August 17, 2007 • 7:56 pm
My walking shoes
My walking shoes don't fit me anymore
My walking shoes don't fit me anymore
Stay on your side of town, honey, I won't be around
My walking shoes don't fit me anymore
It's long way from here to over yonder
My feet they're getting mighty sore
I ain't coming back you've made your mind to wander
My walking shoes don't fit me anymore
* Refrain
I'll be a longtime gone from you baby
You'll never here me knock upon your door
I thought you were worth it once but I was crazy
My walking shoes don't fit me anymore
Filed under: My Walking Shoes, Show Notes & Song References
| Clinch Mountain Backstep
Here are two approaches to the bluegrass classic, Clinch Mountain Backstep. Most bands play this tune in the style of the original recording by the Stanley Brothers. The first version below is a straightforward bluegrass arrangement. If you are not already familiar with Clinch Mountain Backstep watch out for the extra half bar in the second part of the tune.
Most bands play Clinch Mountain Backstep in the key of A, which works out fine for the mandolin and fiddle. However, interestingly, the original recording, on the classic LP The Stanley Brothers and the Clinch Mountain Boys, King 615, is in G sharp. I guess they were playing in G fingering with the instruments tuned up half a tone. Can anyone shed further light on this, please? As Clinch Mountain Backstep started life as a banjo instrumental played in standard open G tuning, a banjo player will often launch into the tune without putting on his capo at the second fret. This presents us mandolin (and fiddle) players with the problem of transposing, as we bravely do everything without a capo.
When I was working up a version of Clinch Mountain Backstep in G, it seemed to come out as a minor key tune. (The usual description of the bluegrass version is “modal”.) Hence the second arrangement below is notated with chords in the key of G minor, in the style of recordings of Clinch Mountain Backstep by the British banjo player Pete Stanley. (The surname is co-incidental – Pete is not Ralph’s long-lost cousin.) You can hear Pete playing Clinch Mountain Backstep on the CD re-release of his 1966 LP with Wizz Jones, More Than Sixteen Tons of Bluegrass. Pete uses a modal banjo tuning gDGCD for his version of CMB.
Another interesting variant of Clinch Mountain Backstep is the Dillards’ song, Go The Whole World Round, which they sing in F sharp minor. You can hear this song on the excellent CD re-release of the classic LP The Dillards Live – Almost!, coupled with Back Porch Bluegrass.
You will find lots more ideas for Clinch Mountain Backstep in the tabs at CoMando and Nigel Gatherer’s site. I urge you to download these as well and to work through them, then come up with your own arrangement. That’s what playing bluegrass is all about.
The original Stanley Brothers recording of Clinch Mountain Backstep is moderately fast, at about 138 half note beats per minute. However, it can also sound good played faster or slower. Just enjoy playing this classic bluegrass instrumental your own way! |
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Filed under: Clinch Mountain Backstep, Show Notes & Song References
Peaches in the summertime
Apples in the fall
If I can’t get the girl I love
I don’t want none at all
Chorus
Shady grove, my little love
Shady grove, I know
Shady grove, my little love
I’m bound for shady grove
Wish I had a banjo string
Made of golden twine
Every tune I’d play on it
I wish that girl were mine
[chorus]
Wish I had a needle and thread
Fine as I could sew
I’d sew that pretty girl to my side
And down the road I’d go
[chorus]
Some come here to fiddle and dance
Sme come here to tarry
Some come here to fiddle and dance
I come here to marry
[chorus]
Every night when I go home
My wife, I try to please her
The more I try, the worse she gets
Damned if I don’t leave her
Filed under: Shady Grove, Show Notes & Song References
The Long Black Veil
[G]Ten years ago on a cold dark night
There was [D]someone killed ‘neath the [C]town hall [G]light
There were few at the scene, but they all agree
That the [D]slayer who ran, looked a [C]lot like [G]me
The judge said, “Son, what is your alibi,”
“If you were [D]somewhere else then [C]you don’t have to [G]die”
I spoke not a word, though it meant my life
For I had [D]been in the arms of my [C]best friends [G]wife
Chorus:
She [C]walks these [G]hills
In a [C]long black [G]veil
She [C]visits my [D]grave
When the [C]night winds [G]wail
Nobody knows, [C]nobody [G]sees,
[C]Nobody [D]knows but [G]me
The scaffold’s high and eternity near
She stood in the crowd and shed not a tear
But sometimes at night when the cold wind moans
In a long black veil, she cries o’er my bones
Chorus
Nobody knows but me
Filed under: Long Black Veil, Show Notes & Song References
