"Dixie"-the song

[liberaltrucker]

*dons flame-proof suit*

The lyrics are nowhere near racist. Silly to our contemporary
ears, maybe, since they were written in the late 1800's by a
Virginia transplant to New Hampshire. He was homesick.

I understand people's feelings. After all, usually when it's
played, the Confederate flag flies(pisses me off, too).
Anyhoo, here's the lyrics. You decide.



O, I wish I was in the land of cotton
Old times there are not forgotten
Look away! Look away!
Look away! Dixie Land.

In Dixie Land where I was born in
Early on one frosty mornin'
Look away! Look away!
Look away! Dixie Land.

Chorus:
O, I wish I was in Dixie!
Hooray! Hooray!
In Dixie Land I'll take my stand
To live and die in Dixie
Away, away,
Away down south in Dixie!

Old Missus marry Will, the weaver,
William was a gay deceiver
Look away! Look away!
Look away! Dixie Land.

But when he put his arm around her
He smiled as fierce as a forty pounder
Look away! Look away!
Look away! Dixie Land.

Chorus:
O, I wish I was in Dixie!
Hooray! Hooray!
In Dixie Land I'll take my stand
To live and die in Dixie
Away, away,
Away down south in Dixie!

His face was sharp as a butcher's cleaver
But that did not seem to grieve her
Look away! Look away!
Look away! Dixie Land.
Old Missus acted the foolish part
And died for a man that broke her heart
Look away! Look away!
Look away! Dixie Land.


:hide:

[txwhitedove]

1. It was a nice, friendly night. But NO, ya just had to......

Where's my Popcorn Clique???

[CaliforniaPeggy]

2. My dear liberaltrucker!

Well, I have always liked those lyrics.......

To me, they represent something better than what we have today....

No flaming from me!

:loveya: :hug:

[txwhitedove]

3. I'm just tired of the Texas and Southerner bashing.

[liberaltrucker]

4. You and me both, tx

But it's folks like us who can change things.
It'll take time, but our progeny will benefit.

[txwhitedove]

7. I grew up singing Dixie, along with the great Woody Guthrie songs.

Being a Southerner, I can understand both sides - why some see the song and flag as bad, but most Southerners just see it as part of their heritage. Good or bad, your heritage is who you are, and it is history. How sad if we are all one day homogenized under only one flag, one language, one belief, probably eating TOFU...., gag me. Oh woe.

[liberaltrucker]

9. You, Texas. Me, Alabama

The South's gonna rise again, but in a good way.

:toast:

[txwhitedove]

10. I sure hope so, LT, but H.Katrina set us back 10-years. Bush set

us back, what, clear back to 1950's???

[liberaltrucker]

5. You got that right!

:hug:

[Aristus]

6. I think the lyrics were originally printed in an exaggerated

African-American dialect. That's where the racism charge stems from.

"Oh I wish I war in de lan' ob cotton
Ole time dar am not forgotten..."

Something like that.

[txwhitedove]

8. Like Tom Sawyer as Mark Twain orginally wrote it?

I recently ordered some books written very early 1900's in much the same dialect.
A quote referred to the language and "mammyisms". I just remember the books as
hysterically funny, so am anxious to re-read and compare with wisdom of age.

[liberaltrucker]

11. I've heard that....

But even then, it's not racist. I grew up in rural Alabama.
The dialect you mention(and darned accurately) isn't exclusively
African American. White folks of the same era spoke pretty much
the same dialect (oh how I wish I could've recorded my great-grandma's
voice!).

[KitchenWitch]

12. This Yank has always loved "Dixie"

[Aristus]

13. My favorite rural American folk song always has been and always will

be "Shenandoah". It's so beautiful it just makes me ache.

[liberaltrucker]

19. Hi KW!!

Long time, no see.

:(

:hug:

[KitchenWitch]

20. Yeah, yeah

Busy Busy Busy!

[liberaltrucker]

23. ......

:patriot:

[wildhorses]

14. whassup are they bashing us southerners in GD tonight?

of course I love this song...dixieland is my heritage and I have faith that from our past we can learn and possibly lead this nation into a brighter future...to wit: Ava (need I say more?):patriot:

[txwhitedove]

15. Bravo, wildhorses, exactly right. No bashing tonight, just a lot in

last few weeks.

[unsavedtrash]

16. It was a comfort song that I thought about and hummed to myself when I was

outside the South. I never thought of it as a racist song.

[norml]

17. Those are the cleaned up lyrics. Try this version.

Dixie's Land
(Daniel Decatur Emmett)

Away down south in de land ob cotton
Old times dar am not forgotten
Look away! Look away!
Look away! Dixie Land.
In Dixie Land where I was born in
Early on a frosty mornin'
Look away! Look away!
Look away! Dixie Land.

cho: Den I wish I was in Dixie
Hooray! Hooray!
In Dixie Land I'll take my stand
To lib and die in Dixie,
Away, away, away down south in Dixie.
Away, away, away down south in Dixie.

Ole missus marry "Will de Weaber,"
William was a gay deceiber;
Look away! Look away!
Look away! Dixie Land.
But when he put his arm around 'er,
He smiled as fierce as a forty pounder,
Look away! Look away!
Look away! Dixie Land.

His face was sharp as a butcher's cleaber,
But dat did not seem to greab' er;
Look away, etc.
Ole missus acted de foolish part,
And died for a man dat broke her heart,
Look away, etc.

Now here's a health to the next old Missus,
An' all de gals dat want to kiss us;
Look away, etc.
But if you want to drive 'way sorrow,
Come and hear dis song tomorrow,
Look away, etc.

Dar's buckwheat cakes and Injun batter,
Makes you fat or a little fatter;
Look away, etc.
Den hoe it down an' scratch your grabble,
To Dixie's Land I'm bound to trabble,
Look away, etc.

RG

snip

http://sniff.numachi.com/~rickheit/dtrad/pages/tiDIXIELND;ttDIXIELND.html

[liberaltrucker]

18. See post 11

nt

[Robeson]

21. As a General, Grant ruled!....

...:D

[liberaltrucker]

22. Yup, he never ran from a strategic bottle

:)

[Robeson]

24. To use a famous quote from Al Davis, all he ever did....

...was "win baby", just "win baby"! Best General the Civil War produced...:D

[liberaltrucker]

25. Uh, make that the Waw of Nawdn Greshun

:)

An', by da way, Gen Lee finished ahead o' Mista Grant
at dat dare West Pint. Dat make us all Murkins now, y'all
heah?

:toast:

[Hissyspit]

26. Possibly written by black men:

http://www.npr.org/programs/morning/features/patc/dixie/


Nov. 11, 2002 -- "Dixie" -- a song strongly identified with the South -- stirs emotion and exposes timeworn rifts across American society.

It has been that way almost since "Dixie" was born in the days just before the Civil War. Adopted as a Confederate anthem, it was offered up by President Abraham Lincoln as a gesture of reconciliation after the war. It's accepted with affection by many whites and scorned by many blacks. And yet it's been recorded by everyone from Elvis Presley to the Robert Shaw chorale.

- snip -

The song that provokes such contrasting responses also has more than one version of its creation.

Authorship is credited to Daniel Decatur Emmett, a native of Mount Vernon, Ohio, who was a member of a group called Bryant's Minstrels. But some believe "Dixie" was really a tune passed on to Emmett by a pair of African-American brothers born to parents who were slaves. Emmett wrote such early American standards as "Turkey in the Straw" and "Blue-Tail Fly." Johnston reports that in 1859, while Emmett was living and performing in New York City, he was asked to write a new song. "Dixie" was the result. A hit in New York, it caught on across the country within a year.

"Dixie" wasn't meant to be serious. It was a minstrel tune, performed in blackface. But as war divided the nation, a song initially embraced by all sorts of Americans -- including the man trying to preserve the union -- became more and more identified with the South.

By 1862, the region had become popularly known as "Dixie," though a variety of elements apart from the song may have influenced the nickname. Despite its prompt association with the southern cause, "Dixie" remained one of President Lincoln's favorite tunes. Historian Cheryl Thurber says the very day the South surrendered, Lincoln asked a band to play "Dixie" for crowds gathered outside the White House.

To many African-Americans, "Dixie" is a symbol of racism and slavery. Thomasina Neely-Chandler, an ethnomusicologist and music professor at Spelman College in Atlanta, says the important thing to remember is that "Dixie" is a harmful misrepresentation of blacks. "It's not the song or the text," Neely-Chandler says, "So much as how it's used in a distorted way to present a particular people with an image that really doesn't represent them."

MORE AT THE LINK

[liberaltrucker]

28. HEHEHE...

Kharmic justice don't y'all know. :evilgrin:

[Hissyspit]

27. So the possibility that Emmett learned "Dixie" from black musicians...

"So the possibility that Emmett learned "Dixie" from Ben and Lew Snowden -- a pair of black musicians he knew from his hometown -- carries its own irony. The Snowdens' parents had been slaves in Maryland, but by the 1820s were living outside Mount Vernon, Ohio, not far from where Dan Emmett's family lived."

[alcibiades_mystery]

29. You'll get as far as the Emmitsburg Road with that one

And not much farther...

:rofl: