This blog is dedicated to the amateur or beginner musician with music written in a simple and easy to read Alpha Notes format and with Chords for the left hand. This is to assist those with little or hardly at all note reading skills. This is a blog that shows all the chords in Alpha Notes format too which you can find the notes for the chords in one of the blogs. Please feel free to leave a comment or any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Enjoy!
The subject of the song is grief associated with loss, in this case from the death of an "old gray goose".
A darker version of the song is depicted in the video game Resident Evil 7.
Go Tell Aunt Rhody” may have originated as a play-party song during New England’s colonial days. Most Protestant communities had restrictions against dancing and playing musical instruments. Play parties were designed to sidestep those restrictions by using only handclaps for accompaniment and the simple patterns of children’s games to replace the intricate patterns of country dances. Depending on the locale in which this song was sung, the aunt may have had a name such as Patsy, Dinah, or Nancy.
To download the easy alphanotes sheet music, look here.
Enjoy!
Lyrics:
Go tell Aunt Rhody, Go tell Aunt Rhody, Go tell Aunt Rhody The old gray goose is dead.
The one she's been saving, The one she's been saving, The one she's been saving To make a feather bed.
The goslings are weepin', The goslings are weepin', The goslings are weepin', Because their mammy's dead.
The gander is mournin', The gander is mournin', The gander is mournin', Because his wife is dead.
She died in the mill pond, She died in the mill pond, She died in the mill pond From standin' on her head.
Go tell Aunt Rhody, Go tell Aunt Rhody, Go tell Aunt Rhody The old gray goose is dead.
"Go Down Moses" is an African American spiritual that describes the Hebrew exodus, specifically drawing from Exodus 5:1: "And the LORD spoke unto Moses, Go unto Pharaoh, and say unto him, Thus saith the LORD, Let my people go, that they may serve me", where God commands Moses to demand the release of the Israelites from bondage in Egypt. As is common in spirituals, the song discusses freedom, referring both to the freedom of the Israelites, and that of runaway enslaved people. As a result of these messages, this song was outlawed by many enslavers.
Lyrically, the song discusses the liberation of the ancient Jewish people from Egyptian slavery. This story held a second meaning for enslaved African Americans, as they related their experiences under slavery to those of Moses and the Israelites who were enslaved by the pharaoh, and they resonated with the message that God will come to the aid of the persecuted. "Go Down Moses" also makes references to the Jordan River, commonly associated with reaching freedom in spirituals because such an act of running away often involved crossing one or more rivers. Since the Old Testament recognizes the Nile Valley as further south, and thus, lower than Jerusalem and the Promised Land, heading to Egypt means going "down" while going away from Egypt is "up". In the context of American slavery, this ancient sense of "down" converged with the concept of "down the river" (the Mississippi), where enslaved people's conditions were notoriously worse. Later verses also draw parallels between the Israelites' freedom from slavery and humanity's freedom won by Christ.
Although usually thought of as a spiritual, the earliest written record of the song was as a rallying anthem for the Contrabands at Fort Monroe sometime before July 1862. White people who reported on the song presumed it was composed by them. This became the first spiritual to be recorded in sheet music that is known of, by Reverend Lewis Lockwood. While visiting Fortress Monroe in 1861, he heard runaway enslaved people singing this song, transcribed what he heard, and eventually published it in the National Anti-Slavery Standard. Sheet music was soon after published titled "Oh! Let My People Go: The Song of the Contrabands", arranged by Horace Waters. L.C. Lockwood, chaplain of the Contrabands, stated in the sheet music that the song was from Virginia, dating from about 1853. However, the song was not included in Slave Songs of the United States, despite its being a very prominent spiritual among enslaved people. Furthermore, the original version of the song sung by enslaved people almost definitely sounded very different from what Lockwood transcribed by ear, especially following an arrangement by a person who had never before heard the song as it was originally sung. The opening verse, as recorded by Lockwood, is:
The Lord, by Moses, to Pharaoh said: Oh! let my people go If not, I'll smite your first-born dead—Oh! let my people go Oh! go down, Moses Away down to Egypt's land And tell King Pharaoh To let my people go
Sarah Bradford's authorized biography of Harriet Tubman, Scenes in the Life of Harriet Tubman (1869), quotes Tubman as saying she used "Go Down Moses" as one of two code songs used with fugitive enslaved people to communicate when fleeing Maryland. Tubman began her underground railroad work in 1850 and continued until the beginning of the Civil War, so it is possible Tubman's use of the song predates the origin claimed by Lockwood. Some people even hypothesize that she herself may have written the spiritual. Others claim that Nat Turner, who led one of the most well-known slave revolts in history, either wrote or was the inspiration for the song.
To download the easy alphanotes sheet music, look here.
Enjoy!
Lyrics:
When Israel was in Egypt’s land, Let My people go! Oppressed so hard they could not stand, Let My people go!
Refrain: Go down, Moses, Way down in Egypt’s land; Tell old Pharaoh To let My people go!
No more shall they in bondage toil, Let My people go! Let them come out with Egypt’s spoil, Let My people go!
Oh, let us all from bondage flee, Let My people go! And let us all in Christ be free, Let My people go!
You need not always weep and mourn, Let My people go! And wear these slav’ry chains forlorn, Let My people go!
Your foes shall not before you stand, Let My people go! And you’ll possess fair Canaan’s land, Let My people go!
"Git Along, Little Dogies" is a traditionalcowboy ballad, also performed under the title "Whoopie Ti Yi Yo." It is cataloged asRoud Folk Song IndexNo. 827. Members of theWestern Writers of Americachose it as one of the Top 100 Western songs of all time.
The "dogies" referred to in the song are runty or orphaned calves.
It is believed to be a variation of a traditional Irish ballad about an old man rocking a cradle. The cowboy adaptation is first mentioned in the 1893 journal of Owen Wister, author of The Virginian. Through Wister's influence, the melody and lyrics were first published in 1910 in John Lomax's Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads.
The Sons of the Pioneers covered the song for their 1990 album Sunset on the Range.
To download the easy alphanotes sheet music, look here.
Enjoy!
Lyrics:
As I was a-walking one morning for pleasure I spied a cowpuncher all riding along His hat was throwed back and his spurs was a-jinglin' As he approached me, he was singin' this song:
(Chorus:) Whoopee ti yi yo, git along little dogies It's your misfortune and none of my own Whoopee ti yi yo, git along little dogies You know that Wyoming will be your new home
Early in the spring, we round up the dogies Mark 'em and brand 'em and bob off their tails Drive up our horses, load up the chuck-wagon Then throw the dogies out on the trail
(Chorus) It's a-whoopin' and yellin' and a-drivin' them dogies Oh, how I wish that you would go on It's a-whoopin' and punchin' and go on little dogies You know that Wyoming will be your new home
(Chorus) Some boys goes up on the trail just for pleasure But that's where they get it most awfully wrong For you haven't an idea the trouble they give us While we go driving them all along
(Chorus) When the night comes, and we hold them on the bed-ground These little dogies that roll on so slow Round up the herd and cut out the strays And roll the little dogies that never rolled before
"Frog Went a-Courtin'" (Roud No. 16;see alternative titles) is an English-languagefolk song. Its first known appearance is in Wedderburn's Complaynt of Scotland (1549) under the name "The Frog cam to the Myl dur", though this is in Scots rather than English. There is a reference in the London Company of Stationers' Register of 1580 to "A Moste Strange Weddinge of the Frogge and the Mouse." There are many texts of the ballad; however the oldest known musical version is found in Thomas Ravenscroft's Melismata in 1611.
The lyrics involve a frog courting a mouse (Missie Mouse). The mouse is willing to marry the frog, but she must ask permission of Uncle Rat. In other versions such as "King Kong Kitchie Kitchie Ki-Me-O" by Chubby Parker, the frog fights and kills Miss Mouse's other suitors (an owl, bat and bumblebee) after they interrupt his proposal. Uncle Rat's permission received, the two work out details of the wedding. Some versions end with a cat, snake or other creature devouring or chasing the couple and wedding guests. Sometimes the frog gets away, but is later swallowed by a duck. Usually, the final verse states that there's a piece of food on the shelf, and that if the listener wants to hear more verses, they have to sing it themselves.
Spaeth has a note claiming that the original referred to François, Duke of Anjou's wooing of Elizabeth I of England; however, that was in 1579 and the version in Scots had been published thirty years earlier. If the second known version (1611, in Melismata, also reprinted in Chappell) were the oldest, this might be possible — there are seeming political references to "Gib, our cat" and "Dick, our drake." But the Wedderburn text, which at least anticipates the song, predates the reign of Queen Elizabeth by nine years, and Queen Mary by four. If it refers to any queen at all, it would seemingly have to be Mary Stuart. Evelyn K. Wells, however, in the liner notes to the LP Brave Boys; New England traditions in folk music (New World Records 239, 1977), suggests that the original may have been satirically altered in 1580 when it was recorded in the register of the London Company of Stationers, as this would have been at the height of the unpopular courtship.
According to Albert Jack in his book "Pop Goes the Weasel: The secret meanings of nursery rhymes" (pp. 33–37, copyright 2008), the earliest known version of the song was published in 1549 as "The Frog Came to the Myl Dur" in Robert Wedderburn's Complaynt of Scotland. He states that in 1547 the Scottish Queen Consort, Mary of Guise, under attack from Henry VIII, sought to have her daughter Princess Mary (later Mary Queen of Scots), "Miss Mouse", married to the three-year old French Prince Louis – the "frog" – and that the song resurfaced a few years later, with changes, when another French (frog) wooing caused concern – that of the Duke of Anjou and Queen Elizabeth I in 1579. Elizabeth even nicknamed Anjou, her favorite suitor, "the frog".
Another theory traces the song to Suffolk: "Roley, Poley, Gammon and Spinach" refer to four families of Suffolk notables, Rowley, Pole, Bacon and Greene.
The song has been heard by many people (as "Froggie Went a-Courtin'") in the 1953 Tom and Jerry cartoon Pecos Pest, which uses a version arranged and performed by Shug Fisher, in character as "Uncle Pecos." In Pecos Pest, Jerry's Uncle Pecos stays with him while getting ready for a television appearance, and continues to pluck Tom's whiskers to use as guitar strings throughout the cartoon. It is an improvised version with many lyrics that are unintelligible, and many changed. For example, he stutters and gives up when he tries to say "hickory tree" and says "way down yonder by the ...", stammers out the names of several types of trees, finally settling on "eucalyptus". He also mentions while continuing the music "That's the hard part right in there, n-n-n-n-nephew!" and "there's a yodel in thar somewhar, but it's a little too high f'r me."
Some refer to this song as "Crambone", as it is repeated at the end of many lines and said more clearly than the other words in this version. For example, the line is "Froggie went a-courtin' he did ride/Crambone". Fisher, in character as Pecos, delivers the coda with a glottal stutter on the letter c. Woody Guthrie's version used "Hey-hey", and Bob Dylan's version used "uh-huh" in the same way after several lines.
To download the easy alphanotes sheet music, look here.
Enjoy!
Lyrics:
Froggy went a-courtin’ and he did ride, uh-huh (uh-huh)
Froggy went a -courtin’ and he did ride
Sword and pistol by his side, uh- huh, uh-huh, uh-huh
Well, he went down to Miss Mousie’s door, uh-huh (uh-huh)
He went down to Miss Mousie’s door
Where he had often been before, uh huh, uh-huh, uh-huh
And he took Miss Mousie on his knee, uh-huh (uh-huh)
He took Miss Mousie on his knee, and he said,
“Miss Mousie, will you marry me?” uh huh, uh-huh, uh-huh
“Not without my Uncle Rat’s consent uh-huh (uh-huh)
Not without my Uncle Rat’s consent
I would not marry the President, uh huh, uh-huh, uh-huh
Where will the wedding supper be? Uh-huh (uh-huh)
Where will the wedding supper be?
Way down yonder in a hollow tree, uh huh, uh-huh, uh-huh
First to come were the two little ants, uh-huh, uh-huh
Fixin’ around to have a dance, uh-huh, uh-huh
Next to come was a bumblebee
Bouncing a fiddle on his knee, uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh
Follow the Drinking Gourdis an African-Americanfolk songfirst published in 1928. The "drinking gourd" is another name for theBig Dipperasterism. Folklore has it thatenslaved peoplein the United States used it as a point of reference so they would not get lost during their journey of escape to the North and to freedom.
According to legend, the song was used by a conductor of the Underground Railroad, called Peg Leg Joe, to guide some fugitive slaves, and many of the lyrics are simply cartographic directions to advise the runaways on their escape route. While the song may possibly refer to some lost fragment of history, the origin and context remain a mystery.
A more recent source challenges the claim that the song helped free anyone from slavery, as no pre-1910 reference to it has ever been found.
Follow the Drinking Gourd was collected by H. B. Parks, an entomologist and amateur folklorist, in the 1910s. Parks reported that Peg Leg Joe, an operative of the Underground Railroad, had passed as a laborer and spread the song to different plantations, giving directions for slaves to escape. The song was published by the Texas Folklore Society in 1928. (The cover spells the title "Foller de Drinkin' Gou'd.")
In 1947, Lee Hays, of the Almanac Singers and The Weavers, rearranged Follow the Drinkin' Gourd and published it in the People's Songs Bulletin. Familiar with African-American music and culture, Hays stated that he himself had heard parts of the song from an elderly black woman named Aunty Laura. Hays described the melody as coming from Aunty Laura, while the lyrics came from anthologies – probably the Parks version.
In 1955, singer Randy Sparks heard the song from an elderly street singer named John Woodum. These lyrics diverged greatly from the Parks and Hays versions and included no geographical information. Sparks later founded The New Christy Minstrels, with whom he recorded a version of the song based on Woodum's lyrics.
Two of the stars in the Big Dipper line up very closely with and point to Polaris. Polaris is a circumpolar star, and so it is always seen pretty close to the direction of true north. Hence, according to a popular myth, all slaves had to do was look for the Drinking Gourd and follow it to the North Star (Polaris) north to freedom. James Kelley has argued against the historicity of this interpretation in the Journal of Popular Culture.
To download the easy alphanotes sheet music, look here.
Enjoy!
Lyrics:
Refrain Follow the drinking gourd, Follow the drinking gourd, For the old man is a-waiting for to carry you to freedom If you follow the drinking gourd.
1. When the sun comes out and the first quail calls Follow the drinking gourd. For the old man is a-waiting for to carry you to freedom If you follow the drinking gourd. Refrain
2. The river bank makes a mighty good road, Dead trees will show you the way, And the left foot, peg foot, traveling on, Just you follow the drinking gourd. Refrain
3. The river ends between two hills, Follow the drinking gourd. There’s another river on the other side, Follow the drinking gourd. Refrain
4. Where the great big river meets the little river, Follow the drinking gourd. For the old man is awaiting to carry you to freedom if you Follow the drinking gourd. Refrain
"The Farmer in the Dell" is a singing game, nursery rhyme, folksong, and children's song. It probably originated in Germany and was brought to America by immigrants. From there, it spread to many other nations and is popular in a number of languages. It is Roud Folk Song.
The rhyme was first recorded in Germany in 1826, as "Es fuhr ein Bau'r ins Holz". It was more clearly a courtship game, with a farmer choosing a wife, then selecting a child, maid, and serving man who leaves the maid after kissing her. This was probably taken to America by German immigrants, where it next surfaced in New York City in 1883, in its modern form and using a melody similar to "A-Hunting We Will Go". From there, it seems to have been adopted throughout the United States, Canada (noted from 1893), the Netherlands (1894), and Great Britain; it is first found in Scotland in 1898 and England from 1909. In the early twentieth century, it was evident in France ("Le fermier dans son pré"), Sweden ("En bonde i vår by"), Australia, and South Africa.
Like most children's songs, there are geographic variations. In the United Kingdom, the first line is frequently changed to "The Farmer's in his den". The rhyme progresses through the farmer being in the dell or his den, his desire for a wife, hers for a child, its for a nurse, a dog, then a bone, and ending in: "we all pat the bone". Every player then pats the one picked as the bone. The "Hi-Ho, the derry-o" lyric is variously replaced with, "Ee-i, tiddly-i", in London, "Ee-i, adio", "Ee-i, andio,", "Ee-i, en-gee-oh" or "Ee-i, entio", in Northern England, and "Ee-i, ee-i", in the West Country.
The Romanian language version is "Țăranul e pe câmp" ("The farmer is on the field"), but the "Hey-o" is replaced with "Ura, drăguţa mea" ("Hooray, my sweetheart"), and the last verses are: "the child has a nurse, the nurse has a cat, the cat catches a mouse, the mouse eats a cheese, the cheese is in a cask, the cask is in the garbage, the farmer to choose."
