Annotation:Little Brown Hand

LITTLE BROWN HAND. AKA and see "Brown Leaf Rag," "Her Little Brown Hand," "I Took Her by Her Little Brown Hand." American, Reel (cut time). G Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). ABB. "Her Little Brown Hand" is a 1938 'coon' song and instrumental from Tennessee's wikipedia:Fiddlin'_Arthur_Smith, accompanied by the Delmore Brothers. It has a racist word that was edited out by the time the tune was recorded in the early 1950's by Jim Eanes (1923-1995). The words begin:

I had a log cabin way down in Tennessee,
The morning glories hanging ‘round the door;
Prettiest little [coon] gal you ever did see
She’s been my lady friend a year or more.

Chorus:
Now honey, more than once I caught your big eyes a-roamin’,
Just to give me your little brown hand;
If you’ll be my mrs., we’ll live on love and kisses,
Honey does you love your man.

Two little children of long, long ago,
Used to play together in the sand;
One evening when the sun was gettin’ very low,
I took her by her little brown hand.

The melody (as an instrumental) was in the repertoire of southwestern Virginia fiddler Albert Hash (1917-1985), learned from the playing of Tennessee's Fiddlin' Arthur Smith. It was one of his favorite tunes to play, and he was of the opinion that "it had an awful lot of fiddling in it, more than you would think."

Additional notes

Recorded sources : - BeeBalm 303, "The Corndrinkers Still." Bluebird 7547 (78 RPM), Arthur Smith Trio (Delmore Brothers) (1938). Decca Records, Jim Eanes & the Shenandoah Valley Boys (1952). Albert Hash - "I Wonder If I Can Git Ya To Tell Me That Story Of How Ya Made Yer First Fiddle" (). Field Recorders' Collective FRC411, "Albert Hash." Montgomery Ward M-747 (78 RPM), Fiddlin' Arthur Smith (1938). Mountain Records, "Albert Hash And Whitetop Mountain Boys".

See also listing at :
Hear Albert Hash's recording at Slippery Hill [1]
Hear Arthur Smith's 1938 recording at Archive.org [2]

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