Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds

Subject: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: cnd
Date: 19 Feb 16 - 03:25 PM

What's your favorite version of the song "Jack of Diamonds?"

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: gillymor
Date: 19 Feb 16 - 06:10 PM

For me it's Connie Dover hands down. I love this arrangement.

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Feb 16 - 10:14 PM

I prefer SPADES as the suite, proceeded by 10, and followed by Q, J, A.

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: GUEST,HiLo
Date: 20 Feb 16 - 02:16 AM

Thank you Gillymor , I had never heard of Connie Dover til your mention of her. She is really very good and her version is excellent . thanks again.

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: michaelr
Date: 20 Feb 16 - 06:39 PM

Connie Dover is one of America's finest singers, as well as a beautiful and sweet person.

I also quite like Tim O'Brien's version.

And then there's this by Blind Lemon Jefferson - at all related?

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 20 Feb 16 - 07:32 PM

Only ever heard Lonnie Donegan doing it.
He was one of the main reasons I got interested in folk music Ah the days of the teachest bass!

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 21 Feb 16 - 03:51 AM

Lonnie Donegan - no contest!

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 21 Feb 16 - 05:35 AM

My fave-ever version was hearing Barry Dransfield sing it, live, in his sitting room in Hastings, accompanying himself on fiddle. He got a really nice swing into the melody and I thought it was simply brilliant, but could never get him to repeat it. Once of those great Lost Performances, I guess.

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: GUEST
Date: 21 Feb 16 - 10:01 AM

I like Jules Allen's version, but I wish I could find a better recording of it

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: BanjoRay
Date: 21 Feb 16 - 12:42 PM

Tommy Jarrell - none finer.

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: BanjoRay
Date: 21 Feb 16 - 12:48 PM

Jack O'Diamonds AKA Drunken Hiccups by the late Tommy Jarrell of Toast, North Carolina.

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: GUEST,Tunesmith
Date: 22 Feb 16 - 02:17 AM

Lonnie Donegan?
Don't be daft!

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 22 Feb 16 - 10:19 AM

Sorry Tunesmith.

Despite your obvious bias Lonnie, together with Peter, Paul and Mary and others got a hell of a lot of people interested in folk music.
Don't knock it.

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: Sean Belt
Date: 22 Feb 16 - 11:35 AM

I've got to agree with BanjoRay. Tommy Jarrell's version is my favorite.

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: GUEST,Mike Yates
Date: 22 Feb 16 - 11:55 AM

I'm with Ray & Sean on this one. I had the privilege of seeing Tommy Jarrell play this at his home in Toast NC one evening. None better!

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: Brian Peters
Date: 22 Feb 16 - 02:36 PM

Well, the choices so far just go to show how people's tastes can differ. Tim O'Brien played it at Bury a couple of weeks ago, and very good it was too - though I also like Tommy Jarrell's.

Has anyone ever come across the following words to this song (obviously the first two lines are standard)? Cecil Sharp collected them in North Carolina 100 years ago:

I'll tune up my fiddle and rosin my bow
And I'll make myself welcome wherever I go
And if ever I come back any more, it will be in the Spring
To see the waters gliding and the nightingales sing
[low section]
Hush up, Pretty Polly, I'll let you alone
I'll never quite drinking while brandy's so low.

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: gillymor
Date: 22 Feb 16 - 03:05 PM

Brad Leftwich did a fine version as well.

Brian, I've heard lines 3 and 4 used in "One Morning in May" but not in JoD.

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: cnd
Date: 22 Feb 16 - 03:42 PM

The version by Oscar Brand and Erik Darling is quite different from any others I've heard, and focuses much more on the drinking aspect of it. It has verses like "if the ocean was whiskey and I was a duck, I'd swim to the bottom and get one sweet suck" and "It's whiskey, rye whiskey, how I do love thee, you killed my poor daddy, God damn you try me." Of course, that makes sense since their version is on an album called "American Drinking Songs" and called "Rye Whiskey." But it doesn't have your verses, Brian.

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: Joe_F
Date: 22 Feb 16 - 05:53 PM

I may have asked about this on some other thread, but -- what *is* it about the jack of diamonds in particular that makes it a dangerous temptation to (I presume) poker players?

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: cnd
Date: 22 Feb 16 - 09:17 PM

So I can't answer why it's Jack of Diamonds in specific but it was sung by railroadmen who had lost money playing conquian, so Wikipedia tells me, but I can't find anything all that special about Jacks or Diamonds in relation to that game.

According to this card website, "All Jacks correspond with number 11. By some called the number of Evil because it transcended the number of commandments, and did not attain 12, the number of Grace and perfection.... The Jack of Diamonds win their crown through good guardianship of values. Jack of Diamonds is a controversial card. They can be wholly material, highly spiritual, or curios and unaccountable, or a mixture of two. They are aware that hard and stable efforts are a requirement for success. Jack of Diamonds are mentally sharp and clever, and always looking for new enterprises, ventures and opportunities to make their kingdom, but spiritual confusion can lead them to drift through life and live by their wits, usually managing to get by....   Fixation on material matters can lead to a loss of spirituality. Diamonds are believed to be the suit of money, but it is a suit of values - and our values include both - material, spiritual, moral values of human beings."

http://www.sevenreflections.com/cards-of-destiny/cards/jack-of-diamonds/

According to tarrot cards, "It is widely accepted that the Jack of Diamonds' nature is selfish, jealous, unreliable and possibly dishonest. On those lists where his character is not described, this Jack is presented as someone who brings bad news. Two of the entries above present him as a relative of the inquirer's. The meaning that best covers his attributes is that which reads, 'a relative; someone not really reliable, selfish or jealous; bad news'. There are really three meanings here: the card may indicate either a male relative, or someone not very reliable, perhaps selfish or jealous of the querent, or bad news – or more accurately the bearer of bad news. In a reading the card can indicate any one of these three things, and sometimes permutations of the same, as when a male relative is the bearer of bad news."

Additionally, the ten of diamonds is apparently the card of money, and the queen of diamonds is "A fair woman, fond of company and a coquette." So gamblers are naturally constantly between money and women, too.

https://auntietarot.wordpress.com/2012/01/07/playing-cards-diamonds-1/

At least that's what they say.

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: GUEST
Date: 23 Feb 16 - 02:23 AM

l know guys

Kaos Polos

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: Brian Peters
Date: 23 Feb 16 - 04:30 AM

Yes, gillymor - and 'One Morning in May' was apparently in the repertoire of the Watson family, so it was present in the Appalachians. I suppose they were just a couple of floating stanzas that got attached to that version.

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: GUEST,Tunesmith
Date: 23 Feb 16 - 06:20 AM

Regarding Lonnie Donegan!
He certainly inspired a lot of people to take up the guitar.
BUT, I can't take his pseudo-American rip offs seriously.
To say Lonnie's is the best version is just plain daft!

BTW, I - like a number of other posters - love Tommy Jarrell's version.
And, Tommy - unlike Lonnie - is "the real deal".

Subject: RE: Favorite version of Jack of Diamonds
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 23 Feb 16 - 08:48 AM

Tunesmith - I never said Lonnie's version was the best - subjective at best - I said it was the only version I had heard.

His value in attracting people to traditional music would be hard to quantify but must be judged as significant.

Just for the record I never bought any of his recordings - one single a fortnight was the limit of my available expenditure at that time. I did have friends who were more affluent and of course the radio was available even though in our household (gas lit) it came to us via rented cable.