Annotation:Chinky Pin (1)

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CHINKY PIN. AKA and see "Big Muddy," "Big Town Fling," "Buffalo Nickel (1)," "Chinquapin/Chinquipin," "Darling Child," "Farmer Had a Dog (The)," "Fourth of July," "Hair in the Butter," "I'm My Mamma's Darling Child," "Lead Out," "Love Somebody (2)]," "Midnight Serenade (1)," "Missouri Mule," "My Love is but a Lassie Yet (1)," "My Love She's but a Lassie Yet," "Old Kingdom," "Old Mose," "Richmond Blues," "Sweet Sixteen," "Ten Nights in a Bar Room," "Too Young to Marry (1)" "Yellow Eyed Cat." Old-Time, Breakdown. USA, West Virginia. D Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. The melody was directly derived from a traditional fiddle and bagpipe piece in the British Isles, "My Love She's But a Lassie Yet," having myriad titles and variants. Chinquapins are a type of mountain chestnut (white oak or chestnut oak), but the name also refers to its edible nuts. Howard Marshall (MSOTFA Quarterly, "Annals of Fiddling", 1996) says they were a tree employed by early settlers in Missouri and elsewhere for split rail fences and for the logs walls of cabins and other structures. Clark Kessinger was the first to record the melody under the "Chinquapin" title (as "Chinky Pin"), and played it at break-neck speed. Charles Wolfe {1997} states that the name "Chinky Pin" on the record label represents some Brunswick clerks mangling of the name of the type of chestnut called the chinquapin. Bob Palesek, however, suggests another meaning. He was informed by a friend named Art Deems, a West Virginia native, that chinky pin is a term for the company script sometimes given to miners as part of their wages. He still had some samples and lent Palesek some coins to scan, saying: "These came from Davis, West Virginia. Back in the 1920's. This is 1920 to 1938. Well really 19--, when Roosevelt came in-is when they startet to-the first year Roosevelt was in was in '32, and then in 1940 they outlawed all jinky-pin, what we called jinky-pin money. We could go to the store and change that for 80 cents cash and go the next town and spend it. But at home, when you used that in a company store, it was face value..." [Fiddle-L].

"Chinquapin" has the distinction of having the most varied titles of all old-time fiddle tunes, not in small part to the melody's wide dissemination and large number of variants. Tracing its ancestry, Bill Shull (Mo.) finds the root tune to be Scottish fiddler-composer Niel Gow’s (1727-1807) B-flat strathspey “Farewell to Whiskey”, also known in Scotland in a later development as “My Love is But a Lassie.” Imported to America, the tune acquired many derivatives and titles. Gus Meade (liner notes to County 733, Legend of Clark Kessinger) points out relationships to American old-time tunes “Too Young to Marry”, “Too Young to Get Married,” “I am My Momma’s Darling,” “Darling Child” and “Big Town Fling” (a title very similar to a different tune known as “Pig Town Fling”, which is a member of the "Miss McLeaod" tune family). “Chinkapin” or "Lead Out" are the title most common names among Missouri fiddlers in modern times, but it is known in that state by a myriad of other titles as well, according to Howard Marshall (1996). “Old Mose” is idiosyncratic name for the reel from Leonard Smith, Newton County, Mo. (whose father called it by that title), and “Raymondville” is a local title among fiddlers from Texas County, Mo., in honor of a town there. “Leesil” or "Liesel" is a Boone County title (used by Taylor McBaine, for one), derived from (and honoring) fiddler Leesil Bennett, via Wayne Crane. “My Love is But a Lassie”, “Love Somebody”, “Rabbit in the Lettuce Patch” and “Eber Atkins” are northern Missouri titles (Eber Atkins was a local fiddler). “Cat Ate the Handsaw” is a title from Art Galbraith, of southwestern Mo. Bill Shull also gives the Missouri titles “Time for the Old Folks to Go to Bed” and “Ten Nights in a Barroom and What I Saw There.”

Sources for notated versions: Clark Kessinger (W.Va.) [Phillips]; Dean Johnston (1919-2007, Lamar, Barton County, Mo.), learned from his father (who called it "Love Somebody") [Beisswenger & McCann].

Printed sources: Beisswenger & McCann (Ozarks Fiddle Music), 2008; p. 74. Phillips (Traditional American Fiddle Tunes), vol. 1, 1994; p. 50.

Recorded sources: Recorded by Kanawha County, W.Va., fiddler Clark Kessinger in 1929 for Brunswick Records. County 733, "The Legend of Clark Kessinger." Rounder 0436, Dean Johnston - "Traditional Fiddle Music of the Ozarks, vol. 2: On the Springfield Plain" (2000). Voyager 340, Jim Herd - "Old Time Ozark Fiddling."

See also listing at:
Jane Keefer's Folk Music Index: An Index to Recorded Sources [1]

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