Artist: Kelly Harrell
Author: traditional
Label: Victor
Year: 1926
Five string banjo player from Kentucky raised on Elizabethan ballad tradition. Fits in on Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music. Borrows lines from other songs like so many banjo tunes do (The Coo Coo Bird to name but one).
Covers:
Vernon Dalhart [for Edison]
Buell Kazee [as The Wagoner's Lad]
Peggy Seeger [idem]
Obray Ramsey [idem]
Pete Seeger [both as My Horses Ain't Hungry and The Wagoner's Lad]
Bob Dylan [as Farewell Angelina; official release on Bootleg Series Vol. 1-3; in '60 as Rambler, Gambler, issued on No Direction Home (Bootleg Series Vol. 7)]
Joan Baez [idem; also cut it as The Wagoner Lad]
Nana Mouskouri [as Adieu Angelina and in German as Schlaf ein Angelina]
Led Zeppelin [guitar riff of Bert Jansch' version in Bron-Y-Aur Stomp (see also: Blackwaterside)]
Fungus [as Farewell To Tarwathie]
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds [as Rye Whiskey]
John Mellencamp [as Farewell Angelina]
Roger McGuinn [with Joan Baez and Eliza Carthy]
Jason Ringenberg [as Farewell Angelina]
This melody really stuck since Harry Smith fan Bob Dylan used it for his Farewell Angelina. Besides, the Farewell Angelina tune is also linked to the 19th century whaler song Farewell To Tarwathie (Liam Clancy, Judy Collins), written in 1850 by George Scroggie from Aberdeenshire, according to Ewan MacColl. In the US the tune pops up as The Wagoner's Lad, Rye Whisky (Tex Ritter, Tom Rush), Pretty Mary (Jimmie Driftwood, Peter, Paul & Mary) and in up tempo version in Shrimp Boats Are A-Comin (Jo Stafford).
If you noticed blunt omissions, mis-interpretations or even out-and-out errors,
please let me know:
Arnold Rypens
Rozenlaan 65
B-2840 Reet (Rumst)