All The Pretty Little Horses- Painting by Richard Matteson 2006
Children's Bluegrass Songs are songs that are suitable for most children. The songs are bluegrass or country related. In this children's collection there might still be songs that may be deemed inappropriate depending on the criteria of parents.
For example, "Froggie went courtin' and he did ride" but Froggie had a "sword and pistol by his side." My painting above of "All The Pretty Little Horses" has a section of lyrics that is not suitable for children- "bees and butterfiles pickin' at his eyes." Some people are offended by certain references and it is impossible to have a collection of childrens bluegrass songs entirely devoid of any negative connotations. Kids love songs like "The Cat Came Back" and "Groundhog" and I've selected lyrics that are user friendly- still the cat in the Cat Came Back is trying to be eliminated- not much you can do about that except not sing the song. So parents will still need to be selective.
All racial slurs have been eliminated, and the songs are not about romantic encounters, violence, and murders. Generally all versions and lyrics are screened and minor editing has been done if necessary.
One of the main sources of bluegrass children's songs are the play-party and ring-game songs popular in the mountains. Many of the songs were brought into the mountain by the hardy English settlers who arrived in the US following Daniel Boone's Wilderness Road to Cumberland Gap and on to Louisville.
Weevilly Wheat, Juniper Tree, Skip to My Lou, The Needle’s Eye, Happy is the Miller, and We’re Marching Round the Levy are popular play-party songs. Some favourite game-songs of the Central West are Bounce Around, We’ll All Go Down to Rowser’s, Pig in the Parlour. Some minstrel play-party songs such as Old Dan Tucker, Angelina Baker, Jim Along Jo, and Buffalo Gals are found in this collection.
Hope you enjoy the collection,
Richard Matteson