BUTCHER'S BOY, THE

Created on 14/06/2003
Latest update on 07/01/2024

Artist: Kelly Harrell
Author: traditional
Label: Victor
Year: 1925

Murder ballad. Roud #77 (also as Brisk Young Sailor, Bold Young Farmer, Died For Love and I Wish My Baby Was Born while in America as The Railroad Boy en Go Dig My Grave). Kelly recorded Butcher Boy twice; once without-, once with electricity. Reissued on JSP box set Worried Blues. Harrell wrote Away Out In The Mountain, a big hit for Jimmie Rodgers.

Covers:

1928:

Buell Kazee [as The Butcher Boy; version also appeared on Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music]

1929:

Henry Whitter

1940:

Blue Sky Boys

1940s:

Almeda Riddle

1955:

Peggy Seeger

1956:

Ewan MacColl

1959:

Shirley Collins [as Died For Love]

1960s:

Jeannie Robertson

1960s:

Dave Van Ronk

1961:

Joan Baez [as The Railroad Boy; Joan & Bob performed it together during the Rolling Thunder Tour in '76]

1961:

Clancy Brothers & Tommy Makem

1961:

Bob Dylan [as Railroad Boy on Minnesota Tape I]

1962:

Frank Proffitt [as Morning Fair]

1963:

Jody Miller [as The Railroad Boy]

1963:

Jean Ritchie & Doc Watson [as Go Dig My Grave]

1969:

Martin Carthy [as Died For Love]

1972:

Blues Project [as Railroad Boy]

1976:

Richard & Linda Thompson [as Died For Love]

1979:

Dan Crary

1980:

John Renbourn [als A Bold Young Farmer]

1997:

Sinéad O'Connor

1998:

Kirsty MacColl [on the audiocassette version of Patrick McCabe's novel The Butcher Boy]

1998:

Ginny Hawker

2000:

Lambchop

2003:

Damien Jurado [on Holding His Breath EP]

2006:

Elvis Costello [on The Harry Smith Project Revisited]

2009:

Gov't Mule [as Railroad Boy]

2010:

Brendan Croker & Bruno Deneckere [live]

2010:

Gráda

2011:

Ollabelle

2016:

Unthanks [as Died For Love]

2017:

Kronos Quartet & Natalie Merchant

2019:

Golden Glows

2022:

Mary Wallopers [the Clancy Brothers way]

2023:

Lankum [as Go Dig My Grave]

The storyline of the young woman more inclined to hang herself than to admit her pregnancy, echoes 18th century old English ballads as The Cruel Father, There's An Ale House In Yonder Town, In London City Where I Did Dwell and In Tarrytown. The story also circulated as a broadside in the 18th century (The Berkshire Tragedy and The Wittam Miller). The Butcher Boy is also an Irish film and an Irish bestselling novel by Patrick McCabe.

Contact


If you noticed blunt omissions, mis-interpretations or even out-and-out errors,
please let me know:

Arnold Rypens
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B-2840 Reet (Rumst)

info@originals.be

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