Artist: Gid Tanner & Riley Puckett
Author: traditional
Label: Columbia
Year: 1924
Pre Skillet Lickers hillbilly version as Alabama Gal, Give The Fiddler A Dram. Ole Jim sings it in Mark Twain's Tom Sawyer (1885). Same tune as in John Hodges' (alias blackface performer Cool White) Lubly Fan, Won't You Come Out Tonight (copyright: 1844), as in English song Pray Pretty Miss and as in German music hall song Im Grünewald, im Grünewald ist Holzauktion. Two possible explanations for Buffalo: it may be the town (in the state of New York) close to Niagara Falls, where diggers of the Erie Canal found female company on a Saturday night, or it may be the term used by Native Americans to refer to blacks (as in Buffalo Soldiers). The Lomaxes found a version as As I Walked Down On Broadway.
Covers:
Fiddlin' John Carson [as Alabama Gal (Won't You Come Out Tonight)]
Henry Whitter [as Round Town Girl on OKeh]
Blue Ridge Highballers [as Round Town Girls]
Ernest Stoneman Trio [als Round Town Girl]
Frank Hutchison [as Alabama Girl, Ain't You Comin' Out Tonight]
Sons Of The Pioneers [with Roy Rogers]
Charles Ketvirtis [Alan Lomax recording in Newberry, Michigan]
Terry Shand & his Orch. [as Dance With A Dolly, co-crediting himself: Terry Shand/Jimmy Eaton/Mickey Leader]
Carson Robison Old Timers [as Buffalo Boy Go 'Round The Outside]
Almanac Singers [with Pete Seeger]
Russ Morgan [top 3 US as Dance With A Dolly (With A Hole In Her Stocking)]
Evelyn Knight [as Dance With A Dolly; top 10 US]
Jimmy Stewart & Donna Reed [in film It's A Wonderful Life]
Bill Haley [rock version of Dance With A Dolly]
Roy Acuff [RC Cola radio show transcription]
Bookmiller Shannon [Ozark Mountains banjo player (see also: Battle Of New Orleans)]
Bobby Darin [as Plain Jane (Won't You Come Out Tonight)]
Olympics [hit US as Dance By The Light Of The Moon]
Damita Jo [as Dance With A Dolly]
Conny Froboess [as Die Holzauktion]
Piute Pete, Caller & his Country Cousins [on Folkways LP Square Dances, version used by Malcolm McLaren along with his private recording in Knoxville of the Roan Mountain Hilltoppers and South African Zulu artists from Johannesburg]
Malcolm McLaren [marrying square dance with breakdance using a Roan Mountain Hilltoppers sample]
Malcolm McLaren [as Buffalo Gals Stampede; hit UK]
John Hartford [as Portsmouth Airs]
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)