"My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!", typically shortened to "My Old Kentucky Home", is a sentimental ballad written by Stephen Foster, probably composed in 1852.[1][2][3] It was published in January 1853 by Firth, Pond, & Co. of New York.[1][4] Foster was likely inspired by Harriet Beecher Stowe's anti-slavery novel Uncle Tom's Cabin, as evidenced by the title of a sketch in Foster's sketchbook, "Poor Uncle Tom, Good-Night!"
Interpretations of the song vary widely. Frederick Douglass wrote in his 1855 autobiography My Bondage and My Freedom that the song "awakens sympathies for the slave, in which antislavery principles take root, grow, and flourish".[5][6] However, the song's publication by Firth & Pond as a minstrel song and its use in "Tom shows" (stagings of Stowe's novel of varying degrees of sincerity and faithfulness to the original text), and other settings, have clouded its reception.[2][3]
Creation and career impact
The creation of the song "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!" established a decisive moment within Stephen Foster's career in regard to his personal beliefs on the institution of slavery, as, following publication of the song, Foster began to abandon minstrelsy and writing music with African-American vernacular.[7] It also is an example of the common theme of the loss of home, which is prevalent throughout Foster's work. Foster was greatly inspired by Harriet Beecher Stowe's abolitionist novel Uncle Tom's Cabin, which appeared in bookstores in Foster's hometown of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in March 1852. The novel, written about the plight of a slave in Kentucky, had a profound effect on Foster's future songwriting by altering the tone of his music to sympathize the position of the enslaved person. In his notebook, Foster penned the lyrics inspired by Stowe's novel, initially named "Poor Old Uncle Tom, Good-Night!" Foster ultimately removed references to Stowe's book, renaming the work, "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!"
Foster's brother Morrison indicated in correspondence in 1898 that Foster was an "occasional visitor" to the plantation of their cousins the Rowan Family known as Federal Hill. No evidence exists to confirm that Foster was inspired by imagery seen at Federal Hill for the song's composition, and the imagery in the song does not include any specific markers to Federal Hill. The Foster and Rowan family's close relationship appears to have been initiated through Stephen's sister Charlotte, who stayed with the Rowans at Federal Hill in 1828. While Charlotte lived with the Rowan family, Atkinson Hill Rowan made a proposal of marriage to her, which she ultimately declined.[8] Charlotte died in the home of George Washing Barclay, a cousin of both families, with Atkinson Hill Rowan at her bedside.[9]
The song "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!" is one of many examples of the loss of home in Foster's work. Biographers believe that this common theme originated from the loss of Foster's childhood home, known as the "White Cottage", an estate his mother referred to as an Eden, in reference to the Garden of Eden. The family was financially supported by the family patriarch William Foster, who owned vast holdings, which were lost through bad business dealings that left the family destitute and unable to keep possession of the White Cottage; the family was forced to leave the estate when Stephen Foster was three years old. After years of financial instability and the sharing of memories of the White Cottage with Stephen by his parents and siblings, the impact of longing for a permanent home that was no longer available to him greatly influenced his writing.[7]
Reception
Frederick Douglass in 1856
Upon its release in 1853 by Firth, Pond & Company,[10] "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night" grew quickly in popularity, selling thousands of copies. The song's popular and nostalgic theme of the loss of home resonated with the public and received support from some within the abolitionist movement in the United States. For example, African-American abolitionist Frederick Douglass promoted the song, among other similar songs of the time period, in his autobiography My Bondage and My Freedom as evoking a sentimental theme that promotes and popularizes the cause of abolishing slavery in the United States. Douglass commented, "They [My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!, etc.] are heart songs, and the finest feelings of human nature are expressed in them. [They] can make the heart sad as well as merry, and can call forth a tear as well as a smile. They awaken the sympathies for the slave", he stated, "in which anti-slavery principles take root and flourish".[11]
Foster sold the work to the music publishing company Firth & Pond that published and branded the work as a "plantation melody" among the catalog of Christy's Minstrels. As a result, the song was popular on the blackfaceminstrel stage and in melodrama through the nineteenth century. Frequently, the song was included in "Tom shows", stagings of Uncle Tom's Cabin. The song remained popular in amateur blackface minstrel shows through at least the first half of the twentieth century. While some of the shows in which "My Old Kentucky Home" was featured depicted slavery as wrong and the enslaved people sympathetically, most of these shows hewed to the common demeaning traditions and tropes of blackface minstrelsy.[12][13]
The song held popularity for over a decade and throughout the American Civil War. The song's reach throughout the United States and popularity have been attributed to soldiers of the war, who passed the tune from location to location during the war's tenure. The song remained popular through the nineteenth century. The typical reduction of the song's title from "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!" to "My Old Kentucky Home" occurred after the turn of the century.[14]
WHEREAS, the song, "My Old Kentucky Home," by Stephen Collins Foster, has immortalized Kentucky throughout the civilized world, and is known and sung in every State and Nation; ...
—Preamble to a 1928 Act of the Kentucky legislature[18]
During the first decades of the twentieth century, the song became increasingly popular nationwide and the state legislature of the Commonwealth of Kentucky sought to utilize the song's popularity by establishing it as Kentucky's state song.[19]
On March 11, 1986, a group of students from the Sendai Christian Educational Institute in Miyagi, Japan sang the song on their field trip to the Kentucky General Assembly, using the original lyrics that included the word "darkies".[20] Legislator Carl Hines was infuriated by this, and subsequently introduced a resolution that would substitute the word "people" in place of "darkies" whenever the song was used by the House of Representatives. State Senator Georgia Davis Powers introduced a similar resolution in the Kentucky State Senate. Both chambers adopted their respective resolution.[21]
Modern impact
Today, the song "My Old Kentucky Home" remains an important composition due to its role in the evolution of American songwriting and is an influential song in American culture. According to popular-song analysts, the appeal of the theme of "returning home" is one in which listeners of "My Old Kentucky Home" are able to personally relate within their own lives.[citation needed] Many revisions and updates of the song have occurred throughout the past century, which have further ingrained the song in American culture. These revisions and a constantly adapting cultural landscape also complicate the song's legacy and meanings for different people.[7]
Recording history
"My Old Kentucky Home" was recorded many times during the early era of cylinder recordings. The Cylinder Audio Archive at the University of California (Santa Barbara) Library contains 19 commercial recordings of the song (in addition to several home recordings).[22] In most cases, even those of the commercial recordings, the Archive is unable to determine the precise dates (or even years) of either their recording or their release, with some cylinders being dated only to a forty-year range from the 1890s to the 1920s. The earliest recording of "My Old Kentucky Home" for which the Archive was able to determine a precise year of release is from 1898 and features an unidentified cornet duo.[23] However, the song is known to have been recorded earlier than that (in February 1894) by the Standard Quartette, a vocal group that was appearing in a musical that featured the song (making their recording perhaps the earliest example of a cast recording). No copy of that cylinder is known to have survived.[24] And although cylinder recordings were more popular during the 1800s than disc records, some of the latter were being sold, mostly by Berliner Gramophone. A version sung by A.C. Weaver was recorded in September 1894 and released with catalog number 175.[25]
The popularity of "My Old Kentucky Home" as recording material continued into the 20th century, despite the fact that the song was then more than fifty years old. In the first two decades of the century, newly established Victor Records released thirteen versions of the song (plus five more recordings that included it as part of a medley).[26] During that same period, Columbia Records issued a similar number, including one by Margaret Wilson (daughter of U.S. president Woodrow Wilson).[27] One of the major vocal groups of the day, the Peerless Quartet, recorded it twice,[28] as did internationally known operatic sopranoAlma Gluck.[29] It was also recorded by various marching and concert bands, including three recordings by one of the most well-known, Sousa's Band,[30] as well as three by the house concert band at Edison Records.[31]
Although the frequency of its recording dropped off as the century progressed, "My Old Kentucky Home" continued to be used as material by some of the major popular singers of the day. Versions were recorded by Kate Smith,[32]Bing Crosby,[33] and Al Jolson.[34] A version by operatic contraltoMarian Anderson was released in Japan[35] and Paul Robeson recorded his version for an English company while living in London in the late 1920s.[36] The song continued to find expression in non-traditional forms, including a New Orleans jazz version by Louis Armstrong[37] and a swing version by Gene Krupa.[38] For a listing of some other recorded versions of the song, see External links.
By the time commercial music began to be recorded, the verse melody of "My Old Kentucky Home" had become so widely known that recording artists sometimes quoted it in material that was otherwise unrelated to Foster's song. The 1918 song "Rock-a-Bye Your Baby with a Dixie Melody", recorded and popularized by Al Jolson, quotes the chorus phrase "weep no more my lady", and also makes reference to two other Foster songs. Henry Burr's 1921 recording of "Kentucky Home" quotes the verse melody in an interlude midway through the record.[40] And vaudeville singer Billy Murray's 1923 recording of "Happy and Go-Lucky in My Old Kentucky Home" adds the melody in the record's finale.[41] An earlier recording by Murray, 1915's "We'll Have a Jubilee in My Old Kentucky Home", takes the further step of incorporating a portion of Foster's melody (but not his lyrics) into each chorus.[42] And a few decades earlier than that, a young Charles Ives, while still a student at Yale University in the 1890s, used Foster's melody (both the verse and the chorus) as a strain in one of his marches. Ives often quoted from Foster and musicologist Clayton Henderson has detected material from "My Old Kentucky Home" in eight of his works.[43]
In the mid-1960s, songwriter Randy Newman used the verse of "My Old Kentucky Home" (with modified lyrics) as the chorus to his "Turpentine and Dandelion Wine". Newman recorded this adaptation for his 12 Songs album (1970, Reprise RS 6373) under the title "Old Kentucky Home". However, the adaptation had been recorded earlier at least twice. The first was by the Beau Brummels, who recorded it for their Triangle album (1967, Warner Brothers WS 1692). The second was by the Alan Price Set, who included it as the B-side to their "Love Story" single (1968, Decca F 12808). Since Newman's recording, the adaptation was covered several times more. The only version that charted was by Johnny Cash, who released it as a single from his John R. Cash album (1975, Columbia KC 33370). The single reached No. 42 on Billboard'scountry-music chart.[44] Note that the various cover versions generally use slightly different titles, some adding "My" to Newman's title, others omitting "Old". Also, some use Newman's original title of "Turpentine and Dandelion Wine" as a subtitle. A more complete listing of these cover versions can be found in External links. In 2021, Tyler Childers released the song "Long Violent History" on his album of the same name. The introduction of the song contains the chorus melody of My Old Kentucky Home, and the song's coda contains the coda melody of My Old Kentucky Home.
Appearance in media
"My Old Kentucky Home" has appeared in many films, live action and animated, and in television episodes, in the 20th and 21st centuries.
The original title for the first draft of Margaret Mitchell's 1936 novel Gone with the Wind was "Tote The Weary Load", a lyric from "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!"[45]Scarlett O’Hara and Rhett Butler sing the song in Chapter 17, and the lyric "a few more days for to tote the weary load" appears in the text of the novel as Scarlett is returning to Tara.[46] In 1939, "My Old Kentucky Home" was featured in the film version of Gone with the Wind both instrumentally and with lyrics. In the movie, Prissy, played by Butterfly McQueen, sings the line, "a few more days for to tote the weary load".[47][48]
Fleischer Studios adapted the song in their 1926 cartoon short My Old Kentucky Home, noteworthy for containing the first ever fully animated dialogue.
Judy Garland sang "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!" live on December 14, 1938, on the radio show, America Calling. She later covered it again on The All Time Flop Parade with Bing Crosby and The Andrews Sisters. On April 29, 1953, Garland headlined a Kentucky Derby week appearance in Lexington, Kentucky, named "The Bluegrass Festival" where she sang the song "My Old Kentucky Home", accompanied by a single violin.[49]
In 1940, Bing Crosby sang "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!" via radio broadcast with Leopold Stokowski conducting a symphony for the dedication of the Stephen Foster postage stamp release held in Bardstown, Kentucky, at My Old Kentucky Home.[50]
Bugs Bunny sang the opening bars to this song in the original version of the 1953 Warner Brothers cartoon Southern Fried Rabbit. In the unedited version, Bugs is playing the banjo disguised in blackface to fool Yosemite Sam. Later releases omit this part due to negative racial stereotypes.
In 2009 the song was covered in Mad Men, Season 3, Episode 3, "My Old Kentucky Home." Roger Sterling (played by John Slattery) performs the song in blackface for a company Kentucky Derby party.[53]
In 2010 the song was covered in The Simpsons, Season 21, Episode 13, "The Color Yellow". Marge and Lisa read from the footnotes of a cookbook written by Mabel Simpson in which she describes the escape of a slave, Virgil, who is assisted by Eliza Simpson. Virgil and Eliza find safe harbor in a circus operated by Krusty the Clown, who hides them from slave patrollers by disguising them as circus acts. Krusty asks what talents Virgil possesses, to which he replies that he has music talent and then performs the song, "My Old Kentucky Home" while playing violin.[54] The song also appears in the episode "Rosebud", where a young George Burns sings the song's first line.[55]
Don Henley stated in 2015 for the Los Angeles Times that some of the music he wrote for the Eagles was inspired by the music of Stephen Foster. Henley states that, as a child, his grandmother sang songs such as My Old Kentucky Home. "“My grandmother lived with us. She sat in a rocking chair every day, singing hymns and Stephen Foster songs: ‘My Old Kentucky Home,’ ‘Way Down Upon the Suwanee River’ and ‘The Old Folks At Home,’ and all those very American things. That's probably where I got ‘Desperado.’ If you listen to that melody and those chords ... Billy Joel said to me the minute he heard it, ‘That’s Stephen Foster! I said, ‘OK, fine!’"[57]
Lyrics by Stephen C. Foster
The original Stephen Foster lyrics of the song are:[58][59]
My old Kentucky Home, good-night!
The sun shines bright in the old Kentucky home, 'Tis summer, the darkies are gay, The corn top's ripe and the meadow's in the bloom While the birds make music all the day. The young folks roll on the little cabin floor, All merry, all happy and bright: By'n by Hard Times comes a knocking at the door, Then my old Kentucky Home, good night.
Chorus: Weep no more, my lady, oh! weep no more today! We will sing one song For the old Kentucky Home, For the old Kentucky Home, far away.
My Old Kentucky Home 1926 by the Fleischer Brothers
They hunt no more for the possum and the coon On the meadow, the hill and the shore, They sing no more by the glimmer of the moon, On the bench by the old cabin door. The day goes by like a shadow o'er the heart, With sorrow where all was delight: The time has come when the darkies have to part, Then my old Kentucky Home, good-night!
Chorus.
The head must bow and the back will have to bend, Wherever the darkey may go: A few more days, and the trouble all will end In the field where the sugar-canes grow. A few more days for to tote the weary load, No matter 'twill never be light, A few more days till we totter on the road, Then my old Kentucky Home, good-night!
Stephen Collins Foster, known as "the father of American music", was an American composer known primarily for his parlour and minstrel music during the Romantic period. He wrote more than 200 songs, including "Oh! Susanna", "Hard Times Come Again No More", "Camptown Races", "Old Folks at Home", "My Old Kentucky Home", "Jeanie with the Light Brown Hair", "Old Black Joe", and "Beautiful Dreamer", and many of his compositions remain popular today.
Benjamin Robertson Harney was an American songwriter, entertainer, and pioneer of ragtime music. His 1896 composition "You've Been a Good Old Wagon but You Done Broke Down" is the second ragtime composition to be published and the first ragtime hit to reach the mainstream. The first Ragtime composition published was La Pas Ma La written by Ernest Hogan in 1895. It has been disputed by many historians on whether or not, "You've Been a Good Old Wagon but You Done Broke Down" was released in late 1895 or early 1896. On the front cover of "You've Been a Good Old Wagon but You Done Broke Down", its listed as being copyrighted on 1895. However on the first page, its listed as being copyrighted in 1896. During the early years of Harney's career, he falsely promoted himself as being the inventor of ragtime and never acknowledged the genre's black origin. Many contemporary musicians criticized him for it. Although ragtime is now probably more associated with Scott Joplin, in 1924 The New York Times wrote that Ben Harney "Probably did more to popularize ragtime than any other person." Time magazine called him "Ragtime's Father" in 1938.
The minstrel show, also called minstrelsy, was an American form of theater developed in the early 19th century. The shows were performed by mostly white actors wearing blackface makeup for the purpose of comically portraying racial stereotypes of African Americans. There were also some African-American performers and black-only minstrel groups that formed and toured. Minstrel shows stereotyped blacks as dimwitted, lazy, buffoonish, cowardly, superstitious, and happy-go-lucky. Each show consisted of comic skits, variety acts, dancing, and music performances that depicted people specifically of African descent.
"Old Folks at Home" is a minstrel song written by Stephen Foster in 1851. Since 1935, it has been the official state song of Florida, although in 2008 the original lyrics were revised. It is Roud Folk Song Index no. 13880.
"The Teddy Bears' Picnic" is a song consisting of a melody written in 1907 by American composer John Walter Bratton, and lyrics added in 1932 by Irish songwriter Jimmy Kennedy. It remains popular in Ireland and the United Kingdom as a children's song, having been recorded by numerous artists over the decades. Kennedy lived at Staplegrove Elm and is buried in Staplegrove Church, in Taunton, Somerset, England. Local folklore has it that the small wooded area between the church and Staplegrove Scout Hut was the inspiration for his lyrics.
Arthur Francis Collins was an American baritone who was one of the pioneer recording artists, regarded in his day as "King of the Ragtime Singers".
Byron George Harlan was an American singer from Kansas, a comic minstrel singer and balladeer who often recorded with Arthur Collins. The two together were often billed as "Collins & Harlan".
"Oh! Susanna" is a minstrel song by Stephen Foster (1826–1864), first published in 1848. It is among the most popular American songs ever written. Members of the Western Writers of America chose it as one of the Top 100 Western songs of all time.
"On the Banks of the Wabash, Far Away" was among the best-selling songs of the 19th century, earning over $100,000 from sheet-music revenues. Written and composed by American songwriter Paul Dresser, it was published by the Tin Pan Alley firm of Howley, Haviland and Company in October 1897. The lyrics of the ballad reminisce about life near Dresser's childhood home by the Wabash River in Indiana, United States. The song remained popular for decades, and the Indiana General Assembly adopted it as the official state song on March 14, 1913. The song was the basis for a 1923 film of the same title. Its longtime popularity led to the emergence of several lyrical versions, including an 1898 anti-war song and a Swedish version that was a number-one hit.
"Silver Dagger", with variants such as "Katy Dear", "Molly Dear", "The Green Fields and Meadows", "Awake, Awake, Ye Drowsy Sleepers" and others, is an American folk ballad, whose origins lie possibly in Britain. These songs of different titles are closely related, and two strands in particular became popular in commercial Country music and Folk music recordings of the twentieth century: the "Silver Dagger" version popularised by Joan Baez, and the "Katy Dear" versions popularised by close harmony brother duets such as The Callahan Brothers, The Blue Sky Boys and The Louvin Brothers.
"Old Dan Tucker," also known as "Ole Dan Tucker," "Dan Tucker," and other variants, is an American popular song. Its origins remain obscure; the tune may have come from oral tradition, and the words may have been written by songwriter and performer Dan Emmett. The blackface troupe the Virginia Minstrels popularized "Old Dan Tucker" in 1843, and it quickly became a minstrel hit, behind only "Miss Lucy Long" and "Mary Blane" in popularity during the antebellum period. "Old Dan Tucker" entered the folk vernacular around the same time. Today it is a bluegrass and country music standard. It is no. 390 in the Roud Folk Song Index.
My Old Kentucky Home State Park is a state park located in Bardstown, Kentucky, United States. The park's centerpiece is Federal Hill, a former plantation home owned by United States Senator John Rowan in 1795. During the Rowan family's occupation, the mansion became a meeting place for local politicians and hosted several visiting dignitaries.
"Hesitation Blues" is a popular song adapted from a traditional tune. One version was published by Billy Smythe, Scott Middleton, and Art Gillham. Another was published by W.C. Handy as "Hesitating Blues". Because the tune is traditional, many artists have taken credit as writer, frequently adapting the lyrics of one of the two published versions. Adaptations of the lyrics vary widely, though typically the refrain is recognizably consistent. The song is a jug band standard and is also played as blues and sometimes as Western swing. It is cataloged as Roud Folk Song Index No. 11765. Composer William Grant Still arranged a version of the song in 1916 while working with Handy.
"The Laughing Policeman" is a music hall song recorded by British artist Charles Penrose, initially published under the pseudonym Charles Jolly in 1922. It is an adaptation of "The Laughing Song" first recorded in 1890 by American singer George W. Johnson with the same tune and form, but the subject matter was changed from a "dandy darky" to a policeman. Both "The Laughing Policeman" and "The Laughing Song" were highly popular songs in their times, and "The Laughing Policeman" remained popular in later decades as a children song.
"Man of Constant Sorrow" is a traditional American folk song first published by Dick Burnett, a partially blind fiddler from Kentucky. The song was originally titled "Farewell Song" in a songbook by Burnett dated to around 1913. A version recorded by Emry Arthur in 1928 gave the song its current titles.
"Hard Times Come Again No More" is an American parlor song written by Stephen Foster. It was published in New York City by Firth, Pond & Co. in 1854 as Foster's Melodies No. 28. Well-known and popular in its day, both in the United States and Europe, the song asks the fortunate to consider the plight of the less fortunate and includes one of Foster's favorite images: "a pale drooping maiden".
"Old Black Joe" is a parlor song by Stephen Foster (1826–1864). It was published by Firth, Pond & Co. of New York in 1860. Ken Emerson, author of the book Doo-Dah! (1998), indicates that Foster's fictional Joe was inspired by a servant in the home of Foster's father-in-law, Dr. McDowell of Pittsburgh. The song is not written in dialect.
Tom show is a general term for any play or musical based on the 1852 novel Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe. The novel attempts to depict the harsh reality of slavery. Due to the weak copyright laws at the time, a number of unauthorized plays based on the novel were staged for decades, many of them mocking the novel's social message, and leading to the pejorative term "Uncle Tom".
Carsten Thorvald Woll (1885-1962) was a leading Norwegian-American singer and recording artist of the 1910s and 1920s.
The Stephen Foster Collection and archives are the largest collection of primary source materials on the life and work of composer Stephen Foster. The collection consists of documents and other items of historical interest related to the life and work of Stephen Foster. It resides in the Stephen Foster Memorial at the University of Pittsburgh. Josiah K. Lilly donated an almost complete set of first edition music. The memorial houses sketchbooks and other memorabilia. The process of assembling the collection was methodical, well-organized and funded by various non-governmental and governmental sources. The cost of maintaining the collection is partially funded by the University of Pittsburgh.
References
1 2 Richard Jackson (1974). Stephen Foster song book: original sheet music of 40 songs. Courier Dover Press. p.177.
1 2 Austin, William (1987) [1975]. Susannah Jeanie and the Old Folks at Home: Stephen Foster from his Time to Ours (2nded.). Champaign: University of Illinois Press.
↑ Douglass, Frederick. My Bondage and My Freedom: Part I- Life as a Slave, Part II- Life as a Freeman, with an introduction by James M'Cune Smith. New York and Auburn: Miller, Orton & Mulligan (1855); ed. John Stauffer, Random House (2003) ISBN0-8129-7031-4.
↑ Nicholson, James (March 15, 2012). The Kentucky Derby, How the Run for the Roses Became America's Premiere Sporting Event. Lexington, KY: The University of Kentucky Press. ISBN978-0-8131-3576-2.
↑ Kaiser, Carly (May 4, 2011). "My Old Kentucky Home". University Place Patch. Retrieved October 1, 2016.
↑ Shankle, George Earlie (1941) [1934]. State Names, Flags, Seals, Songs, Birds, Flowers, and Other Symbols (reviseded.). New York: H.W. Wilson. pp.397–398.
↑ Preamble to a 1928 Act of the Kentucky legislatureShankle, George Earlie (1941) [1934]. State Names, Flags, Seals, Songs, Birds, Flowers, and Other Symbols (reviseded.). New York: H.W. Wilson. pp.397–398.
↑ "Japanese students' use of old lyrics angers black House member," The Courier-Journal, March 12, 1986, p.9
↑ "Interview with Carl R. Hines, Sr". Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History. University of Kentucky Libraries: Lexington. Retrieved June 18, 2016. Discussion of the episode begins approximately 82 minutes into the interview. Also see the contemporaneous reporting that appeared in the article written by Bob Johnson in the edition of March 12, 1986, of the Courier-Journal (page 18) and the Associated Press article that appeared in the edition of March 21, 1986, of the Lexington Herald-Leader (page A11). Hines' resolution was House Resolution 159 (1986); Powers' resolution was Senate Resolution 114 (1986).
↑ "Berliner 175 (7-in. single-faced)". Discography of American Historical Recordings. UC Santa Barbara Library. Retrieved June 2, 2016. Note that Berliner issued "My Old Kentucky Home" several times through 1899, with different singers. These re-recordings were released under the same catalog number as the original but with differently-suffixed matrix numbers. For example, the version sung by Weaver has matrix number 175-Z, whereas a later version by Irish tenorGeorge J. Gaskin (recorded in 1897) has matrix number 175-ZZ.
↑ Berliner 129 (1898), Victor 3264 (1901) and Victor 2481 (1903). The two Victor recordings were labeled "fantasies".
↑ Edison Gold Moulded 8818 (1904), Edison Amberol 87 (1909), and Edison Blue Amberol 2239 (1914), all credited to the Edison Concert Band.
↑ MGM Records 30474, part of Smith's Songs of Stephen Foster album (MGM E-106)
↑ Crosby's recording appeared as the B-side on two of his singles—"'Til Reveille" (Decca Records 3886, 1941) and "De Camptown Races" (Decca Records 25129, 1947). It also appeared in his Stephen Foster album (Decca Records A-440 and A-482, both 1946).
↑ Victor Co. of Japan SD-4. This is the same recording that was released by Victor Records in the United States with catalog number 18314. The recording and release dates are unclear, but the physical characteristics of the label for the Japanese release (red label, circular non-scroll border, etc.), as well as the numbering of the American release, suggest that both were issued in the very early 1940s (and certainly before the outbreak of war between Japan and the United States). The recording later appeared on the 1951 LPGreat Combinations (RCA Victor LM 1703).
↑ His Master's Voice B.3653. The recording's entry at the British Library gives the recording date as October 2, 1928 (see item number BLLSA4329674 at www.explore.bl.uk).
↑ Victor Records 18821. Written by Harold Weeks and Abe Brashen.
↑ Victor Records 19240. Written by Clarence Gaskill. Another version of "Happy and Go-Lucky ..." was recorded a few months later by The Happiness Boys, who extended Murray's arrangement by quoting "My Old Kentucky Home" as a countermelody not just in the finale, but also in other parts of the song. That version was issued on Federal Records 5376 (the company not to be confused with the Cincinnati-based Federal Records that operated in the 1950s). It was also issued on Sears, Roebuck's Silvertone label, with catalog number 2376.
↑ Henderson, Clayton W. (2008) [1990]. The Charles Ives Tunebook (seconded.). Bloomington: Indiana University Press. pp.158–159. ISBN978-0-253-35090-9. The march is identified as Ives' third (i.e., "March No.3"). It apparently had not been recorded until 1974, when it appeared on the Yale Theater Orchestra's Old Songs Deranged (Columbia Masterworks M 32969). Because Ives added the Foster quote to a work he had already composed, there are two versions of that march—one that incorporates the melody and one that does not. The version that incorporates the melody also appears on the Detroit Chamber Winds' 1993 album Remembrance: A Charles Ives Collection (Koch International Classics 7182).
↑ "Simpsons scripts: Rosebd (1F01) — Simpsons Crazy". Simpson Crazy. Retrieved September 16, 2020. (sings) Bwa bwa bwa bwa, Oh the sun shines bright on my old Kentucky Home, Bwa bwa bwa bwa... (spoken) Trust me, it'll be funny when I'm an old man.
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