Origin: Rose of Alabamy? / Rose of Alabama

Subject: Rose of Alabamy
From:
Date: 30 Apr 99 - 08:22 AM

Can anyone provide information about the composer and history of the song "Rose of Alabamy"?

Thanks, Daniel

Subject: RE: Rose of Alabamy
From: DonMeixner
Date: 30 Apr 99 - 09:04 AM

Daniel,

The only place I have ever heard this song mentioned was in "The Outlaw Josie Wales". It probably really exists elsewhere but thats the only reference known to me.

Don

Subject: RE: Rose of Alabamy
From: Tucker
Date: 30 Apr 99 - 09:08 AM

Try "Taylor's traditional tunebook". I know that Barry has it there. You probably heard it on the Outlaw Jose Welles. That's where I first heard it. I have no clue as to the author but Barry does answer questions sometimes by mail. You may ask him. Joe Offer may know this too.

Subject: RE: Rose of Alabamy
From: Tucker
Date: 30 Apr 99 - 02:05 PM

PS, if you don't find your info at Taylor's I have the words to the song. I'll be happy to write them for you.

Subject: RE: Rose of Alabamy
From: Banjer
Date: 30 Apr 99 - 08:05 PM

I checked my several versions of the song but none tells the author. The best explanation I can get is on a CD of 97th Regimental String Band (a locally based Civil War reenactment band) which says it is a "pre-civil war comedy song unascribed to any source." Called a member of their band who lives nearby and he could shed no better light on it. If you do find it, please share it as I am now curious as well.

Subject: RE: Rose of Alabamy
From: Ole Bull
Date: 30 Apr 99 - 09:06 PM

"Rose" is one of those songs that was popular amoung the explosion of Minstrel bands before the Civil War. Publishers released numerous versions of different verses surrounding the common chorus but no one has offered a difinitive authorship of the melody.

Subject: RE: Rose of Alabamy
From: arkie
Date: 01 May 99 - 04:52 PM

According to our resident expert, Dr. W. K. McNeil, the writer of Rose of Alabama was one Silas S. Steele. The song was a minstrel show piece written in 1846.

Subject: RE: Rose of Alabamy
From: GUEST,john
Date: 14 Feb 04 - 11:13 PM

where can I find sheet music (piano) for this song?

Subject: RE: Rose of Alabamy
From: LadyJean
Date: 14 Feb 04 - 11:29 PM

I have it on a record, "Songs of the North and South" (Dad was a civil war buff.) I'll bet the Stephen Foster Memorial Library at the University of Pittsburgh would have the music for it.

Subject: RE: Rose of Alabamy
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 14 Feb 04 - 11:35 PM

Rose of Alabama, 1846, Steele, sheet music is in the Levy Collection: THE ROSE OF ALABAMA

Subject: RE: Rose of Alabamy
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 14 Feb 04 - 11:40 PM

Never do get Levy right.
Just use Levy Sheet Music and enter Rose of Alabama in "Search"

Subject: RE: Rose of Alabamy
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 14 Feb 04 - 11:42 PM

How did that get cut off??
Levy Sheet Music

Subject: RE: Rose of Alabamy
From: masato sakurai
Date: 15 Feb 04 - 12:45 AM

Title: The Rose of Alabama (Words Used by Permission of Turner & Fisher).
Composer, Lyricist, Arranger: Words by S.S. Steele. Music na
Publication: Boston: Geo. P. Reed, 17 Tremont Row, 1846.
Form of Composition: strophic with chorus
Instrumentation: piano and voice
First Line: Away from Mississippi's vale, Wid my ole hat dar for a sail
First Line of Chorus: Oh, brown Rosey, De Rose ob Alabama, A sweet tobacco posey
Performer: Sung by A.F. Winnemore & His Band of Serenaders

Subject: RE: Rose of Alabamy
From: masato sakurai
Date: 15 Feb 04 - 12:52 AM

From American Memory:

The rose of Alabama. H. De Marsan, No. 38 Chatham Street, N. Y. [n. d.] (song sheet)

Fantasia and variations on the Ethiopian air "The rose of Alabama," op. 2 / by Theod. Von La Hache (Philadelphia: A. Fiot, 1846).

Subject: RE: Rose of Alabamy
From: masato sakurai
Date: 15 Feb 04 - 01:21 AM

"The Rose of Alabama" lyrics & midi are at Public Domain Music: Music from 1800-1860 (under 1846).

Words by S. S. Steele / Sung by A. F. Winnemore & His Band of Serenaders / Arranged for the Piano Forte. / [Music: anonymous]

Subject: RE: Origin: Rose of Alabamy? / Rose of Alabama
From: GUEST,George
Date: 24 Jun 13 - 03:59 PM

Wasn't this also in the background music in Hang 'Um High?

Subject: RE: Origin: Rose of Alabamy? / Rose of Alabama
From: GUEST,Old Steve
Date: 30 Oct 16 - 01:13 AM

Rose of Alabamy is in reference to the tobacco fields. The rose of Alabama is the tobacco plant

Subject: RE: Origin: Rose of Alabamy? / Rose of Alabama
From: leeneia
Date: 30 Oct 16 - 04:12 PM

The chorus goes:

Cho: Oh brown Rosie,
Rose of Alabamy.
A sweet tobacco posey
Is my Rose of Alabamy.
A sweet tobacco posey
Is my Rose of Alabamy.

Sweet tobacco (Nicotiana alata) is related to the tobacco used for cigarettes, but it is much nicer. It has pretty flowers of various colors, and it smells sweet in the evening. It is a common garden flower in warm areas.

The singer is comparing her to the the flower.

I grew it one year, but the plants were straggly and it needed too much watering.

Subject: RE: Origin: Rose of Alabamy? / Rose of Alabama
From: mkebenn
Date: 31 Oct 16 - 07:40 AM

I've always believed that this song was a thinly veiled love song by a white man to a mixed race female, similar to " The Yellow Rose of Texas". Mike

Subject: RE: Origin: Rose of Alabamy? / Rose of Alabama
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Oct 17 - 01:39 PM

Not an interracial love balkad, something out of the question in 1846. The lyrics are like the original Yellow Rose song. Both are relics of blackface minstrelsy in which a "darky" expresses his love for a lighter skinned maiden of his own race. Unsingable now unless you are into reviving blackface or Confederate reenactment.

Subject: RE: Origin: Rose of Alabamy? / Rose of Alabama
From: leeneia
Date: 12 Oct 17 - 05:38 PM

There's nothing in the song that says she's lighter-skinned. She's called "brown Rosie," and that's all.

If you like the song, change the offending words and snide spellings and sing it. Too much music is being taken away from us all the time.

Subject: RE: Origin: Rose of Alabamy? / Rose of Alabama
From: Lighter
Date: 12 Oct 17 - 06:46 PM

She's a "sweet tobacco posey," because she's the color of a tobacco leaf.

Subject: RE: Origin: Rose of Alabamy? / Rose of Alabama
From: leeneia
Date: 14 Oct 17 - 02:25 PM

No. Sweet tobacco is a fragrant garden flower.

Subject: RE: Origin: Rose of Alabamy? / Rose of Alabama
From: Lighter
Date: 14 Oct 17 - 08:21 PM

It all depends on whether he means a posy of "sweet tobacco" or a sweet "posy of tobacco."

Since this is a humorous minstrel song, my money is on the latter.

Subject: RE: Origin: Rose of Alabamy? / Rose of Alabama
From: GUEST
Date: 21 Apr 18 - 12:55 AM

Yellow Rose of Texas is not originally a minstrel song. It dates back to the Texas War of Independence. The original words were, “She’s the sweetest rose of color this darkey ever knew . . .” There are many legends about the story behind the words...

Subject: RE: Origin: Rose of Alabamy? / Rose of Alabama
From: Lighter
Date: 21 Apr 18 - 09:15 AM

"Legends" is right, most of them recent.

There is no evidence, only repeated speculative claims, that "The Yellow Rose of Texas" dates to 1836 or has anything to do with the Texas War of Independence.

Its first appearance in print was anonymously in the minstrel collection, "Christy's Plantation Melodies" (Phila.: Fisher & Brother, 1851), p.52 (without music). (Wikipedia incorrectly credits the slightly later 2nd edition as the earliest source.)

The first printing of the tune, arranged for the piano by "J.K.," was apparently in 1858.

GUEST is correct about the words. In fact, despite the familiar title, the opening line of the 1851 text is, "There's a yellow girl in Texas."

Mitch Miller and the Gang made the song a pop hit in 1955, making sure there were no racial references.