21 “Frankie” by Mississippi John Hurt

Mississippi John Hurt’s World

From all the Anthology artists, only a few were rediscovered during the Folk revival. Some were dead, some were unable to play music anymore, but some had a second career, thanks to the Anthology and the work of folk and blues entusiasts who looked after them and gave them a chance to perform and record again. Furry Lewis, Clarence Ashley and Dock Boggs notably, were took out of their hometowns and working life to make public performances all over the country and make new records. To all of them, their musical career had stopped during the Depression and couldn’t believe people had any interest about records they have made some 30 years ago. The most surprised of them all was Mississippi John Hurt, who by chance had recorded a few 78 rpm records at the end of the 1920’s in Memphis and New York, but apart from that, spent all his life working in the farms and fields around his hometown of Avalon, Mississippi. He was a kind of “back porch” musician, playing the guitar and singing mostly to entertain his family and neighbours, or maybe for a square dance he would accompany a fiddle player but had no ambition to make a career or something like that and it reflects in his music and the songs of his repertoire. Most of it was pre-blues black folk ballads and spirituals, all played with a ragtime feel, thanks to his alternating bass and gentle and melodic picking on the guitar. He was not a “Blues” singer in the usual sense but more of a “songster”, and his music reflects a time  and style of country black music that precedes the “Blues” craze of the 1920’s, when most of the recorded black guitar singers were supposed to sing “Blues” mostly because that was what the record companies wanted to sell to the public.

We’re lucky that on his recording session in New York in the 1920’s, John Hurt sang a song he made about “Avalon, my hometown…” that reflect his longing for home as he was away for the first time, finding himself so displaced and lonely in the big city. Thanks to this song, Tom Hoskins, a young Blues enthousiast who discovered Hurt’s music like many others on the Anthology in the 1960’s, could manage to find him in 1963 in Avalon, still farming and working hard to feed his many children and grand-children. From then until his death in 1967, he became a much-loved figure of the Blues and Folk scene, charming everyone with his gentle manners and his delicate songs. He was the perfect “grandfather” of the Folk Revival, the “patriarch of the hippies” as someone called him. During these 4 years, he made numerous public performances at festivals and coffee shops, recorded many new albums and influenced many youngsters to pick the guitar in his style, a legacy that is still alive today, more than 40 years after his death (just take a look on Youtube and see how many acoustic guitarists try to recreate his arrangements).

-There are numerous places on the web where you can read about him but this page is a good place  to start, giving a discography and a list of good links.

-I offer you now the 13 tracks John Hurt recorded in the 1920’s and will later make a compilation of my personnal favorite performances from the 1960’s that i’ll post when we get to his “Spike Driver Blues” at the end of the Anthology.

TRACK LIST

1.Aint’ no tellin’

2.Stack O’Lee Blues

3.Candy Man Blues

4.Spike Driver Blues

5.Avalon Blues

6.Louis Collins

7.Frankie

8.Big Leg Blues

9.Nobody’s Dirty Business

10.Got the Blues,can’t be satisfied

11.Blessed be the Name

12.Blue Harvest Blues

13.Praying on the old camp ground

DOWNLOAD HERE

(This download will be available only for a short period of time, as MJH records are easily available elsewhere, so try to support the small record companies like Yazoo and Rounder records by buying their reissues, with great liner notes and photographs)

 

 

 

 

 

-You can see amazing footage of MJH playing and talking on a DVD compiling two Pete Seeger’s Rainbow Quest shows of the 1960’s issued by Shanachie.

See one excerpt here:

Here’s a short one shot during the Newport Folk Festival

You really have to see him play and talk to realize what a sweet human being he was…

-MJH was the first Anthology artist that i listened, long before i discovered the Anthology itself and like many others, was captivated by his guitar playing and did my best to learn it. Stefan Grossman was a precious help during those years i learned to pick the “Country Blues” on the guitar with his instructional books and later on videos (most of it is available on dvd now). Have a visit to his Guitar Worshop’s website.

The Frankie Variations

“NEGRO SHOT BY WOMAN“
Allen Britt, colored, was shot and badly wounded shortly after 2 o’clock yesterday morning by Frankie Baker, also colored. The shooting occurred in Britt’s room at 212 Targee Street, and was the culmination of a quarrel. The woman claimed that Britt had been paying attentions to another woman. The bullet entered Britt’s abdomen, penetrating the intestines. The woman escaped after the shooting.”

 - St Louis Globe-Democrat, October 16, 1899.

With “Frankie and Johnny” (the most usual name of the song) we have a fine example of a folk song that entered the world of popular music via writers and composers of Tin Pan Alley (and later via Hollywood movies) who reshaped the old song and made a new version that became “the” version that everybody sang, included folksingers. How old and from which event came the original “Frankie and Albert” (The change to Johnny as the man’s name was made by Tin Pan Alley writers. Johnny sounded more good for them than Albert) was well debated over the years between scholars and folk music writers. Some said it goes back as far as the Civil War but the first printed versions were all from the early 20th century. The original ballad was of course  inspired  by the story of Frankie Baker, a young black girl who killed her lover Allen “Al” Britt in St-Louis in 1899 because he was flirting with another girl, Alice Pryor (it’s easy to see how “Al Britt” became  ”Albert”, less for the girl’s name, who becomes Nellie Blye or Alice Frye, etc…) But an older version could have derived from a 1832 famous murder case, the murdering of Charles Silver by her wife Frances. Murder ballads sometimes are being changed in the course of time to fit a new event, to something people could relate more easily. It is said that soon after Frankie Baker got arrested for the murder of her lover, people started to “sing the news” in the streets, selling printed ballads about the affair. The first version of the song was called simply “Frankie killed Allen” and was composed by Bill Dooley a St.Louis pianist. Like the 5 dollar Stetson hat in the “Stackolee” ballad, the song displays some little details, real or invented, that hit the imagination of the listeners. Almost every version tells about a “hundred dollar suit of clothes” that Frankie bought to her man, her 44 gun hidden in her clothes, how many bullets she shot at him, the sound of the shot gun (Root toot toot) and so on…And of course, the leitmotiv phrase of the song “He was her man but he done her wrong”. Like in the traditionnal english ballads, it’s the sum of all this little details that makes the story memorized by the singers,and keep the old story alive, as if every singer who sing them can live the events once again. In the beginning it was popular mostly with afro-americans in the South but whites learned it soon from recordings of the popular Tin Pan Alley’s versions, except maybe for appalachian musicians who all heard black folk music and sang their own version of the song which is a bit different in the melody, usually under the name “Frankie Baker” (Listen to Tommy Jarrell, Fred Cockerham,Louise Foreacre and the Virginia Mountain Boys on my compilation, their versions are quite similar). The popularity of the song never decreased and became the subject of theater plays, movies, books. The universal themes of love, betrayal and murder coupled with a simple Blues structure, catchy words and melody  made it the most common folk song played by american musicians and singers in the 20th century. Over the years it was shared by jazz players, rock n’roll teenage bands, folk singers, country and hilbilly musicians, Bluesmen, lounge singers. If there ever was a song that is public domain, this is it…

-First of all, you have to read the excellent essay by Paul Slade, which tells us in details about the life of Frankie Baker and how the popularity of the song followed her all her life. He gives us also a detailed filmography of all the movies inspired by the song.(Read also his “Stackolee” essay)

-You can go to this Wikipedia page to read more in detail about the song and also here for a discography and 10 different lyrics versions.

-I compiled for you 60 variations, presenting all the different musical genres that used the song. I restricted myself to versions i really loved or thought as important, of course there are many more and i maybe forgot to include “your” favorite version. If so, tell me about it in the comments… (The different categories are just guidelines and many tracks could have fit in more than one genre)

Part 1:Blues

1.Frankie And Albert – First Half, Lead Belly, from “Leadbelly Vol. 1 1939-1940″

2.Frankie And Albert – Completion, Lead Belly, from “Leadbelly Vol. 1 1939-1940″

3.Frankie & Albert, Charley Patton, from “Complete Recordings: 1929-1934″ 

4.Frankie And Albert (Cooney And Delia),Booker T. Sapps & Roger Matthews, from “Field Recordings Vol. 7: Florida (1935-1936)”

5.Frankie And Johnny (The Courtroom Scene), Whistlin’ Alex Moore, from “Whistlin’ Alex Moore (1929-1951)”

6.Frankie And Johnny (The Shooting Scene), Whistlin’ Alex Moore, from “Whistlin’ Alex Moore (1929-1951)”

7.Frankie And Johnny, J. Wilson, from “Field Recordings Vol. 1: Virginia (1936-1941)”

8.Frankie And Albert, Jewell Long, from “Rural Blues Vol. 2 (1951-1962)”

9.Frankie and Albert, Mance Lipscomb, from “Captain, Captain!”

10.Frankie And Albert, Joe Callicot, from “Ain’t A Gonna Lie To You”

11.Frankie and Johnny, John Jackson, from “The Harry Smith Connection: A Live Tribute to the Anthology” 

12.Frankie and Johnny, Big Bill Broonzy, from “Classic African American Ballads”

13.Frankie And Johnnie, Furry Lewis, from “Shake ‘Em On Down”

14.Frankie & Johnny, Patent Medicine, from “Songbook, Vol. 4″

15.Frankie and Johnny, Toby Walker, from “Just Rolled In”

16.Frankie and Albert, Mississippi John Hurt, from “Friends Of Old Time Music” 

DOWNLOAD HERE

Part 2: Country, Old-time, Folk

1.Frankie, Dykes Magic City Trio, from ”My Rough and Rowdy Ways, Vol. 1″

2.Frankie And Johnnie, Jimmie Rodgers, from ”Recordings 1927 – 1933″

3.Frankie Dean, Darby & Tarlton, from ”Complete Recordings” 

4.Frankie and Johnny, Pete Seeger, from “American Favorite Ballads,  Vol. 1″

5.Leaving Home (Frankie and Johnny), The New Lost City Ramblers, from “The Early Years, 1958-1962″

6.Frankie Baker ,Tommy Jarrell, Oscar Jenkins and Fred Cockerham, from “ Stay All Night…and Don’t Go Home”

7.Frankie and Albert, Rolf Cahn and Eric Von Schmidt, from ”Rolf Cahn and Eric Von Schmidt”

8.Frankie And Johnnie, Roscoe Holcomb, from ”An Untamed Sense Of Control (1961 – 1973)”

9.Frankie Was a Good Girl,Louise Foreacre, from ”The Stoneman Family – Sutphin, Foreacre, and Dickens”

10.Little Frankie Baker, The Virginia Mountain Boys, from ”The Virginia Mountain Boys, Vol. 2: Bluegrass String Band”

11.Frankie and Johnny, Michael Bloomfield, from ”The Best Of Michael Bloomfield”

12.Frankie and Johnny,Alice Stuart, from ”All the Good Times”                                        

13.Frankie’s Blues, Dave Van Ronk, from ”Just Dave Van Ronk”

14.Frankie, Paul Clayton, from ”Folksongs and Ballads of Virginia”

15.Frankie And Johnny ,Doc Watson And David Grisman, from ”Doc And Dawg”

16.Frankie & Johnny,Harvey Reid, from “ The Autoharp Album”

17.Frankie And Johnny, Mike Auldridge, Bob Brozman And David Grisman, from ”Tone Poems Iii”

18.Frankie & Albert, Bob Dylan, from ”Good As I Been To You”

DOWNLOAD HERE

Part 3:Jazz

1.Frankie And Johnny,  Fate Marable’s Society Syncopators, from ”Breaking Out Of New Orleans”

2.Frankie And Johnny, Isham Jones Orch., from ”Early Jazz 1917-1923″

3.Frankie Blues,  Hazel Meyers, from ”Edna Hicks – Hazel Meyers – Laura Smith Vol. 2 (1923-1927)”

4.Frankie And Johnny, King Oliver, from ”King Oliver And His Orchestra 1929-1930″

5.Frankie And Johnny,  Duke Ellington and His Rhythm, from ”Une Anthologie 1928-1954″

6.Frankie and Johnny, Ethel Waters, from “Ethel Waters 1929 -1939″

7.Frankie And Johnnie Boogie, Memphis Slim, from ”The Bluesville Years Volume 12: Jump, Jumpin’ The Blues”

8.Frankie And Johnny, Benny Goodman, from ”How High The Moon”

9.Frankie & Johnny, Louis Armstrong, from ”The Best Of Louis Armstrong”

10.Frankie And Johnny Fantasy, Erroll Garner, from ”Complete Jazz Series 1946 – 1947″

11.Frankie And Johnny, Gigi Gryce, from “The Hap’nin’s”

12.Frankie And Johnny,David Hughes, Sally Ann Howes & The Original London Cast, from “ Mervyn Nelson’s ‘The Jazz Train’”

DOWNLOAD HERE

Part 4:Popular music,Skiffle, Rock n’Roll, Soul, etc…

1.Frankie And Johnny, Frank Crumit, from “The Gay Caballero”

2.Frankie and Johnny, Riley Puckett, from “ There’s a Hard Time Coming”

3.Frankie And Johnny Blues, Al Bowlly feat. Ella Logan, from “The Magic That Is Al Bowlly”

4.Frankie And Johnny, Burl Ives, from ”Songs From Rock Candy Mountain”

5.Frankie & Johnny, Lonnie Donegan, from ”I Shall Not Be Moved”

6.The New Frankie And Johnnie,The Innsiders, from ”The Way We Were”

7.Frankie & Johnnie, Bob Vidone & The Rhythm Rockers, from ”The Raging Teens, Vol. 4″

8.Frankie and Johnnie ,Jerry Lee Lewis, from ”Sun Recordings, vol. 3″

9.Frankie And Johnnie, Johnny Horton, from “The Louisiana Hayride Archives 1″

10.Frankie and Johnny, Charlie Feathers, from ”Sun Recordings”

11.Frankie’s Man, Johnny Cash, from ”The Fabulous Johnny Cash”

12.Frankie and Johnny ,Elvis Presley, from ”Elvis At the Movies” 

13.Frankie And Johnny ,Lena Horne, from  ”The Irrespressible Lena Horne”

14.Frankie & Johnny, Stevie Wonder, from “Early Classics”

15.Frankie and Johnny, Sam Cooke, from “The legendary Sam Cooke”

DOWNLOAD HERE

 

 

 

 

 

-Hear a recitation of a long version of the Frankie and Johnny ballad:

 

 

 

 

20 “White House Blues” by Charlie Poole & The North Carolina Ramblers

Charlie Poole’s World

From all the pionneer “hilbilly” musicians and singers  whose recordings in the twenties and thirties established the roots of American country and folk music, Charlie Poole is the most well remembered and his legacy on further developements of the music is important. With his band, The North carolina Ramblers, they took the best of the country and the city popular music of their time and blend it together in an unique style that influenced many others back then and ever since. in their recordings, you can hear echoes of rural string band music, Tin Pan Alley popular songs, “coon songs” of the ministrel shows, Irish accents, melted in a tight combination of fiddle-guitar-banjo with Poole’s strong vocals over it. That plus his dexterity on the banjo, played in a pre-Earl Scruggs three-finger style, made their music very unique. Certainly, Poole’s reputation as a hard-living, hard-drinking man and his prematury death at age 39 helped also to forge his “legend”.

-The best way to enter “Charlie Poole’s world” is by buying the excellent box-set “You ain’t talkin to me-Charlie Poole and the roots of country music” issued by Columbia-Legacy a few years ago. In addition to Charlie Poole’s best recordings, are featured many other recordings who influenced his music and other versions of Poole’s records by other string bands. The liner notes by Henry Sapoznik are excellent and the packaging is very cool. (Robert Crumb did the artwork). You can have a glimpse of it here. 

-On this page, read Charlie Poole’s biography

-And here, you’ll have the lyrics for many Poole’s songs.

-I compiled 25 tracks that i love selected from the JSP box-set reissue of Poole’s complete recordings that i own. But i plan to buy also  the box-set descibed above because from what i heard, the sound is much better than on the JSP reissue and it offers also many rare records not available anywhere.

-TRACK LIST

1.The Girl I Left In Sunny Tennessee

2.I’m The Man That Rode The Mule Around The World

3.Can I Sleep In Your Barn Tonight Mister

4.Don’t Let Your Deal Go Down Blues

5.Goodbye Booze

6.Budded Rose

7.There’ll Come A Time

8.White House Blues

9.The Highwayman

10.Hungry Hash House

11.If I Lose, I Don’t Care

12.You Ain’t Talkin’ To Me

13.Falling By The Wayside

14.Take A Drink On Me

15.George Collins

16.Ramblin’ Blues

17.Shootin’ Creek

18.Bill Mason

19.Baltimore Fire

20.Sweet Sunny South

21.He Rambled

22.Tennessee Blues

23.If The River Was Whiskey

24.Goodbye Sweet Liza Jane

25.Milwaukee Blues

DOWNLOAD HERE

The White House Blues Variations

After “Charles Giteau” here’s another folk ballad that deals with the assassination of a president, this time, William McKinley, 25th president of the United States, killed by Leon Czolgosz, an anarchist, in 1901. For the details of this event, go here. It seems that the ballad originated with afro-americans “songsters” and, like “Stackalee”, was a kind of proto-Blues with a melody and a verse structure very alike another murder Blues ballad, “Delia’s gone”. In fact, all this songs, Delia, White House Blues, The Cannon Ball, Railroad Bill, even Stackalee and Frankie had very similar melodies in their primary forms, as they entered the oral tradition at the same time, the turn of the century and were all associated with black singers. Later, white musicians began to take those songs in their repertoire, like White House Blues, who became, thanks to Bill Monroe, a bluegrass standard.

-You can go here, to read more about the sources of this song.

-in his book “Long Steel Rail”, Norm Cohen tells about the writer D.H Lawrence, who used to sing a version of “White House Blues”. A friend of Lawrence recalled that in 1915, as he was singing several Negro Spirituals, he also “…set our brains jingling with an american ballad on the murder of president McKinley with words of brutal jocularity sung to an air of of lilting sweetness…”

-A few words on my selected tracks: “Zolgotz” is the title that Bascom Lamar Lunsford gave to his version of “White House Blues”, refering to the name of the murderer. He recorded this track for the Library of Congress in 1949. The New Lost City Ramblers’s version is in fact a parody that was written during the Depression and mock President Hoover. Ernest Stoneman’s version is titled “Road to Whashington” and sounds a lot like the Charlie Poole’s version. He recorded the song twice, the first version being called “Unlucky road to Whashington”. The Greenbriar Boys’s version was learned from a Riley Puckett record. Peter Stampfel of The Holy Modal Rounders does a unique performance in his unique weird string-band style. On the wonderful website “Digital Library of Appalachia” i was happy to find two afro-american versions of the song, bringing it to his roots. One is by banjo player Big Sweet Lewis Hairston with Leonard Bowles on fiddle ( this is really black string-band music at his best), the other one by Howard Twine on the electric guitar. British guitarist John Renbourn made a really nice version of the song, turning it into an introspective ballad with nice minor chords on the guitar. I’ve included also two versions of “Cannon Ball Blues” by The Carter Family, as the melody and the verses are strongly related. The first one was sung by A.P Carter and the other was sung by Maybelle during a “Friends of old-time music” concert in the sixties.

-TRACK LIST:

1.Zolgotz ,Bascom Lamar Lunford, from “Songs and Ballads of American History and of the Assassination of Presidents”

2.White House Blues, Big Sweet Lewis Hairston & Leonard Bowles, from Digital Library of Appalachia

3.The Road To Washington, Ernest V. Stoneman, from “The Unsung Father Of Country Music”

4.The Cannon Ball,The Carter Family , from a Jsp box set

5.White House Blues, Tom, Brad & Alice, from “Carve That Possum”

6.White House Blues, Bill Monroe and His Bluegrass Boys, from “Live Recordings 1956-1969: Off the Record Volume 1″

7.McKinley , The Greenbriar Boys, from “Best of the Vanguard Years” 

8.White House Blues, John Renbourn, from “Faro Annie”

9.White House Blues, New Lost City Ramblers, from “Songs From The Depression”

10.White House Blues, Janice Trail, from “Digital Library of Appalachia”

11.New White House Blues,Peter Stampfel, from “The Jig Is Up”

12.White House Blues, Howard Twine, from “Digital Library of Appalachia”

13.He’s Solid Gone, Maybelle Carter, from “Friends Of Old Time Music “

14.White House Blues, Haywood Blevins, from Digital Library of Appalachia

DOWNLOAD HERE

19 “Stackalee” by Frank Hutchison

Frank Hutchison’s World

“Frank Hutchison was born 1897 in Raleigh County, West Virginia; some sources quote 20th March 1897 as his date of birth. Soon after 1897 the Hutchison family moved to Logan County, West Virginia, a location commemorated by Hutchison’s classic guitar solo Logan County Blues. Prior to his musical and recording career Frank Hutchison had worked as a miner and according to a fellow Logan County musician, had a limp – one assumes this may have been due to an accident while working in the mines. He also worked at times as a cook, carpenter and general handyman. Photos show a serious looking man but by all accounts he was very friendly and an outgoing character. According to Ernest Stoneman, Hutchison was ”a big red-headed Irishman”, one who evidently had plenty of fun in him.

With regard to Hutchison’s contributions to the field of early country music (or if you prefer the term otm), it has to be said he was not only an innovative while country blues man but also someone who had a few ‘extra cards up his sleeve’ as compared to some of his contemporaries. Apart from his distinctive voice, albeit a trifle rough one, Frank Hutchison’s guitar playing was innovative, particularly in his use of the slide guitar on some of his recordings.
In September 1926 he travelled to New York to make his first recordings for the Okeh company with whom he would remain for his three-year recording career. The two sides he cut were made using the acoustic method of recording, as distinct from the electrical process that would eventually consign the earlier method to the history books. In fact it appears that when Hutchison re-recorded these two numbers they may have been the first Okeh issues to use the then new electrical recording system.
It seems obvious that the label must have been satisfied with the sales of his initial recordings because Frank Hutchison was called back for a 1927 date that provided nine fine performances. A two-day session in April produced five numbers, including the re-makes of Hutchison’s first two sides. Apart from them, two items are worthy of mention; The Last Scene of The Titanic is, as a song, a unique version about the Titanic disaster; an event that had occured fifteen years earlier but was still very much in the mind of the general public and record buyers. Hutchison’s version difters from all the many other ‘Titanic’ songs recorded by both black and white performers. The other piece of interest is Logan County Blues, a variation on the tune Spanish Fandango; it is played in open tuning and is a Hutchison ‘piece-de-resistance’. His picking makes the listener think it is a simple guitar solo – any would-be guitar player will tell you otherwise!
Having cut so many sides in 1927 it is perhaps not surprising that nearly eighteen months would elapse before he returned to the Okeh studios, once again for a two-day stint. On the first day Hutchison was in the company of fiddler Sherman Lawson; according to Lawson, Okeh had asked Hutchinson to bring along a fiddler player as they thought he was running low on material. The presence of Lawson is unusual as normally Frank Hutchison was a solo performer and reportedly not very good as an accompanist. While the sides cut on the first day, with fiddle player Sherman Lawson are excellent, the results of the second day’s work produced three superb Hutchison vocal /guitar solos plus the instrumental Hutchinson’s Rag. This last-named number being very akin to Riley Puckett’s 1927 recording, Fuzzy Rag. Disc B commences with the conclusion of Frank Hutchison’s final solo recording session for Okeh. (He did record for the label again, in September 1929, as a part of the Okeh Medicine Show, a six-sided set that was a showcase for a selection of Okeh’s otm artists). Once again everything made at the July date can be described as either first-rate or outstanding. Some pundits consider these last recordings to be less original than earlier performances; even if this is true to an extent one cannot dismiss Hutchison’s ‘parting shots’ in the commercial recording world. Debatably, his final session proved he had more to offer. Cannonball Blues and K.C. Blues may well be re-works of earlier recordings but what a stunning exit for the end of a solo career. Hutchison may not have had a particularly attractive voice (some have even described it, perhaps unfairly, as ‘leather-throated’), but there can be no doubt as to its rough charm. Additionally, his grand guitar playing overrides any doubts about his vocal abillities. But, it may well have been simply, as mentioned in the notes to disc A, that Okeh had been correct and Hutchinson had just run out of new material.

After the Okeh Medicine Show recordings, Hutchison and his family moved briefly to Chesapeake, Ohio but soon ended up back in West Virginia. Here they ran a store from 1934 until 1942 when the premises burnt down, forcing the family to move to first Columbia, Ohio and then to Dayton. Frank Hutchison died on 9th November 1945, leaving behind a fine music legacy, a bequest that might have been enhanced with new material to give an extension to his recording career.” (Pat Harrison’s liner notes to “Worried Blues”, a JSP box-set that re-issued all Frank Hutchison and Kelly Harrell’s 78rpm records)

-I have compiled 22 tracks by Frank Hutchison here, so to complete all his recording output, you have 6 other tracks that i already posted in my Dick Justice compilation, the instrumental version of “Stackalee” is on the first part of “The Stackalee Variations” and his song about the Titanic will be featured in a future post. (I didn’t included some re-recordings he made of “Worried Blues” and “The train that carried my girl from town”)

TRACK LIST:

1.Worried Blues

2.The Train That Carried My Girl From Town

3.The Wild Horse

4.Long Way To Tipperary

5.West Virginia Rag

6.C&O Excursion

7.Coney Isle

8.Lightning Express

9.Old Rachel

10.Stackalee

11.All Night Long

12.Alabama Girl, Ain’t You Comin’ Out Tonight

13.Hell Bound Train

14.Wild Hogs in the Red Brush

15.The Burglar Man

16.Back In My Home Town

17.Hutchison’s Rag

18.The Boston Burglar

19.Railroad Bill

20.Johnny and Jane (Part 1)

21.Johnny and Jane (Part 2)

22.Cannon Ball Blues

DOWNLOAD HERE

 

-In bonus i offer you the musical and humorous skit he recorded along with other Okeh artists, notably John Carson and Emmett Miller.

It’s called “The Okeh Medecine Show“, it appeared in 1929 on three 78rpm records.(You can here Frank in part 2,4 and 6 of the skit)

DOWNLOAD HERE (zip file of six mp3s)

-Frank Hutchison was originally a miner in West Virginia and i found this clip on YouTube that reminds us of the violent conflicts and strong social injustices that happened in 1920-1921, known as “The West Virginia Mine Wars”.

The Stackalee Variations

Excerpts from the Wikipedia page about Stackalee:

“William Lyons, 25, a levee hand, was shot in the abdomen yesterday evening at 10 o’clock in the saloon of Bill Curtis, at Eleventh and Morgan Streets, by Lee Shelton, a carriage driver. Lyons and Shelton were friends and were talking together. Both parties, it seems, had been drinking and were feeling in exuberant spirits. The discussion drifted to politics, and an argument was started, the conclusion of which was that Lyons snatched Shelton’s hat from his head. The latter indignantly demanded its return. Lyons refused, and Shelton withdrew his revolver and shot Lyons in the abdomen. When his victim fell to the floor Shelton took his hat from the hand of the wounded man and coolly walked away. He was subsequently arrested and locked up at the Chestnut Street Station. Lyons was taken to the Dispensary, where his wounds were pronounced serious. Lee Shelton is also known as ‘Stagger’ Lee. ” (St.Louis, Misouri, Globe-Democrat article from 1895)

Lee Shelton (also known as Stagger Lee, Stagolee, Stackerlee, Stack O’Lee, Stack-a-Lee and by several other spelling variants) was a black cab driver and a pimp convicted of murdering William “Billy” Lyons on Christmas Eve, 1895 in St. Louis, Missouri. The crime was immortalized in a blues folk song that has been recorded in hundreds of different versions. Lee Shelton was not just a common pimp, but as described by Cecil Brown, “Lee Shelton belonged to a group of pimps known in St. Louis as the ‘Macks’. The macks were not just ‘urban strollers’; they presented themselves as objects to be observed.”

Shelton died in prison in 1912, of tuberculosis.

-Stackalee is, along with John Henry, the most important figure in afro-american oral traditions, one of the most persistent too, his legend being present in  almost every new stage of developement of afro-american music in the 20th century. In a way he is the opposite of John Henry, his negative side, surely a “bad” man, with all the clichés of violence, gambling, booze and women surrounding him, but nevertheless became a “hero” for the black community, a symbol of resistance against white supremacy and racism. 

-I found some really great articles on the net about Stagger Lee: The Stagger Lee Files is a great place to start exploring the myth and the legend, Stagger Lee.com has a very complet historical page and also a list of  421 recordings!, from Early Blues.com, there’s a superb essay by Max haymes and here, another brillant essay by Angela Nelson who analyse the figure of Stagger Lee in rap music. 

-Go there to read the long essay by writer Paul Slade “De Lyons Sleeps Tonight:Stagger Lee”

-There are two books also of interest on the subject, Cecil Brown’s “Stagolee shot Billy”  and  Greil Marcus’s essay “Sly Stone and the myth of Stagolee” in his book “Mystery Train”.

-I’ve selected 60 performances, trying to represent all the musical traditions that shared the song and his legend. Once again, like “The John Henry Variations”, i’ve classed the tracks according to musical thematics but once you have download them all, it’s good to mix them, to make your own list of favorites,etc…

Afro-american musical traditions

(Hollers, Jazz, Blues, Rock, Soul, Funk, Rap, etc…)

-Part 1:

1.Stackerlee, Bama, from “Prison Songs Vol.1;Alan Lomax recordings”

2.Stack O’ Lee Blues, Ma Rainey, from “Black Bottom”

3.Stackolee, Mississippi John Hurt, from “Avalon Blues”

4.Stack O’Lee Blues, Cab Calloway, from “Complete Jazz Series 1931 – 1932″

5.Original Stack O’ Lee Blues, Long “Cleve” Reed & Little Harvey Hull, from “The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of: Super Rarities & Unissued Gems Of The 1920s & 30s”

6.Stack O’Lee Blues,  Johnny Dodds, from “Complete Jazz Series 1928 – 1940″

7.Billy Lyons and Stack O’Lee, Furry Lewis, from “First Recordings”

8.Stack O’Lee Blues,  Duke Ellington, from “Complete Jazz Series 1927 – 1928″

9.Stagolee, David “Honeyboy” Edwards, from “Big Joe Williams and the Stars of Mississippi Blues “

10.Old Stack O’Lee Blues, Sidney Bechet, from “Shake It And Break It”

11.Staggerlee , John Cephas and Phil Wiggins, from “Classic African American Ballads”

12.Stagolee, Hogman Maxey, from “Angola Prisoners’ Blues”

13.Stack O’ Dollars Blues, James “Yank” Rachell, from “Legendary Country Blues Artists”

14.Stack O’ Dollars, Big Joe Williams, from “Big Joe Williams and the Stars of Mississippi Blues” 

15.Stackolee, Dom Flemons,from “Dance tunes, Ballads and Blues”

DOWNLOAD HERE

-Part 2:

1.Stackalee, Margaret Walker, from ”Anthology of Negro Poetry”

2.Stagger Lee, Lloyd Price, from “60s Soul Sessions”

3.Stack-O-Lee ,Champion Jack Dupree, from “Blues from the Gutter”

4.Stack-A-Lee, Archibald, from “Archibald’s Crescent City Bounce”

5.Stagger Lee, Ike And Tina Turner, from “Soul Masters: Proud Mary”

6.Stagger Lee, James Brown, from “The Godfather Returns”

7.Staggolee, Pacific Gas & Electric , from “Quentin Tarantino’s Death Proof”

8.Stagger Lee, Professor Longhair, from “Big Easy Strut: The Essential Professor Longhair”

9.The Great Stackalee, Snatch and The Poontangs, from “Snatch & The Poontangs”

10.Stackolee, Samuel L. Jackson, from “Black Snake Moan”

11.Stagger Lee, Henry Gray, from “Blues won’t let me take my rest”

12.Stagger Lee, Taj Mahal, from “Hanapepe Dream”

13.Wrong’em Boyo, The Rulers, from “Trojan Ska Box Set” 

14.Stagolee, R.L. Burnside , from “Well…Well…Well”

15.Stack-O-Lee, Bruce Jackson, from “Get Your Ass in the Water and Swim Like Me! Narrative Poetry from the Black Oral Tradition”

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White Musical Traditions

(String bands, country,folk,skiffle, rock, etc…)

-Part 3:

1.Stackalee (Instrumental version),Frank Hutchison, from “Worried Blues”

2.Stack-O-Lee, Fruit Jar Guzzlers, from “Old Time Music from West Virginia – Vol. 1″

3.That Bad Man Stackolee, David Miller, from “My Rough & Rowdy Ways Vol. 2″

4.Stack-O-Lee King,Queen, Jack, from “It’s Hotter in Hawaii”

5.Stagger Lee, Woody Guthrie, from “Muleskinner Blues: The Asch Recordings, Vol. 2″

6.Stack O’Lee Blues, Ken Colyer’s Skiffle Group, from “Pig Iron, Washboards, Freight Trains & Kazoos: The UK Skiffle Boom 1954-57″

7.Stack-O-Lee ,Tennessee Ernie Ford, from “Sixteen Tons”

8.Stack O’ Lee, Merle Travis, from “In the Jailhouse Now : Prison Songs & Murder Ballads”

9.Badman Stackolee, Chas McDevitt Skiffle Group Pig Iron, from “Washboards, Freight Trains & Kazoos: The UK Skiffle Boom 1954-57″

10.Stagger Lee, The Wayside Trio, from “Wayside Trio”

11.Stack O’lee, Doc & Merle Watson, from “Ballads from Deep Gap”

12.Stack-O-Lee, Bert Garvin, Danielle Fraley & J.P. Fraley, from “Kentucky Old-Time Banjo”

13.Stagolee, Pete Seeger, from “American Favorite Ballads, Vol. 2″

14.Stagolee, Krüger Brothers, from “Behind the Barn”

15.Stagger Lee, Foghorn Stringband, from “Weiser Sunrise”

DOWNLOAD HERE

-Part 4:

1.Stagger Lee, Bobby Pratt & The Rockers,from ”Wildcat Jamboree!”

2.Stackolee, Journeymen, from “New directions in folk music”

3.Stagger Lee, Dale Miller, from “Finger Picking Rags and Other Delights”

4.Stagger Lee ,Tim Hardin, from “This Is Tim Hardin”

5.Stackerlee, Tom Rush, from “Blues, Songs and Ballads”

6.Stagolee, Bert Jansch, from “Young Man Blues: Live In Glasgow 1962-1964″

7.Stack-O-Lee, Dave Van Ronk, from “On Air”

8.Stackerlee, Tom Paley, from “Old Tom Moore”

9.Mrs. Delion’s Lament,David Bromberg, from “Reckless Abandon/Bandit in a Bathing Suit”

10.Stagger Lee, Grateful Dead , from “Shakedown Street”

11.Stagger Lee ,Dr. John, from “All by Hisself (Live At The Lonestar)”

12.Stack O’ Lee ,Frank Morey, from “The Delmark Sessions”

13.Stack Shot Billy, The Black Keys, from “Rubber Factory”

14.Stagger Lee ,Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, from “Murder Ballads”

15.Stack A Lee, Bob Dylan, from “World Gone Wrong”

DOWNLOAD HERE 

 “What does the song say exactly? It says no man gains immortality thru public acclaim. truth is shadowy. in the pre-postindustrial age, victims of violence were allowed (in fact it was their duty) to be judge over their offenders- parents were punished for their children’s crimes (we’ve come a long wy since then) the song says that a man’s hat is his crown. futurologists would insist it’s a matter of taste. they say “let’s sleep on it” but they’re already living in the sanatorium. No Rights Whithout Duty is the name of the game & fame is a trick. playing for time is is only horsing around. Stack’s in the cell, no wall phone. he is not some egotistical degraded existentialist dionysian idiot, neither does he represent any alternative lifestyle scam (give me a thousand acres of tractable land & you’ll see the Authentic alternative lifestyle, the Agrarian one) Billy didn’t have an insurance plan, didn’t get airsick yet his ghost is more real & genuine than all the dead souls on the boob tube- a monumental epic of blunder & misunderstanding. a romance tale whithout the cupidity.” (Bob Dylan’s liner notes to “Stack a lee” on his album “World Gone Wrong”)