Awake! Awake!- McDowell (TN) 1947 McDowell
[From: Memory Melodies- A Collection of Folk-Songs from Middle Tennessee- McDowell; 1947. Book's notes follow. A recording was made (Library of Congress recording 3179 B1 & 2) of her singing in 1936 by Sidney Cowell, fist line was "Wake up, wake up you drowsy sleepers" which is different than below.
R. Matteson 2016]
The tune and a few of the words were remembered by Mrs. L. L. McDowell. Other words were supplied by Mrs. Otis Miller and Miss Cora Womack. The failure of the rhyme in the second stanza was found in all three versions, therefore left to stand.
If anyone objects to writing the music with the signature as given, he is welcome to the pleasure of erasing the flat in the signature and considering the tune in the key of C ; where it seems at first sight to belong. However, the gapped scale is very queer with the third and seventh tone omitted; as it would be if the tune be considered a major in the key of G. It seems better to let the unused flat stand and think if the old tune as in the mixolydian mode.
AWAKE! AWAKE!- The tune and a few of the words were remembered by Mrs. L. L. McDowell. Other words were supplied by Mrs. Otis Miller and Miss Cora Womack
1. Awake! Awake! You drowsy sleeper,
Awake! Awake! For it's almost day,
Why do you lie there in your slumber,
When your true-love is going away?
2. "Oh, who is this beneath my window,
That speaks my name so speedily?"
It ls your own and dear true lover,
Who wants to speak a word with you."
3. "Hush, Oh hush! you'll wake my father,
Who lies on yonder bed so near
All in his hand he holds a weapon,
To kill the one that I love dear."
4. I thought I had but one true lover,
Indeed, I thought he was my own,
But now hers going away off yonder,
And leave me hero to weep and moan,
5. "You'll have to go and court, some other
Or whisper softly in my ear
You'll wake my mother where she lies sleeping,
With the word, of love she hates to hear.
6. "I won't go off and court, another
What I say: I mean no harm
I mean to wean you from your mother,
And rest you in your true lover's arm."