Lyr/Chords Req: Walking Boss (from Clarence Ashley

Subject: Help ! Lyrics & Chds to Walkin Boss
From: mice
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 11:46 AM

Hello All,

This old traditional song which I think is called "Walkin Boss " is really inspiring me to learn it. Could you intelligent folk historians help me on this songs lyrics, chords, history, antedote's etc., .Thanks so much.

Subject: RE: Help ! Lyrics & Chds to Walkin Boss
From: Amos
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 11:55 AM

See if either of these links help. found by plugging "Walking Boss" into a Google search engine:

 Skookum Ryan, the Walking Boss (FRAGMENT) (JOE HILL) (c. 1912)

Louis Moreau, a Wobbly "camp delegate" who helped organize the construction workers [of the
       Canadian Northern Railroad Company in British Columbia, 1912]... remembers that Joe Hill... appeared in
       the strikers' camp in Yale, British Columbia.... Moreau remembers seeing Joe Hill often in the office of the
       Yale strike secretary writing songs. "Where The River Fraser Flows" was written during the first few
       days Hill was in the camp....

       Another song, "Skookum Ryan, the Walking Boss," was very popular and consisted of five or six stanzas
       of which Moreau remembers one....

Gibbs M. Smith, Labor Martyr Joe Hill, New York, NY, 1969, pp. 24-25.
 
 

Lyrics (one stanza) as remembered by Moreau, reprinted ibid.
 
 

       Skookum Ryan the Walking Boss
       Came tearing down the line,
       Says he, "You dirty loafers take your coats off
       Or go and get your time."

-- Folk Music Index - Walk to Walx
Walking Boss
              Rm - Coo Coo [Bird]
         1.Ashley, Clarence (Thomas/Tom)). Old-Time Music at Clarence Ashley's, Part 2, Folkways FA 2359,
              LP (1963), cut# 7
         2.New Lost City Ramblers. Old-Time String Band Songbook, Oak, Bk (1964/1976), p 96
         3.Warner, Jeff; and Jeff Davis. Days of Forty Nine, Minstrel JD-206, LP (1977), cut#A.08

Subject: RE: Help ! Lyrics & Chds to Walkin Boss
From: wysiwyg
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 11:59 AM

Hmmmmm. Iddinnit on one of my Doc Watson albums, and iddinnit a completely different version? Wish the turntable was working better.... Can't quite get ahold of the words...

~S~

Subject: RE: Help ! Lyrics & Chds to Walkin Boss
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 02:42 PM

This sounds a good one - keep looking, and for the Joe Hill version. Here's a link to a website about Joe Hill, but it hasn't got that one.

But "Chds?" - I thought this was going to be yet another thread about vote-rigging! (Seen Salman Rushdie's Grinch version of that, which I posted? I think Joe Hill would have liked it.)

Subject: Lyr Add: WALKING BOSS (from Clarence Ashley)
From: BanjoRay
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 07:59 PM

The Clarence Ashley version has the words:

chorus:
Walkin' boss, walkin' boss, walkin' boss, well I don't belong to you
I belong, I belong, I belong to that steel drivin' crew

Work one day (x3) then lay down in a shanty too

chorus

Well I asked that boss for a job, just a job, he said son, what can you do?
I can pull a jack, line a track, line a track, I can pick and shovel too

Chorus

It sounds like he plays it on the banjo in mountain minor tuning gDGCD. Its quite easy to follow the tune in clawhammer.
Cheers
Ray

Subject: RE: Help ! Lyrics & Chds to Walkin Boss
From: wysiwyg
Date: 06 Jan 01 - 10:16 PM

Yup, that's the Doc Watson one I remember.

~S~

Subject: RE: Help ! Lyrics & Chds to Walkin Boss
From: Lepus Rex
Date: 07 Jan 01 - 09:53 AM

I think that's the same version Meat Puppets did, too. ;)

---Lepus Rex

Subject: RE: Help ! Lyrics & Chds to Walkin Boss
From: rush
Date: 08 Jan 01 - 01:54 PM

Thanks Everyone !

Subject: RE: Lyr/Chords Req: Walking Boss
From: GUEST,Ian
Date: 13 Apr 10 - 01:03 PM

Garcia and Grisman do my favorite version. The main chords are Dm and C, with lots of walk ups and downs. My favorite song to play right now. Enjoy!!

Subject: RE: Lyr/Chords Req: Walking Boss (from Clarence Ashley
From: GUEST
Date: 21 Mar 12 - 01:48 PM

Hey, there! Just went back and listened to Tom Ashley. There's one subtle, but important, difference to be made in the lyrics. The first verse should read:

"Work one day, work one day, just a day….then go lay in a shanty (for) two"

Meaning, since I'm cool, I work one day, "just one day"....and go lay down for two days. Then go to work a day, then be off for two......'cause I'm cool like dat.....& the boss cain't say 'sheet"....

Sule Greg Wilson

Thinking about it, Ashley pro'ly heard that song sung, then put it on the banjo his own way.....

PS: here's a new verse:

I can kick some ass, 'cause I'm full o' brass, don't take no sass
'Specially off the likes of you!



www.sulegregwilson.com