I have a friend who is currently producing a short documentary about a county fair. #The focus of the peice will be on livestock competition, demolition derbys and carnival rides. #He is looking for music that should ideally involve lyrics about a fair. #I think that an old-timey feel might work better than a hard and fast bluegrass song, but either could work. #Anyone got any suggestions? #Public domain songs ideal, will work out any other licensing considerations/fees/compensation.
Gotta start sometime, might as well be now...
County Fair by Joe walsh
Jim Richmond
Roseville Fair by Bill Staines; not PD though.
Here's a link to Nanci Griffith singing it on YouTube.
Allen Hopkins
Gibsn: '54 F5 3pt F2 A-N Custm K1 m'cello
Natl Triolian Dobro mando
Victoria b-back Merrill alumnm b-back
H-O mandolinetto
Stradolin Vega banjolin
Sobell'dola Washburn b-back'dola
Eastmn: 615'dola 805 m'cello
Flatiron 3K OM
HOw about Balo's Song by Dry Branch Fire Squad. It's on their Live At Last CD. Ron is Hambone'ing.......
"Me and my horse Balo are going to the fair,
Gonna' ride the bucks and run the barrels
See everything that's there
We gonna wink at all the women
Flag tail at all the mares
We'll be h3ll bent for leather
when we go to the fair
Ganna shave brush and shower
shine our shoes up good and bright
Gonna strap on all our leather stuff
and cinch it up real tight
gonna jog around the warm up ring
and lean against the rail
and check out all that horsey stuff
Like eyes legs and tail
Gonna jog into the show ring
with our head set good and proud
when the announcer calls our names out
we hope he does it good and loud
We gonna win us a blue ribbon
and show off for the crowd
I guess we'll bring the stands down
when Balo does his bow
Gonna strut around the grandstand
and down the old midway
I'll be munching popcorn
while Balo's chomping hay
We gonna find ourselves a saddle
with something cute on either side
then me and my horse Balo
might just join them for a ride."
"Ancora lmparo", said Michelangelo when he was in his 80's (I am still learning)
"He Went To Sleep And The Hogs Ate Him"
but better yet.....
Tom Waits: "Lucky Day (Overture)" - first track on The Black Rider
"Goin' to the Fair"
New Grass Revival on Barren County
She was only a whiskey maker, but he loved her still.
I Second "Roseville Fair", our band is doing it now with a little more grassy feel- great, positive tune. I can send you a sound clip if you like.
Teri LaMarco
John Wertheimer is a song writer and musician in Davidson,NC.He wrote a song called Big Fat Turkey Legs,about fair food at the "Cleveland County Fair".He also has one called Closing Down. The first verse is about a fair.
Big Fat is a great song. Davidson Express does it with Tony Hoover singing the lead.
Contact him at jowertheimer@davidson.edu
Life is short-Pray hard-Pick fast!
Oregon Country Fair, in Lane County, adopted 'the Teddy Bear's Picnic' as their official song decades ago..
writing about music
is like dancing,
about architecture
Girl from the North Country fair .....by Bob Dylan
Cleanliness is next to Dawgliness....Dawg,2008 Blueberry Band Workshop.
I was going to say girl from the north country too... we do that one
Two British folk songs spring to mind:
Copshawholme Fair (traditional, recorded by Steeleye Span)
The Hiring Fair (written by Ralph McTell for Fairport Convention)
The latter is the better-known song, but only peripherally about the fair itself (plus, it's a copyrighted song), whereas the former gives a pretty good lively impression of what's going on at a country fair (plus, it's public domain, although of course Steeleye's recording is not). There's an acoustic version of Copshawholme Fair with several more verses on "Folk Songs of Olde England Vol. 2" by Tim Hart & Maddy Prior (both also members of Steeleye Span). The lyrics to the longer version are here.
Martin
"She moved through the fair" is a irish song. No demolition derbies in it though. Many versions out there--Van Morrison has an interesting one.
Weber original Bitterroot mandolin
Weber custom Hyalite mandocello
Good one Landgrass! I second the NGR version. Great tune and I love the kick off.
Going to the fair. The neon lights are shining like a gypsy with a flower in her hair....
Day at the county fair by the skillet lickers
Go Long, Mule
Fair and Tender Ladies
"Fourth of July at a County Fair," on the (original) Red Clay Ramblers' live album "Chuckin' the Frizz" on Flying Fish. They learned the song from the Georgia Yellow Hammers. It's a lively number, although once I checked the lyrics, I realized that only the first verse actually mentions a county fair:
On the Fourth of July at a Country Fair a man went up in a balloon
He was to go right up through the clouds and take a circle around the moon
But when he got up about ten miles high the gas in his balloon went out
He came down without a parachute and he was heard so very loud to shout:
“I ain’t got no feather bed to land on land when I fall
I may dive in the river, my land on the city hall
But the best of all that I’ll ever land on will be a house up our street
Any old haystack that I land on will be home sweet home to me.”
The album was originally an LP, but has been reissued on CD in the limited edition "Rounder Archives" series. You can buy the CD from various sources including Mike Craver's own website (mikecraver.com) as well as from Rounder (rounder.com), Elderly, and the usual other e-commerce sites that carry Rounder CDs. Digital download available via iTunes, I think, so you could buy just the one song (although the whole album is great).
Bob Blackman
Former host of "The Folk Tradition," WKAR-FM
East Lansing, MI
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