Annotation:Where's that Nigger with the White Man's Wife?
X:1 T:Where's that N____ with he White Man's Wife? T:Miscegenation M:2/4 L:1/8 Z:Transcribed by Andrew Kuntz K:G D/(E/G/)A/ (B/A/)B/(B/|A/)(D/G) (G/[GB])(A|B)/A/B/(B/ d/A/)B/(B/| A/)[GB][G/B/] [G/B/][G/A/][G/B/]G/|D/(E/G/)A/ (B/A/)B/(B/|A/)(D/G) (G/[GB])(A| B/)A/B/B/ d/A/B/B/|A/[GB][G/B/] [GB]d||(e/e)(e/ e)(e|e/)(e/g) d>(A| B/)A/B/B/ d/A/B/B/|A/[GB][G/B/] [GB]d|( e/e)(e/ e)(e| e/)(e/g) d>(A|B/)A/B/B/ e/A/B/B/|A/[GB][G/B/] [G/B/]A/[G/B/]G/||
WHERE'S THAT N_____ WITH THE WHITE MAN'S WIFE?[1] AKA - "N_____ ran off with the White Man's Wife," "Miscegenation." American, Reel (2/4 time). USA. G Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. The source for the tune (which begins on the subdominant chord, 'C' major) and title was Ethel Harmon "Red" Abbott, of Mattoon, Coles County, east-central Illinois, born in 1895 in Old Lebanon, Missouri, and brother to another musical informant, Jess Abbott[2]. It was collected in 1979 by musician and regional collector Gary Harrison. "Miscegenation" is an alternate title proposed for the tune, in an attempt to distance its racist origins. Rayna Gellert's solution was to call it "Where's that Preacher with the Rabbi's Wife?" on her "Ways of the World" recording.
Folklorist Stephen Green mentions the tune[3] in his analysis of the interrelated titles of American fiddle tunes:
The source field recording for the above tune provides only a brief (perhaps fragmentary) rendition, and again, though we have no lyrics other than the title spoken by Mr. Abbott, there are clear melodic links to other tunes in our study complex. The fine strain of "Where’s that N_____ with the White Man’s Wife" is nearly identical to the fine strain of Clyde Davenport's "Cornstalk Fiddle and a Shoestring Bow". The coarse strain of Abbott’s piece appears to be melodically truncated with only the final four (of an implied eight) measures being played. Even so, those measures closely match the final four coarse strain measures of Christeson's "Sugar in the Coffee" and Ford’s "Cotton Eyed Joe (1)."
Green also points out the similarity of Abbott's name for the tune with a trope in old-time music. The phrase "...be my wife" crops up in a number of songs, ditties, and fiddle tunes, as in "I asked that pretty girl to be my wife." These word tropes are binary in nature, so that parts of the phrase are often altered or substituted, or words otherwise substituted, while still scanning to the same musical beat. For example, he points out the musician and field recorder Bruce Greene once heard a Kentucky fiddler he recorded in the 1970's sing:
Rich man killed a poor man's wife
Cut her in two with a barlow knife.
Similarly, Estill Bingham, of Bell County, Kentucky, and elderly fiddler recorded by Bob Butler in the 1980s, played a piece he called "Rich Man Stole the Poor Man's Wife." In this context, Abbott's title "Where's that N_____ with the White Man's Wife" is another variant of the metrical trope phrase.
- ↑ Some of items in the Traditional Tune Archive may contain offensive language or negative stereotypes. Such materials should be seen in the context of the time period and as a reflection of the attitudes of the time. The items are part of the historical record, and do not represent the views of the administrators of this site.
- ↑ "Red" Abbott's son, John Franklin Abbott (b. 1938), wrote this excerpted sketch [1] of the Abbott family: "My family was extremely poor and my mother gave me birth at home in a two-room shack on a day which I’ve been told was very cold and snowy. I was the eighth and last child of Ethel Harmon Abbott and Esther Eleanor Clayton. I will insert their place and date of birth here: Ethel Harmon Abbott was born November 20, 1895 in Lebanon, Leclede County, Missouri, Esther Eleanor Clayton was born September 21, 1897 near Sullivan, Moultrie County, Illinois. Getting back to my family, I will list my brothers and sisters from the oldest to the youngest. James Harmon, Charles Edward, Marvin Dale, Betty Jane, Wilma Jean, Oliver Dean, Cecil Francis and myself. Let me say here that Marvin Dale died at age nine years old and before I was born. Life was extremely difficult for me as a little boy because we were very poor, and the reason for that being that my dad had trouble finding work because he had no education. All his life he could just barely write his name. But it makes no difference as to how hard life was, Mom and Dad loved us. We lived in Sullivan until April of 1948, at which time we moved out in the country about four miles from Mattoon, on a little farm of about eight acres. It was southwest of town near what was called then Paradise Lake. Our house was way back off the road and right back near the woods. My dad loved to raccoon hunt and he almost always had a couple of raccoon hounds around the house. His favorites at the time were two Redbones named Dan and Boone. My fondest memories are of nice warm summer nights when Dad would light his coal-oil lantern and we would go raccoon hunting. We would take off into the woods and listen to those dogs bellow as they picked up the trail of a big raccoon. Dad would sit down under a tree for a while and almost every time I would listen to the dogs for a while, then fall over in his lap asleep. He would wake me up when they ”treed,” and oh, that is the prettiest sound of all to hear those hounds baying that special sound which tells you that they have found the tree where that ole raccoon is hiding. Since I am talking about my day and my early life as a boy, I will add this part. He was an “old time” fiddle player and some other great memories are of wintertime when it was cold and the snow was deep. In the evening our whole family would sit around a wood-burning heating stove with coal-oil lamps for light and listen to Dad play all these old-time fiddle pieces: Arkansas Traveler, Irish Washer Woman, Red Wing, Pop Goes the Weasel, Leather Britches, and many, many more. Although we were poor and food was scarce and our clothes were ragged, we managed to get by and everything went along fine until 1951 when Mom died.
- ↑ Stephen Green (Archivist, Western Folklife Center, Elko, Nevada), "Title, Test, and Tune Interrelations in American Fiddle Music"