BLACK IS THE COLOR
Created on 03/01/2006Latest update on 30/07/2021
Artist: Mrs. Lizzie Roberts
Author: traditional
Label: Folkways
Year: 1916
From Hot Springs, NC; collected by Cecil Sharp & Maud Karpeles and published in Sharp's English Folksongs From The Southern Appalachians (1932). Same Mrs. Roberts was revisited in '51 by Karpeles and on that occasion a recording was made (with harmonium) for Folkways.
Covers:
- 1936:
John Jacob Niles [arranged as Black Is The Color Of My True Love's Hair in his songbook Songs Of The Hill Folk, the main source for most covers; audio recording in '41 (RCA)]
- 1944:
Burl Ives [idem in Ballad Opera The Martins And The Coys - released in the Alan Lomax Collection]
- 1947:
Jo Stafford [for Capitol]
- 1952:
- 1954:
Nina Simone [bootlegged in Philadelphia; her best known official version was on 1966 lp Wild Is The Wind; she's also from North Carolina]
- 1956:
- 1957:
- 1958:
- 1959:
- 1959:
Joan Baez [her best known version In Concert in '63]
- 1959:
- 1960s:
- 1963:
- 1964:
- 1964:
- 1964:
Cathy Berberian [arranged by her husband Luciano Berio]
- 1965:
Donovan [similar lyrics in Colours]
- 1967:
- 1972:
- 1973:
Linda Lowe [alias Linda Thompson]
- 1978:
Christie Moore [knew it through Hamish Imlach]
- 1978:
Barry Moore [Luka Bloom on his debut album]
- 2000:
- 2001:
- 2002:
- 2004:
- 2004:
Twilight Singers [on cd She Loves You]
- 2005:
- 2005:
- 2008:
- 2009:
- 2011:
- 2015:
Alan Lomax (in Sing Out) compares it with Fair And Tender Ladies (old English), Poor Wayfaring Stranger and Greenback Dollar. Cecil Sharp also suspected an English origin, showed by the spelling of the word Color (as Colour).
