Annotation:Old Aunt Jenny with Her Night-Cap On (1)

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X:1 T:Old Aunt Jenny with Her Nightcap on [1] S:Estill Bingham (Ky.) M:C| L:1/8 F:https://www.slippery-hill.com/recording/old-aunt-jenny-her-nightcap Z:Transcribed by Andrew Kuntz K:G B-||BA BA G2 GG|A2G2E3D|BBAA GGBA|D2E2 G4| BBAA GGBB|A2G2E3D|BBAA GGBB|D2E2 G3B|| e4 e4|efgf e2d2|B2B2 dBAA |[M:6/4]G2G2A2G2 E4| [M:C|]e4 e4|efgf e2d2|B2B2 dBAA|[M:6/4]G2B2D2E2 G4||

OLD AUNT JENNY WITH HER NIGHT-CAP ON. Old-Time, Breakdown. USA; West Virginia, Kentucky. G Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AB. Bruce Greene learned the tune from Estill Bingham (1899-1990) of the Hensley Settlement, Pineville, Bell County, Kentucky, near the Cumberland Gap (where Kentucky, Tennessee and Virginia abut one-another). He played it in G Major, although an 'A' major cross-tuned version was played by Kentucky fiddler Lella Todd [1] (1891-1978). Titon (2001) points out that several different tunes go by this title. He recorded Indiana fiddler Clyde Davenport playing a G tune, unrelated to Bingham's Kentucky tune, that he calls "Old Lank Jenny with Her Nightcap On." Bingham was the youngest of thirteen children, and took up the fiddle at age seven.

Sometimes this ditty (in part, a common floating verse) is sung to the tunes (see also Ira Ford's "Old Aunt Jenny"):

Who's been here since I been gone?
Old Aunt Jenny with her nightcap on.

However, the whole tune sounds quite like a song air and may have had more substantial verses to it at one time. The second strain of Bingham's version is 'crooked', in that the cadence of each phrase of the strain has an extra two beats in the measure.

Additional notes

Source for notated version: - Estill Bingham (Pineville, Bell County, Ky., c.1986) [Tition]. According to fiddler Bruce Greene, Bingham learned the tune from an itinerant preacher by the name of Columbus "Lum" Green, who would circuit to the remote area every few months to conduct services, after which he would play the fiddle.

Printed sources : - Titon (Old-Time Kentucky Fiddle Tunes), 2001; No. 111, p. 140.

Recorded sources: -Wilson Douglas - "Fiddle Tunes from Central West Virginia." Shanachie Records 6040, Gerry Milnes & Lorraine Lee Hammond - "Hell Up Coal Holler" (1999. Learned from "old Tom Dillon" of Webster County, W.Va.).

See also listing at:
Jane Keefer's Folk Music Index: An Index to Recorded Sources [2]
Hear Bingham playing the tune at the Berea Sound Archives, recorded by Bob Butler c. 1986 [3], at Slippery Hill [4], and at the Digital Library of Appalachia [5]
Hear Bruce Greene, Don Pedi & John Hermann playing the tune at Berea Sound Archives [6]
See/hear a version of Bingham's tune played on youtube.com [7]

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