Annotation:Mabel
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MABEL. AKA and see "Dubuque." Old-Time, Breakdown. The tune has a variety of titles in American tradition, of which perhaps "Dubuque" is the best known, but also includes "Duck River," "Fiddling Phil/Phiddlin' Phil," "Five Miles Out of Town," "General Lee," "Muddy Road to Kansas," "Old Dubuque," and "Sally in the Green Corn." The "Off to California" tune family is a related group of tunes.
"Mabel" comes from the playing of Texas rancher and fiddler Elmo Newcomber, who was recorded at his home near Pipe Creek, Bandera, County, by John Lomax during a 1939 field recording trip. Newcomber also had a reputation as a fine dance caller and was much in demand in his county. According to Lomax's field notes (located at American Memory [lcweb2.loc.gov/afc/afcss39/fn0001/fn0001.sgm] ):
The fiddle tunes and breakdowns on this record were played and sung by Elmo Newcomor, in his ranch home on the San Antonio-Bandera Road, near Pipe Creek, Texas, Bandera Co., May 3, 1939. Mr. Newcomer was introduced to Mr. Lomax by J. Marvin Hunter, editor of Frontier Times and Director of the Frontier Times Museum in Bandera, Texas. Mr. Newcomer and his family of wife and four children live in a very old two-room house, where Mr. Newcomer lived from the age of two, and where his mother died when he was four. He has "always" played these tunes and is a favorite caller at dances. His Rye Whiskey with antics is a general favorite at fiddle contests. Mrs. Newcomer is a member of the school trustees of Pipe Creek.
Newcomber sang these couplets with the melody:
Glory to the Meetinghouse and glory to the stable,
Glory to the little girl that they call Mable.
Love it is a an awful thing and beauty is a blossum,
If you want your finger bit just poke it at a 'possum.
Source for notated version:
Printed sources:
Recorded sources: Rounder CD0262, Mike Seeger - "Fresh Oldtime String Band Music" (1988. Learned from a 1939 recording by Elmo Newcomer, Pipe Creek, Texas, recorded by John and Rudy Lomax for the Library of Congress).
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