Cowboy Waltz (1)
COWBOY WALTZ [1]. AKA and see "Cavalier's Waltz." Old-Time, Waltz. D Major. Standard tuning. ABB' (Phillips/1995): AABB (Phillips/1989). A simplified version of "Keller's Walz." Paul Tyler (Fiddle-L, 02/02/06) remarks that the 'A' and 'B' strains of the tune are each reminiscent of other tunes. The 'A' strain, for example, reminds of Eddy Arnold's pop song "Cattle Call," and Tyler also hears a "Minnesota Dutchman" waltz recorded as the "St. Paul's Waltz" by Whoopee John Wilfhart. "I first heard it played by Herman Fox," writes Tyler, "an old German concertinist in Fort Wayne, Indiana, who I met in 1976. (Indiana fiddler) Lotus Dickey played a similar tune. Herman sang a snatch of German lyrics in referring to the tune. He also called it 'Cheese, Cheese, Limburger Cheese'. Bruno Rudzinski, a wild Polish concertinist from Chicago who recorded in 1928 played that strain as the 'Pawel Waltz'." These different, but related melodies may have had a common ancestor in German tradition. Paul Gifford says he believes the melody was in circulation "among children of Germans who came to Ravenna, Michigan, after the Civil War."
Source for notated version: Mike Seegar and Mosheh Savitsky [Phillips].
Printed sources: Phillips (Fiddle Case Tunebook: Old Time Southern), 1989; pp. 12–13. Phillips (Traditional American Fiddle Tunes, vol. 2), 1995; p. 247.
Recorded sources:
Folkways FA 2492, New Lost City Ramblers – "String Band Instrumentals" (1964. Learned from a Folkways recording called "Woody Guthrie and Friends").
New Lost City Ramblers – "Out Standing in their Field."