Lyr Add: Yellow Rose of Texas

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: katlaughing
Date: 02 Jan 07 - 01:23 AM

Nice to *see* you, George!

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From:
Date: 02 Jan 07 - 01:19 AM

It was. I just finished reading it.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: katlaughing
Date: 02 Jan 07 - 01:11 AM

There's an interesting write-up about the song HERE. As the author says, "Editor's note: We get a lot of comments on this story, and we are not going to change it to suit individual theories. This is the original story as was published back in the 1980's, and it was based on research conducted then. Research today may change a lot of the facts. We do not know the truth and only present this story for your reading pleasure."

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From:
Date: 02 Jan 07 - 01:00 AM

The DT has two versions in the Database as well as discussion.

Yellow Rose of Texas
Yellow Rose of Texas 2

Lesley Nelson's Contemplator gives an earliest date the tune Yellow Rose of Texas is known to be published
The Session has info on the tune Yellow Rose of Texas, and gives some alternate names.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: Lonesome EJ
Date: 01 Jan 07 - 04:59 PM

Last night, at an Irish Bar in Tulsa OK, I heard this tune sung by an Irish band with completely different lyrics. Did the original melody come from Ireland? Is anyone familiar with an Irish variant of this song?

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: Pooby
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 03:30 PM

Let's not forget the Allan Sherman version:

"Oh I'm Melvin Rose from Texas, my friends all call me Tex
When I live in old New Mexico they used to call me Mex
When I lived in old Kentucky they called me Old Kentuck
I was born in old Shamokin, which is why they call me Melvin Rose."

Poobs

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 05:40 AM

Of course my all time favourite version must be the animated (Bendy rabit etc.,) version with Stan Freberg

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 05:34 AM

I remember this from my schooldays. Another uncredited version.

Oh the Yellow Rose of Texas
And the Man from Laramie
They went to Davy Crockett's house
To have a cup of tea.
The tea was so delicious
They had another cup.
And left poor Davy Crockett
To do the washing up.

(Amazing how these things stick in the mind over the years!)
Nigel

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: masato sakurai
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 04:24 AM

Another edition form Historic American Sheet Music, 1850-1920 (from Duke University):

Yellow rose of Texas. (The Southern musical boquet of favorite songs and ballads; no. 4. 186-)

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: GUEST,Q
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 07:37 PM

Art Thieme, I'm waiting to hear your lyrics!

(Thread creep- should be many good stories about Chicago taxis. In the 1920s,when the night shift got off at the telephone company, taxis, paid for by the company, would be lined up to take the girls home. Or so went the story. A Studs Terkel is needed to provide verification )

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: catspaw49
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 07:05 PM

Gee, and here I thought it was a song about Willie Nelson after the IRS nailed him...."The Fellow Knows His Taxes"

Spaw

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: Art Thieme
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 06:45 PM

This song is about the large staging area at Ohare Field in Chicago where hundreds of cabs wait to be sent to the various air terminals---a few at a time. Originally it was called "The Yellow Rows Of Taxis".

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: GUEST,Q
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 06:22 PM

The little Marsan broadside is unusual in pointing to the original publisher, Firth and Pond, as the source for the music. Very few give any information.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: masato sakurai
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 06:11 PM

Correction:

Copies: Harding B 18(748)   
Ballads: 1. The yellow rose of Texas ("There's a yellow rose in Texas that I am going to see ...")

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: JedMarum
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 06:09 PM

It is true that US historians discredited the Santa Anna link with Emily, (the Yellow Rose) because no creditable US documents contained first accounts of her being present at the battle of San Jacinto - but Mexican documents do detail first hand witness that Emily was indeed on the battle field with Santa Anna and had been his "guest' for some days - don't be too quick to discount the story.

What is commonly believed to be the original manuscript for this song is in a museum/library in Austin.

I'll go locate more info ...

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: masato sakurai
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 06:08 PM

From the Bodleian Library collection:

Printer: De Marsan, H. (New York, N.Y.)
Date: c.1860
    Imprint: H. De Marsan, Publisher, 60 Chatham Street, New-York
    Illus. Ballads on sheet: 1
    Note: Border: The fountain.   
Copies: Ballads: 1. The yellow rose of Texas ("There's a yellow rose in Texas that I am going to see ...")

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: masato sakurai
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 05:57 PM

From the Levy collection:

Title: The Yellow Rose of Texas. Song & Chorus.
Composer, Lyricist, Arranger: Composed and Arranged Expressly for Charles H. Brown by J.K.
J. K. Publication: New York: Firth, Pond, & Co., 547 Broadway, 1858.
Form of Composition: strophic with chorus
Instrumentation: piano and voice
First Line: There's a yellow rose in Texas that I am going to see, No other 'darkey knows her, no darkey only me
First Line of Chorus: She's the sweetest rose of color this darkey ever knew
Engraver, Lithographer, Artist: Quidor, Engvr.
Plate Number: 4449
Subject: Courtship & love
Subject: Pride
Call No.: Box: 016 Item: 147

~Masato

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: MMario
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 04:22 PM

Q - for links to levy you can use the url of the cover of the particular piece...

just an fyi - no sense everyone having to go through the same discovery process of how to link into Levy

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: curmudgeon
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 04:19 PM

Skip Gorman sings, and has recorded, a really fine rendition of this song. Can't, right now, lay my hands on it -- Tom

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: GUEST,Q
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 04:12 PM

Levy?? Click on "new search" box and type in yellow rose in top blank box.

Subject: Lyr Add: THE YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
From: GUEST,Q
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 04:05 PM

I can find no thread devoted to this song. The lyrics below are close to the version (unnumbered in the DT) but the original "darkey" is substituted for the "soldier" of the DT. "Some" questions are answered here, and I hope other answers will be found.
The version here is from the original sheet music printed by Firth and Pond, New York, 1858, by "J. K."

THE YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS

1. There's a yellow rose in Texas that I am going to see.
No other darkey knows her, no darkey only me;
She cried so when I left her, it like to broke my heart,
And if I ever find her we never more will part.

CHORUS: She's the sweetest rose of color this darkey ever knew.
Her eyes are bright as diamonds; they sparkle like the dew.
You may talk about your Dearest May and sing of Rosa Lee,
But the yellow rose of Texas beats the belles of Tennessee.

2. Where the Rio Grande is flowing, and the starry skies are bright,
She walks along the river in the quiet summer night;
She thinks if I remember, when we parted long ago,
I promis'd to come back again, and not to leave her so.

3. Oh! now I'm going to find her, for my heart is full of woe,
And we'll sing the song together, that we sung so long ago;
We'll play the banjo gaily, and we'll sing the songs of yore,
And the yellow rose of Texas shall be mine for evermore.

(1) sic. The song is believed to have a minstrel origin. Cox, "Folk-Songs of the South," notes for song #128, refers to "Christy's Plantation Melodies No. 2," p. 52; "The Christy Minstrels Song Book (London) II, 84 (with music) and others. "J. K." has never been identified.
The song was popular during the Civil War. It is included in a little volume called "Songs of Love and Liberty," by "a North Carolina Lady," 1864, p. 35, same words as the sheet music.

The Traditional Ballad Index CUFresno repeats the tale (nonsense) told by James "Sparky" Rucker that the yellow Rose was Santa Anna's girl friend; others added to the story later, saying that she told Santa Anna's plans to the Texans, was a prostitute, etc. All of these stories seem to be modern. there is no evidence that the song existed at the time of the Mexican War, or during the Texas struggle.

"Songs of Love and Liberty," in the North Carolina series, "Documenting the American South: Yellow Rose of Texas
Levy Colection: THE YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS
Also see thread 15359: Why Yellow
Thread 23549" yellow rose rhythm

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For reference and comparison, here are the entries from the Digital Tradition and the Traditional Ballad Index.
-Joe Offer-

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THE YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS

There's a yellow rose in Texas that I am going to see,
No other soldier knows her, no soldier only me;
She cried so when I left her, it like to broke my heart
And if I ever find her, we never more will part.

Cho: She's the sweetest rose of color this soldier ever knew,
Her eyes are bright like diamonds, they sparkle like the dew
You may talk about your dearest May and sing of Rosa Lee,
But the Yellow Rose of Texas is the only girl for me.

When the Rio Grande is flowing, and the starry skies are bright
She walks along the river in the quiet summer night
She thinks if I remember, when we parted long ago,
I promised to come back again and not to leave her so

Oh, now I'm going to find her, for my heart is full of woe
And we'll sing the song together, that we sang so long ago
We'll play the banjo gaily, and we'll sing the songs of yore,
And the Yellow Rose of Texas shall be mine forevermore.

Note: Tinsley, in He Was Singing This Song, states that the original Yellow Rose
was an indentured servant, the "high yellow" Emily Morgan, who kept Santa Ana
dallying in lascivious torment so long that his leaderless men lost the Battle
of San Jacinto on April 21, 1836. The song was published only in the late
1850s by Firth, Pond and Co., and credited vaguely to "J.K.", according to
Spaeth. EC

@love @America @Civil @army
filename[ YELLOWTX
TUNE FILE: YELLOWTX
CLICK TO PLAY
DC

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Yellow Rose of Texas, The

DESCRIPTION: The singer is going to see his "Yellow Rose" -- "The sweetest rose of color this (darkey) ever knew; Her eyes are bright as diamonds; They sparkle like the dew." He promises that "if I ever find her, we never more will part."
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1858
KEYWORDS: love courting separation reunion
FOUND IN: US
REFERENCES (7 citations):
RJackson-19CPop, pp. 253-257, "The Yellow Rose of Texas" (1 text, 1 tune)
Silber-CivWar, pp. 28-29, "The Yellow Rose of Texas" (1 text, 1 tune)
Gilbert, pp. 20-21, "The Yellow Rose of Texas" (1 text)
Silber-FSWB, p. 272, "The Yellow Rose Of Texas" (1 text)
JHCox 128, "The Yellow Rose of Texas" (1 text)
Fuld-WFM, p. 661+, "The Yellow Rose of Texas"
DT, YELLOWTX*
RECORDINGS:
New Lost City Ramblers, "Yellow Rose of Texas" [instrumental] (on NLCR07)
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "The Yellow Rose of Taegu" (tune)
SAME TUNE:
The Yellow Rose of Taegu (File: EM410)
Song of the Texas Rangers (NOT Laws A8; War Songs and Poems of the Southern Confederacy, pp. 175-176)
Notes: Extremely popular with Southern troops in the Civil War, and frequently parodied, the first known publication of this piece occurred in 1858 (published by William A. Pond). That version appears to be a minstrel piece; in it, both lovers are "darkeys." The only attribution is to "J.K.," who was and still remains unknown.
It is interesting that, in the Civil War, the troops often sang, "She's the sweetest rose of color this SOLDIER (or, later, FELLOW) ever knew." This would hardly have been acceptable to the Southern gentry; it was miscegenation. - RBW
James "Sparky" Rucker places this song in the period of the Mexican War, stating that the "Yellow Rose" was Santa Anna's mulatto (American) girlfriend, who stole his battle plans before the battle of San Jacinto and delivered them to the American army. - PJS
File: RJ19253

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Yellow Rose of Taegu, The

DESCRIPTION: A reluctant soldier meets the Yellow Rose of Taegu, a good two-dollar whore, who makes him forget the perils of war.
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE:
KEYWORDS: bawdy sex soldier whore
FOUND IN: US
REFERENCES (2 citations):
Cray, pp. 410-412, "The Yellow Rose of Taegu" (1 text, 1 tune)
DT, YLLOWTX4*
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Yellow Rose of Texas" (tune)
File: EM410

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