Barbara Allen- Dan Tate (VA) 1962 REC
[From the Album, Virginia Traditions: Ballads from British Tradition, 1978 Dan Tate BRI00002_107 track 7, "Barbara Allen."
Liner notes follow,
R. Matteson 2015]
7. BARBARA ALLEN [Bonnie Barbara Allen, Child 84] - Dan Tate, vocal. Recorded in Fancy Gap [Carroll County], Virginia, July 10, 1962, by George Foss. 2:46.
Barbara Allen is the most widely known Child ballad in America. To list the places where it has been collected and the number of versions collected in each place would try the endurance of even the most avid ballad fan. Its existence in Virginia has been well documented; the Virginia Folklore Society alone has collected over 115 examples of the song. It has been noted, however,
that the song is sometimes hard to find in the North, leading some to conclude the ballad owes at least some of its popularity to its publication in a number of popular mid-nineteenth century southern song books such as The Charleston Warbler and The Virginia Warbler [Not really]. Scholars have so far been unable to find any Continental analogues to this ballad; it seems to be an entirely British, Scottish, and American product. Its antiquity, however, cannot be questioned. Pepys in 1666 praised the "little Scotch song of Barbary
Allen" and Goldsmith, a century later, did the
same in more flowery language, The last verse of
this ballad, the "rose wrapped 'round the briar"
normally associated with Barbara Allen and so
admired by Dan, has, in fact, been lifted from
another ballad, probably "Fair Margaret and
Sweet William," for Child did not print it in any of
his versions.
Dan Tate, well known for his large repertoire
of old songs and tunes among folksong enthusiasts,
sings in the same smooth, controlled style
as do Ruby Bowman and Eunice McAlexander.
He is also a fine banjo player and proves the
exception to Cecil Sharp'S contention that banjo
music and ballad singing are incompatible.
It was early. early in the fall
When the yellow leaves were falling.
When sweet Willie on his death bed lay,
For the love of Barbara Allen.
He sent his servant through the town
To the place where she was dwelling,
"Alas my master calls for you
If your name be Barbara Allen."
They hadn't got more than half through town
When she heard the death bells ringing
And every one it seemed to say,
"Hard-hearted Barbara Allen. "
"Oh yes I'm sick, I'm sick indeed
And death on me is dwelling.
And never better will I be,
If I can't get Barbara Allen."
"Oh yes you're sick, and sick indeed,
And death on you is dwelling,
And never better will you be,
For you can't get Barbara Allen."
She hadn't got more than a mile from town,
Till she saw the corpse a-coming,
"Please set him down here by my side,
That I may look upon him. "
The more she looked the more she wept,
When she fell to the ground a-crying,
Saying. ''Take me up and carry me home,
For I think that I am dying."
They buried her in the old church yard,
They buried sweet Willie nigh her,
And out of his bosom sprang a red, red rose,
And out of hers a briar.
They grew till they came to the top of the church,
And they could not grow any higher,
They locked, they tied in a true lover's knot,
And the rose wrapped round the briar.
"I don't think the last words of that song can be
beat. "
SELECTED DISCOGRAPHY:
George Tucker. "Barbara Ellen." Rounder 0064. Glen Neaves and the Virginia Mountain Boys. Folkways FS 3830. J. B. Cornett. Mountain Music of Kentucky. Folkways FA 2317. Roscoe Holcomb. "Barbara Allen Blues," High Lonesome Sound. Folkways FA 2368.
The Lilly Brothers and Don Stover. Folkways FA 2433. Rebecca Tarwater. Anglo-American Ballads, Library of Congress L 1.
Versions and Variants of Barbara Allen. Thirty artists. Library of Congress L 54.