never Did See,
Yankee Doodle,
Old Gray Goose,
Old John Brown,
Getting Upstairs,
Shortenin’ Bread,
Little Brown Jug,
Hell in Hamburg,
Old Sally Goodin,
Cotton Eyed Joe,
Big Ball Up Town,
Leather Breeches,
College Hornpipe,
Fisher’s Hornpipe,
Mississippi Sawyer,
N-----r’s Hornpipe,
The Devil’s Dream,
Sugar in the Gourd,
Champagne Charlie,
Possum in the Straw,
Bonaparte’s Retreat,
Irish Washerwoman,
Walkin’ in the Parlor,
Knockin’ on the Door,
Pop Goes the Weasel,
Sally Pick the Cotton,
Haste to the Wedding,
Noah was a Good Man,
Natchez Under the Hill,
The Arkansaw Traveler,
The Camels [sic] are Coming,
Coming Through the Rye,
Going Down Fifth Street,
Billy in the Low Ground,
Susannah Don’t You Cry,
Possum Up a Gum Stump,
Jennie Put the Kettle On,
Rising of the Morning Star,
Peepin’ through the Broom,
By By My Honey I’m Gone,
Granny Will Your Dog Bite?,
Fare You Well My Purty Gal,
Massa’s in the Cold Cold Ground,
St. Patrick’s Day in the Morning,
Bonaparte’s March Over the Rhine,
When the Swallows Homeward Fly,
Wake Up Ladies Day is Breaking,
Great Big Boat Came Round the Bend,
Old Aunt Sally’s Good Enough for Anybody.”

Bowling Green is very close to the Missouri-Illinois border, so most of these titles/tunes must have been known in western Illinois as well.

Note that "Goodbye My Honey, I'm Gone" was written as recently as 1885-86, so not every title is very "old." But most of the others must go back at least a generation. ("Champagne Charlie," for example, was written in 1869, "Captain Jinks" in 1862, "When the Swallows Homeward Fly" about 1849.)