Annotation:Holly Ding
X:0 T: No Score C: The Traditional Tune Archive M: K: x
HOLLY DING. AKA - "Hollading," "Holliding." AKA and see "Holliding Cindy," "Backstep Cindy," "Old Time Step Back Cindy." American, Reel. USA; southwest Va., western N.C. D Major. A Galax, Va., region stand-by, usually played as a banjo piece. Ray Alden (1981) believes it to be "one of the many dance tunes that made its way down through Virginia into the Round Peak section of North Carolina at the turn of the century." Tommy Jarrell has pointed out that this family of melodies is known as "Holly Ding" above the "Mountain" (the Blue Ridge chain separating NC and VA) and "Back Step Cindy" below the "Mountain" (Jarrell's "Old Time Step Back Cindy" is melodically related to Wade Ward's "Hollyding"). Noted to have been in the repertoire of the Wagoner Family of Sparta, N.C.
The title "Holly Ding" comes from a verse set to the melody which goes: Hollyding! Step back and swing. Thomas Talley (1870-), in his book Negro Folk Rhymes (originally published 1922, republished in 1991 edited by Charles Wolfe), recalls that it was known in the middle Tennessee African-American community he grew up in since slavery times. His "Holly Dink" (sic) was performed in a call and response format:
Oh now swing yo' partner, Holly Dink,
I sure love Doney. Holly Dink.
Over time the words were lost, with only the response portion retained in the title of the tune. Kerry Blech points out that Talley's lyric fragments scan well to the Tommy Jarrell tune "Old Time Step Back Cindy," melodically related to the Wade Ward version.
