Origins: Wandering (Early and Late)

Subject: RE: Origins: Wandering (Early and Late)
From: GUEST,Joseph Scott
Date: 01 Jun 17 - 03:33 PM

And as long as we're talking about Sandburg and folk music, I think we should point out that he often seems to have represented folk music pretty faithfully in _Songbag_, e.g. in the song with "them blues" that pianist Henry Parks had heard while living in the Deep South in about 1916. It's a very valuable book from a pure folk-interest standpoint, especially if you've been interested in folk music long enough that you can identify the nuggets.

Sandburg acknowledges in the "Lonesome Road" entry how by the time he heard something it might have been dressed up in fancy clothes. My understanding is that he could hear the big difference between "Wanderin'" as he encountered it and "Boll Weevil," with regard to folkishness, much the same way you and I can. Even though he liked to get cutesy in much of his writing afterwards (sometimes very cutesy), I think he was pretty deep into his hobby music research.

Subject: RE: Origins: Wandering (Early and Late)
From: GUEST,Alan Shaw
Date: 29 Nov 20 - 04:07 PM

I used to like the Josh White version - but I remember he sang "Worked on the railroad" not "Worked in the army".
You don't work in the army, you serve in the army.

Subject: RE: Origins: Wandering (Early and Late)
From: Lighter
Date: 29 Nov 20 - 09:02 PM

Newspaper databases turn up a number of ads for Smith's "Wandering Blues" sheet music in 1917-19.

"Wandering Blues" was published in Dallas.

Surprisingly the only "Enrique Smith" of the period who seems to have made it into the news was "Miss Enrique Smith," a very prominent socialite of Waco, Texas, which is halfway between Dallas and Austin.

Surely it wasn't her...

Subject: RE: Origins: Wandering (Early and Late)
From: Lighter
Date: 29 Nov 20 - 09:10 PM

Enrique won a beautiful baby contest in 1898, when she was three years old.

That would make her 21 in 1916.

No way it was her.

The search goes on.

Subject: RE: Origins: Wandering (Early and Late)
From: Lighter
Date: 29 Nov 20 - 09:21 PM

Hmmm. The Dallas Morning News (Apr. 8, 1911), p. 10, mentions a male "Enrique Smith" as a contestant in a high-school track meet.

So he might have been born about the same time as his namesake (maybe in 1893 or '94?).

So he could have been 24 or 25 in 1916.

Subject: RE: Origins: Wandering (Early and Late)
From: Lighter
Date: 30 Nov 20 - 07:48 AM

It was had to follow Joseph's link, but here is the precise URL for one stanza of Smith's lyrics (the only one?):

http://basinstreet.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Blues/1916.pdf

Smith's lyrics are more sophisticated, it seems to me, than those of "Wanderin'."

Subject: ADD Version: Wandering (Dalhart)
From: GUEST,Joseph Scott
Date: 27 Jun 21 - 04:24 PM

Vernon Dalhart's expansion of the Sandburg "Wanderin'":

http://nadimall.blogspot.com/2016/07/wanderin-vernon-dalhart.html

Wanderin'
(as sung by Vernon Dalhart)

(lyrics posted above by Abby Sale)