Black-Boy Davy- Chisholm (VA) 1916 Sharp G
[Single stanza from: English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians, collected by Cecil J. Sharp also Olive Dame Campbell. Edited by Maud Karpeles, Volume I, published 1917, 1932. Notes from 1932 edition follow, then Sharp's diary entry.
Additional stanza in Davis TBVA, 1929.
R. Matteson 2015]
Notes No. 33. The Gypsy Laddie.
Texts without tunes:—-Child's English and Scottish Popular Ballads, No. 200. C. S. Burne's Shropshire Folk-Lore, p. 550. Gavin Greig's Folk-Song of the North-East, ii, art. 110. Irish and English broadsides. Garret's Merrie Book o' Garlands, vol. i. A. Williams's Folk Songs of the Upper Thames, p. 120. Journal of American Folk-Lore, xix. 294; xxiv. 346; xxv. 171-5. Broadside by H. de Marsan, New York (a comic parody).
Texts with tunes:—-Songs of the West, 2nd ed., No. 50. Folk Songs from Somerset, No. 9 (also published English Folk Songs, Selected Edition, i. 13, and One Hundred English Folk-Songs, p. 13). Gavin Greig's Last Leaves, No. 60. Scots Musical Museum, ii, No. 181. Cox's Folk Songs of the South, pp. 130 and 524. Journal of American Folk-Lore, xviii. 191 ; xxii. 80 (tune only) ; xxx. 323. British Ballads from Maine, p. 269. Davis's Traditional Ballads of Virginia, pp. 423 and 590. McGill's Folk Songs of the Kentucky Mountains, p. 15. Sandburg's American Songbag, p. 311.
Version A is published with pianoforte accompaniment in Folk Songs of English Origin, 2nd Series.
The first two lines of the second stanza of text A provide a good instance of the stereotyped idiom of the ballad. Owing to the almost invariable description of a 'steed' as 'milk-white' the term has come to lose its literal significance, and in the mind of the singer a 'milk-white steed' means merely a horse. Similarly the folk will sing without any sense of contradiction of a 'false true lover.'
Sharp diary 1916 page 290. Wednesday 27 September 1916 - Charlottesville
Took Alphonso Smith with us in our motor to Woodridge and collected quite a lot of songs from the Chisholm & Smith clan, returning home about 4.30. Wrote out tunes in my book and then after dinner went to the University where I addressed several members of the faculty at their private Club meeting. Bed at 11.30 pretty tired.
G. [Black-Boy Davy] Sung by Mr. N. B. CHISHOLM at Woodridge, Va., Sept. 27, 1916
Heptatonic. Mode I, a + b (mixolydian).
1. "O Davy, I'm so glad t o meet you[1],
I've got something to tell you that will fret you:
Way down there at the old barn door,
I saw your wife about a week ago.
Ta - de - ra etc.
2. Then he went un to the house
Enquiring for his lady[2];
The answer that she made to him:
She's gone with the black-boy Davy
Ta - de - ra etc.
1. First stanza from TBVA, 1929, version H
2. MS has baby.