Origins: Chinese Breakdown

Subject: Chinese Breakdown singing call
From: Pete and Gin
Date: 25 Apr 99 - 01:43 PM

Words wanted for the singing call for this dance please! We can only half-remember them!

Subject: RE: Chinese Breakdown singing call
From: Margo
Date: 26 Apr 99 - 11:14 AM

If you don't mind buying a recording, Folkways has five listed at:

http://www.si.edu/folkways/start.htm

I haven't seen lyrics yet. I was surprised when I brought up a search engine, typed in Chinese breakdown and came up with a lot of results. (That's searching the web) Hope this helps.

Margarita

Subject: RE: Chinese Breakdown singing call
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 26 Apr 99 - 12:35 PM

Whoops--my machine hiccuped.

First you're going uptown
Then you're going downtown
Uptown and downtown, and all around the town
Meet your honey with right hand round
Swing your corners all;
Promenade you corner gal
All around the hall.

Subject: RE: Chinese Breakdown singing call
From: Pete and Gin
Date: 26 Apr 99 - 05:41 PM

Dear Mr Greenhaus, Sir!

Being new to Mudcat I don't really understand the proprieties of communicating via threads yet. Thankyou for your suggestion...very interesting though the words don't seem to fit the tune too well.

I can remember something along the lines of: "Do si do your corner, and pass your partner by Do si do with the girl on the left and pass your partner by...." and after that I really get totally lost!

Does this jog any memories? I've tried searching the web at some length but with no success for the words- tho many recordings of the tune...but I KNOW that!

Many thanks for the interest!

Gin

Subject: RE: Chinese Breakdown singing call
From: Pete and Gin
Date: 26 Apr 99 - 05:49 PM

...which just goes to show that I really don't know what I'm doing or else hiccups can be transmitted via modem!

gin

Subject: Singing call to 'Chinese Breakdown'
From: GUEST,Gin
Date: 01 Jun 00 - 06:53 PM

Tried this one a year or so ago, without much luck! Words must fit the dance tune of the same name and probably include "Do-si-do your corner, and pass your partner by" and " allemande with the one you love" or some such.

Subject: RE: Singing call to 'Chinese Breakdown'
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 01 Jun 00 - 09:41 PM

First you're going uptown Now you're going downtown Uptown, and downtown And all around the town

Meet your lady with a right hand round Left to tour corners all; Take your corner lady And promenade the hall.

Subject: Chinese Breakdown
From: GUEST,Gin
Date: 01 Jul 01 - 05:20 PM

I have requested the singing call for this several times without being able to access the answers, if they were provided! I'm putting it down to incompetence on my part, but in the mean time, I reallly would like the singing call words...! Help!

Gin

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chinese Breakdown
From: Sorcha
Date: 01 Jul 01 - 06:37 PM

I didn't think there were words to it. I've just heard it as a tune.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chinese Breakdown
From: Louie Roy
Date: 01 Jul 01 - 07:52 PM

I've heard the new square dance callers use this tune Chineese Break Down to call some of their squares.If you know any square dance clubs in your area I'm sure they can give you the square dance words,but like Sorcha I've heard it played for many years and it didn't origially come out with any lyrics Louie Roy

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chinese Breakdown
From: Noreen
Date: 01 Jul 01 - 08:28 PM

Looks like Dick Greenhaus's words are not the ones you want?

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chinese Breakdown
From: Sorcha
Date: 01 Jul 01 - 08:43 PM

ooops. I did a DT and Forum search and those didn't turn up.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chinese Breakdown
From: Helen
Date: 01 Jul 01 - 11:10 PM

Gin, It's better to find the original thread that you posted to rather than starting new ones. I realsie that you are unfamiliar with the system here, but it works a lot better than many ohter forum formats I have seen.

As Noreen said, do a search for your previous thread titles by using the filter box at the top of the forum page and choosing the time period in which you think that the thread was last opened. If you are not sure, just pick the longest period, but be warned, if you are looking for a fairly common word like "lyric" or "song" etc then it could take a long time or your computer might hang.

"Chinese" & "breakdown" are uncommon enough that the search would be fairly quick.

There is a FAQ file about the Mudcat Forum, which is the teal coloured thread at the top of the list of threads on the main Forum page.

Hope you enjoy your visit with us, and please consider becoming a member. You can click on the word "membership" on the heading of each Mudcat page, including this one.

Helen

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chinese Breakdown
From: cnd
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 03:52 PM

Several abortive threads on this topic -- perhaps they could be merged?

Plenty of sources have a solid description of the piece (Kuntz's The Fiddler’s Companion, for example), but the name remains a mystery. As widely reported, "Chinese Breakdown" was first recorded by the "Dixie String Band" in 1925 under the title Atlanta Special (this latter bit of trivia is, for whatever reason, less widely circulated), followed by a recording in Atlanta in 1927 by the Scottdale String Band. After the 1927 recording, the tune was frequently and widely noted in newspapers at the time.

I did locate one reference of a song titled the Chinese Breakdown being played before 1927 by Guilford College's (Greensboro, NC) string quartet for a spring festival in 1925 (News and Record, March 30th, 1925, p. 3). And a newspaper from Kentucky in 1930 noted the number was "unusual (The Courier-Journal, May 2nd, 1930, p. 12). This is likely a case where it was known earlier by other names, but how and why exactly it came to be known as Chinese Breakdown remains a mystery to me at present.

Some alternate names for the song include "Beaver Valley Breakdown," "Georgia Bust-Down," "Georgia Breakdown," "Tiger Rag" (via Fiddler's Companion"), and Shanghai Rag ("I Remember Those Days, ...Way Back" - Union Grove Talking Machine Records – SS-5, 1971)


Here's the tune - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNducuQBc4Y

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chinese Breakdown
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 04:43 PM

I remember hearing Asa Martin singing these words to the tune:

I tickled her under the chin
I did it again and again
She loved it so that she didn't say no
When I tickled her under the chin

I can't remember if he sang it when we visited him at his home or if I heard it on a recording.
I have to admit using it myself when the tune was played at our old time sessions.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chinese Breakdown
From: Helen
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 04:53 PM

Thanks cnd for that information. Very interesting!

I listened to the video link you provided and thought it was a different tune until I heard the fiddle.

Chineese Breakdown, Old Time Fiddling

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chinese Breakdown
From: cnd
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 07:09 PM

Sorry for the confusion, Helen, that's a fair point. That's the version I listen to the most, but they do really hold off on the fiddle part, and the banjo part is a bit less recognizable.

It's funny that the band from your link titled it "Chineese" Breakdown" (with 3 total e's). I've also got a version on record where it was spelled "Chinease Breakdown." Perhaps it's just because the bluegrass world isn't the best at spelling, perhaps it's people thinking that it surely couldn't be related to China, or perhaps it's because the song does actually have a point of origin where it was spelled alternately. Probably not, but still...

Hootenany, it was indeed Asa Martin - listen here

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chinese Breakdown
From: Helen
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 11:07 PM

Chineeese is probably just a typo. It's easy to hit the key one time too many.

I didn't even notice it when I copied the info below the video to put into the link.

Subject: RE: Origins: Chinese Breakdown
From: Helen
Date: 15 Jun 23 - 12:48 AM

So, just checking, it's not the lyrics of the song which is required but the dance call instructions?

Subject: RE: Origins: Chinese Breakdown
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Jun 23 - 02:56 AM

cnd

Thanks for the reminder I now have "egg on my face". That very disc is just a few feet away from me as I sit here. What's more embarrassing is the fact that I was able to make a small contribution to that series of CD's and should have remembered. I did first hear it some years ago.

The folks at the FRC are doing an amazing job at making so much wonderful material available and the amount of research and knowledge, pages and pages of it, packed into this particular set and freely available on line is astounding.
The other good thing about it is that all monies from the sale of these recordings go to the performers of their estate.

Subject: RE: Origins: Chinese Breakdown
From: Joe Offer
Date: 15 Jun 23 - 03:28 AM

From the Traditional Tune Archive (click):

"Chinese Breakdown" was first recorded by the "Dixie String Band" in 1925.

Subject: RE: Origins: Chinese Breakdown
From: Helen
Date: 15 Jun 23 - 03:37 AM

Egg on face is the normal look around here. Sometimes a pointer in the right direction is all we need to be able to look in the right place. :-)

Subject: RE: Origins: Chinese Breakdown
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Jun 23 - 05:44 AM

We played this for decades in our pub sessions in a medley with The Flop-eared Mule. Great fun!

Subject: RE: Origins: Chinese Breakdown
From: cnd
Date: 15 Jun 23 - 08:33 AM

Yes Helen, the original request(s) were for square dance call instructions. And Hoot, no worries about the "egg" -- I wasn't familiar with that adaptation, so it was good to learn!

There's a couple versions of calls for Chinese Breakdown at ContraFusion and the Square Dance History Project

Thanks Joe et. al. for consolidating the previous threads

Subject: RE: Origins: Chinese Breakdown
From: cnd
Date: 15 Jun 23 - 09:10 AM

Here's the only version I know of bearing the "Tiger Rag" name - Tiger Rag by Byrd Moore and His Hotshots (with Melvin Robinette). The recording date is reported to be 4/10/29

Shanghai Rag was recorded 2/24/1928 by Hershall Brown And His Washboard Band and can be purchased here or heard here

Subject: RE: Origins: Chinese Breakdown
From: cnd
Date: 15 Jun 23 - 09:16 AM

Here's a transcription from the Square Dance History Project's Otto Wood notes, linked above. Note that I indented the "And pass your partner by" line, which was not indented in the original:

CHINESE BREAKDOWN (square dance calls)

Now the first couple promenade,
  All round the outside ring.
Promenade, go all the way,
  And listen while I sing,
Chain two ladies across the set,
  Turn the ladies round,
Same two ladies chain right back,
  And now you're homeward bound,
Now chain your right hand lady,
  You're right hand lady chain,
Chain the ladies right back,
  And now you're home again,
Nov chain the left-hand lady,
  The left hand lady too,
Chain the ladies right back,
  And here is what well do:
Allemand left on the corner,
  Pass your partner by,
Turn the right hand girl with your right hand,
  And pass your partner by,
Allemend left on the corner,
  & Do-se-do your own,
Step right up & swing her,
  and promenade home,
Promenade, go round that ring,
  You promenade two-by-two,
Hurry boys, get right back home,
  Second couple its up to you!

Pattern -- Non-progressive: do the entire call through once for each couple.

Subject: RE: Origins: Chinese Breakdown
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 15 Jun 23 - 09:24 AM

Apologies, the GUEST above at 02.56 was me.