Carl August Sandburg was an American poet, biographer, journalist, and editor. He won three Pulitzer Prizes: two for his poetry and one for his biography of Abraham Lincoln. During his lifetime, Sandburg was widely regarded as "a major figure in contemporary literature", especially for volumes of his collected verse, including Chicago Poems (1916), Cornhuskers (1918), and Smoke and Steel (1920). He enjoyed "unrivaled appeal as a poet in his day, perhaps because the breadth of his experiences connected him with so many strands of American life". When he died in 1967, President Lyndon B. Johnson observed that "Carl Sandburg was more than the voice of America, more than the poet of its strength and genius. He was America."
"St. James Infirmary" is an American blues and jazz standard that emerged, like many others, from folk traditions. Louis Armstrong brought the song to lasting fame through his 1928 recording, on which Don Redman is named as composer; later releases credit "Joe Primrose", a pseudonym used by musician manager, music promoter and publisher Irving Mills. The melody is eight bars long, unlike songs in the classic blues genre, where there are 12 bars. It is in a minor key, and has a 4
4 time signature, but has also been played in 3
4.
Western music is a form of music composed by and about the people who settled and worked throughout the Western United States and Western Canada. Western music celebrates the lifestyle of the cowboy on the open range, along the Rocky Mountains, and among the prairies of Western North America. The genre grew from the mix of cultural influences in the American frontier and what became the Southwestern United States at the time, it came from the folk music traditions of those living the region, those being the hillbilly music from those that arrived from the Eastern U.S., the corrido and ranchera from Northern Mexico, and the New Mexico and Tejano endemic to the Southwest. The music industry of the mid-20th century grouped the western genre with that of similar folk origins, instrumentation and rural themes, to create the banner of country and western music, which was simplified in time to country music.
"Red River Valley" is a folk song and cowboy music standard of uncertain origins that has gone by different names, depending on where it has been sung. It is listed as Roud Folk Song Index 756 and by Edith Fowke as FO 13. It is recognizable by its chorus :
"(Ghost) Riders in the Sky: A Cowboy Legend" is a cowboy-styled country/western song written in 1948 by American songwriter, film and television actor Stan Jones.
"She'll Be Coming 'Round the Mountain" is a traditional folk song often categorized as children's music. The song is derived from the Christian spiritual known as "When the Chariot Comes". It has been assigned the number 4204 in the Roud Folk Song Index.
"Midnight Special" is a traditional folk song thought to have originated among prisoners in the American South. The song refers to the passenger train Midnight Special and its "ever-loving light."
"Hallelujah, I'm a Bum" is an American folk song that responds with humorous sarcasm to unhelpful moralizing about the circumstance of being a hobo. The song's authorship is uncertain, but according to hobo poetry researcher Bud L. McKillips, the words were written by an IWW member. Carl Sandburg collected the song for his anthology The American Songbag, and he wrote that it was "heard at the water tanks of railroads in Kansas in 1897 and from harvest hands who worked in the wheat fields of Pawnee County, was picked up later by the I. W. W.'s, who made verses of their own for it, and gave it a wide fame." Some verses may have been written by a Kansas City hobo known only as "One-Finger Ellis," who scribbled it on the wall of his prison cell in 1897. There is also a questionable theory that Harry McClintock, an IWW member, could have written it in 1899 when he was only fifteen.
"The Moonshiner" is a folk song with unknown origins. In Ireland and America, it is sung with similar lyrics but different melodies. It is catalogued as Roud Folk Song Index No. 4301. The song's structure is very similar to The Wild Rover, but instead extolling the virtues of moonshining.
"Sweet Betsy from Pike" is an American ballad about the trials of a pioneer named Betsy and her lover Ike who migrate from Pike County to California. This Gold Rush-era song, with lyrics published by John A. Stone in 1858, was collected and published in Carl Sandburg's 1927 American Songbag. It was recorded by Burl Ives on February 11, 1941 for his debut album Okeh Presents the Wayfaring Stranger.
"Keep Your Eyes on the Prize" is a folk song that became influential during the American Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s. It is based on the traditional song, "Gospel Plow," also known as "Hold On," "Keep Your Hand on the Plow," and various permutations thereof.
R. W. Hampton is an American western music singer-songwriter, actor and playwright. Hampton has achieved both critical and commercial success, winning multiple awards from the Western Music Association and the Academy of Western Artists and four separate Wrangler Awards from the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City.
"Bang Bang Lulu" is a traditional American song with many variations. It derives from older songs most commonly known as "Bang Bang Rosie" in Ireland, "Bang Away Lulu" in Appalachia, and "My Lula Gal" in the West. The form "Bang Bang Lulu" became widespread in the United States from its use as a cadence during the World Wars. The song uses the tune of "Goodnight, Ladies".
"Poor Paddy Works on the Railway" is a popular Irish folk and American folk song. Historically, it was often sung as a sea shanty. The song portrays an Irish worker working on a railroad.
"Bury Me Not on the Lone Prairie" is a cowboy folk song. Also known as "The Cowboy's Lament", "The Dying Cowboy", "Bury Me Out on the Lone Prairie", and "Oh, Bury Me Not", the song is described as the most famous cowboy ballad. Members of the Western Writers of America chose it as one of the Top 100 Western songs of all time. Based on a sailor's song, the song has been recorded by many artists, including Moe Bandy, Johnny Cash, Cisco Houston, Burl Ives, Bruce Molsky, The Residents, Tex Ritter, Roy Rogers, Colter Wall, William Elliott Whitmore and Sam Shackleton.
"Sipping Cider Through a Straw" is a folk song of uncertain origin. A minstrel song titled "Sucking Cider Thro' a Straw", with words and music attributed to W. Freear, was published in 1894 by White-Smith in the United States; this composition may be the origin of the folk song, or may owe its own origin to the folk song.
"Willie the Weeper" is a song about drug addiction. It is based on a standard vaudeville song, likely written in 1904. It is credited to Walter Melrose, Grant Rymal, Marty Bloom, who published it with Morris Edwin H & Co Inc in 1908. The first recording was likely by Freddie Keppard between 1923 and 1926. Many artists recorded it in 1927, including Frankie "Half-Pint" Jaxon, Louis Armstrong and His Hot Seven, and King Oliver. Ernest Rodgers recorded a version, also in 1927, which shares several lines with Cab Calloway's "Minnie the Moocher".
"The Hearse Song" is a song about burial and human decomposition, of unknown origin. It was popular as a World War I song, and was popular in the 20th century as an American and British children's song, continuing to the present. It has many variant titles, lyrics, and melodies, but generally features the line "The worms crawl in, the worms crawl out," and thus is also known as "The Worms Crawl In." Generally, the song recounts the viewing of a hearse, prompting the thought of death. The listener's body is buried in a casket and assaulted by worms, then decomposes; some versions continue by stating the dead listener will be forced to eat their moldering remains.
The American Songbag is an anthology of American folksongs compiled by the poet Carl Sandburg and published by Harcourt, Brace and Company in 1927. It was enormously popular and was in print continuously for more than seventy years. Melodies from it were used in Alec Wilder's Names from the War (1961).
The Colorado Trail is a traditional American cowboy song, collected and published in 1927 by Carl Sandburg in his American Songbag. Sandburg says that he learned the song from Dr. T. L. Chapman, of Duluth, Minnesota, who heard it from a badly injured cowboy being treated in his hospital. The cowboy sang it, and many others, to an audience of patients in his ward.
Ken Kesey suggested that "Houlihan" is a synonym for "Maverick". Meaning: Wild... Untamed.
This would be in his famous essay "The Day After Superman Died". Wherein he refers to wild man Neil Cassidy (AKA Dean Moriarity) as... O'Houlihan.
Moreover, the Lyrics of the song itself, actually suggest the wild cattle, ARE The Houlihan.
Fiery and Snuffy, are the Fire and the Branding Iron. By which, those purportedly wild cattle, become your cattle.
Standard Lyrics are in the Public Domain.
I ride an old paint I lead an old dan I'm going to Montana To throw the houlihan They feed in the coolies They water in the draw Their tails are all matted Their backs are all raw Ride around Ride around real slow The fiery and the snuffy are raring to go
Carl Sandberg published lyrics in 1927, but the song may actually be as much as 80 years older.
