Alabama Fiddle Tunes - Civil War

Subject: Alabama Fiddle Tunes - Civil War?
From: Lighter
Date: 07 Jun 26 - 03:05 PM

The Atmore [Ala.] Spectrum (Oct. 22, 1908) announced an upcoming "fiddlers' contest" in Mobile for members of the Confederate Veterans of Alabama - few of them under 60 at that point.

The announcement says that "Selections will be confined to the following list," presumably because these were titles familiar to the fiddlers during the Civil War.

The list is interesting because we don't have a lot of information on folk fiddling in the Deep South as early as the 1860s.

A few of the 28 titles may be post-war (nobody's memory is perfect), but by and large most (and possibly all) of these tunes were well-known in the early 1860s:

Mississippi Sawyer
Cotton-Eyed Joe
Run, N----r, Run
Sugar in the Gourd
Old Molly Hare
Bill in the Low Grounds
Natchez Under the Hill
Jenny, Get Your Hoecake Done
Milk and Peaches
Devil Among the Sailors
Speed the Plow
Leather Breeches
Arkansas Traveler
The Lass of Goein [sic]
Hell in Georgia
Suwanee River
Irish Washerwoman
Dixie
After the Yearlings
Alabama Gals
Devil's Dream
Red Apples
Cinda [sic]
Old Hen Cackled
Sweet Gals in the Pine Woods
John T. Moore
Sally Put the Saddle on the Old Gray Mule
Home, Sweet Home

About twenty of these are still commonly played. ("...Sailors" may be a typo for "Tailors," or else a local variant.) Other tunes may be known by different titles.

Subject: RE: Alabama Fiddle Tunes - Civil War
From: pattyClink
Date: 09 Jun 26 - 10:01 AM

Great list! (well except for the n-word part)

Is this the song meant by "Cindy"? Heard this local group at a festival long ago.

Cindy by Reconstructed

Subject: RE: Alabama Fiddle Tunes - Civil War
From: meself
Date: 09 Jun 26 - 11:44 AM

And, of course, Devil's Dream, occurring further down the list, is a slight variant of Devil Among the Tailors - although, who knows, the version they had in mind may have been an extreme variant.

It's interesting to me how few of those are tunes you would have heard 'anywhere' - e.g. Devil['s] ..., Irish Washwoman, Speed the Plow - while the rest seem to be truly 'Southern', at least under the titles given.

Subject: RE: Alabama Fiddle Tunes - Civil War
From: Lighter
Date: 09 Jun 26 - 01:49 PM

"Cinda" is most likely to be the melody of the song "Cindy." "Cinda" is short for "Lucinda" and "Cindy" is just how other people said it.

The Civil War Song "I Can Whip the Scoundrel" goes to a very similar tune.

Meself, "Tailors" and "Sailors" are usually the same tune. The newspaper writer may just have heard both titles and thought they were different tunes.

"Arkansas Traveler," "Sugar in the Gourd," "Devil's Dream/ Devil Among the Tailors," "Speed the Plow," "Irish Washerwoman," and "Home, Sweet Home" were all pretty nationally known in 1861. So, of course, were Stephen Foster's "Suwanee River," Daniel Emmett's "Dixie," and Henry Bishop's "Home, Sweet Home." In its simpler form of "Old Zip Coon," "Natchez Under the Hill" (later "Turkey in the Straw") was also a national hit.

I'd guess that "Lass o' Goein" is really "The Lass o' Gowrie," which was also nationally known.

The other recognizable titles are indeed recognizably Southern.

Subject: RE: Alabama Fiddle Tunes - Civil War
From: meself
Date: 10 Jun 26 - 12:28 PM

My point was that "Tailors/Sailors" and "Devil's Dream" are, presumably, variants of the same tune.

When I said "anywhere", I meant beyond, as well as within, the US. My own background is of the (Canadian) Maritimes, and some of the tunes you mention I've never heard of in the context of fiddling traditions in that region - "Sugar in the Gourd" being one - and while many fiddlers would have played any well-known song melody from time to time, as appropriate to the occasion, "Suwannee River" and "Dixie" were not in the conventional fiddle repertoires, in my experience. "Turkey in the Straw" was/is "everywhere", and "Home, Sweet Home" was/is sometimes played for a waltz.

Subject: RE: Alabama Fiddle Tunes - Civil War
From: Lighter
Date: 10 Jun 26 - 03:03 PM

Interesting, meself. "Sugar in the Gourd" was one of the most popular U.S. fiddle tune titles in the nineteenth century. From its first discovered mention in Virginia in 1832, it had spread to Massachusetts, Ohio, Texas, and California by the 1850s. In other words, nationwide.

The Traditional Tune Archive offers no less than an incredible 14 different tunes known by this title.

Press stories indicate that both "Suwanee River" ("Old Folks at Home") and "Dixie" were played fairly often in contests around 1900, mostly in the South and West. In the same vein were "Oh, Susanna!" "Annie Laurie," "My Old Kentucky Home," "Camptown Races," and others.
I wouldn't call them "standard" pieces, however - like "Arkansas Traveler" and "Solder's Joy."