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In The Pines/Longest Train/Where Did You Sleep Last Night?/Black Girl
Traditional Old-Time Song, usually in Waltz time
ARTIST: Collected by Alan Lomax (#290 in Folk Songs of North America).
CATEGORY: Fiddle and Instrumental Tunes
EARLIEST DATE: 1870s "Joe Brown's coal mine" (Lomax-Wiki); 1917 (Sharp); 1922 (Brown); Dock Walsh 1926
OTHER NAMES: Where Did You Sleep Last Night?; "To The Pines (Lunsford)" "Grave in the Pines (McMichen)" "June wedding Waltz (instrumental" "Look Up, Look Down That Lonesome Road (Delmore Brothers)"
RELATED TO: "Long Lonesome Road" "Rolling Mill Blues"
SOURCES: Mudcat; Folk Index; Norm Cohen; Wiki; Ballad Index;
REFERENCES (9 citations):
Cohen-LSRail, pp. 491-502, "The Longest Train/In the Pines" (3 texts containing many floating verses, 1 tune)
BrownIII 283, "In the Pines" (2 text plus a fragment; the "A" text, though very full, is damaged and probably mixed; the "B" text is mostly floating verses; "C" is only three lines, and may not belong here); also 297, "You Caused Me to Lose My Mind" (1 fragment, mostly of floating lyrics but with hints it goes here); also 301, "High-Topped Shoes" (2 texts, both mixed; "A" is mostly "Pretty Little Foot" with verses from "Don't Let Your Deal Go Down" while "B" is a hash of "Don't Let Your Deal Go Down," ""More Pretty Girls Than One," "In the Pines," and others)
SharpAp 203, "Black Girl" (1 text, 1 tune)
Lomax-FSNA 290, "The Longest Train" (1 text, 1 tune)
MHenry-Appalachians, p. 231, (fifth of several "Fragments from Tennessee") (1 fragment, which might be this although it's too short to know)
PSeeger-AFB, p. 28, "Little Girl" (1 text, 1 tune)
Silber-FSWB, p. 103 "In The Pines" (1 text)
RECORDING INFO: Pretty In the Pines
Gerald Duncan et al, "In the Pines" (on MusOzarks01)
Roscoe Holcomb, "In the Pines" (on Holcomb1, HolcombCD1)
Bascom Lamar Lunsford, "To the Pines, to the Pines" (on BLLunsford01)
Marlow & Young [pseud. for Burnett & Rutherford] "Let Her Go, I'll Meet Her" (Champion 15691, 1929; on KMM)
Clayton McMichen's Wildcats, "In the Pines" (Decca 5448, 1937)
Bill Monroe & His Blue Grass Boys, "In The Pines" (Bluebird B-8861, 1941); (Decca 28416, 1952)
Riley Puckett, "The Longest Train I Ever Saw" (Decca 5523, 1938) (Bluebird B-8104, 1939)
Lou Ella Robertson, "In the Pines" (Capitol 1706, 1951)
Texas Jim Robertson & the Panhandle Pushers, "In the Pines" (RCA Victor 20-2907, 1948)
Arthur Smith & his Dixieliners [or Arthur Smith Trio], "In the Pines" (Bluebird B-7943/Montomery Ward M-7686, 1938)
Pete Seeger, "Black Girl" (on PeteSeeger18) (on PeteSeeger43)
Tenneva Ramblers, "The Longest Train I Ever Saw" (Victor 20861, 1927)
Dock Walsh, "In the Pines" (Columbia 15094-D, 1926)
Ephraim Woodie & the Henpecked Husbands, "Last Gold Dollar" (Columbia 15564-D, 1930) [Filed here by Paul Stamler despite the title - RBW]
In The Pines [Sh 203/Me II-AA 7]
Rt - Look Up, Look Down That Lonesome Road/Old Railroad; My Gal; Lonesome Pines; Longest Train [I Ever Saw]; Fall On My Knees
Wernick, Peter (ed.) / Bluegrass Songbook, Oak, Sof (1976), p 49a
Lynn, Frank (ed.) / Songs for Swinging Housemothers, Fearon, Sof (1963/1961), p245
Leisy, James F. (ed.) / Hootenanny Tonight!, Gold Medal Books, sof (1964), p132
Shelton, Robert (ed.) / Josh White Song Book, Quadrangle, Sof (1963), p114 (Black Girl)
Leisy, James F. (ed.) / Folk Song Abecedary, Bonanza, Bk (1966), p180 (Black Girl)
Abner, Lizzie. Sharp & Karpeles / English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians II, Oxford, Bk (1932/1917), p278/# 203 [1917/08/18] (Black Girl)
Abner, Lizzie. Clayre, Alasdair (ed.) / 100 Folk Songs and New Songs, Wolfe, Sof (1968), p114 (Black Girl)
Anderson, Casey. Goin' Places, Elektra EKL 192, LP (1960), trk# B.03 (Black Girl)
Baez, Joan. Joan Baez, Volume 2, Vanguard VSD 2097, LP (1961), trk# 7 (Lonesome Road)
Baez, Joan. Very Early Joan, Vanguard VSD 79446/7, LP (1982), trk# C.05 [1961-63]
Blue Sky Boys. Together Again, Starday SLP 257, LP (1975/1964), trk# 2
Blue Sky Boys. Wonderful World of Country Music, Starday SLP 270, LP (197?/1964), trk# A.03
Clayton, Bob. Banjo Newsletter, BNL, Ser (1973-), 1979/10,p21
Daniels, Charlotte; and Pat Webb. Charlotte Daniels and Pat Webb, Prestige International INT 13037, LP (196?), trk# B.05
Davis, Janet. Banjo Newsletter, BNL, Ser (1973-), 1981/05,p16
de Wolfe, Dean. Folk Swinger, Audio Odessey DJLP 4030, LP (196?), trk# A.02 (Black Girl)
Gorman, Skip; and Rick Starkey. Late Last Night, Marimac 9602, Cas (1991), trk# 3
Hall, Kenny. Gray, Vykki M,; and Kenny Hall / Kenny Hall's Music Book, Mel Bay, Sof (1999), p248 (Lonesome Road)
Hall, Kenny; and the Sweets Mill String Band. Kenny Hall and the Sweets Mill String Band, Vol. 2, Bay 103, LP (1973), trk# 5 (Lonesome Road)
Heath, Gordan; and Lee Payant. Evening at L'Abbaye, Elektra EKL 119, LP (1954), trk# A.04 (Black Girl)
Hinton, Sam. Sam Hinton Sings the Song of Men, Folkways FA 2400, LP (1961), trk# 12
Holcomb, Roscoe. High Lonesome Sound, Folkways FA 2368, LP (1965), trk# B.02
Holcomb, Roscoe. High Lonesome Sound, Smithsonian/Folkways SF 40104, CD (1998), trk# 12
Holt, Will. Will Holt Concert, Stinson SLP 64, LP (1963), trk# A.06 (Black Girl)
Houston, Cisco. Cisco Houston - A Legacy, Disc D 103, LP (1964), trk# 11 (Black Girl)
Inman and Ira. Exciting New Folk Duo, Columbia CS 8531, LP (1962), trk# B.06 (Black Girl)
Johnson Boys. Singin' and Pickin', Bethlehem BX 4013, LP (1963), trk# B.05 (Little Girl) Journeymen. Journeymen, Capitol T 1629, LP (1961), trk# A.03 (Black Girl)
Kossoy Sisters. Bowling Green and Other Folksongs from the Southern Mountains, Tradition TLP 1018, LP (1956), trk# 5
Louvin Brothers. Tragic Songs of Life, Rounder SS012, LP (1987/1956), trk# A.06 [1956/05/02]
Lunsford, Bascom Lamar. Bascom Lamar Lunsford, Smithsonian SF 40082, CD (1996), trk# 10 [1949/03/25] (To the Pines, To the Pines)
McLain Family Band. Troublesome Creek, Country Life CLR 15, LP (1985), trk# A.05
McNeil, Keith & Rusty. Coarse & Fine, WEM MC 250, LP (1977), trk# B.03 (Black Girl)
Monroe, Bill; and his Bluegrass Boys. Father of Bluegrass, Camden ACL-7059, LP (1977), trk# 11 [1941?]
Monroe, Bill; and his Bluegrass Boys. Bluegrass Bonanza., Properbox 29, CD (2001), trk# 2.23 [1941/10/02]
New Christy Minstrels. Presenting: The New Christy Minstrels, Columbia CS 8672, LP (1962), trk# B.05
Possum Hunters. In the Pines, Takoma A 1025, LP (196?), trk# 10
Poston, Mutt; and the Farm Hands. Hoe Down! Vol. 6. Country Blues Instrumentals, Rural Rhythm RR 156, LP (197?), trk# 1
Rosenbaum, Art. Art of the Mountain Banjo, Kicking Mule KM 203, LP (1975), trk# 1.06
Rosenbaum, Art. Rosenbaum, Art (ed.) / Old-Time Mountain Banjo, Oak, sof (1968), p31
Rosenbaum, Art. Rosenbaum, Art / Art of the Mountain Banjo, Centerstream, Fol (1981), p71
Scragg Family. Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out, Sonyatone ST-1001, LP (1973), trk# 12
Seeger, Pete. Seeger, Pete / American Favorite Ballads, Oak, Fol (1961), p28 (Little Girl)
Silverman, Jerry. Silverman, Jerry (ed.) / Flat-Picker's Guitar Guide, Oak, Sof (1963), p46
Smith, Fiddlin' Arthur; & his Dixieliners. Fiddlin' Arthur Smith and His Dixieliners, Vol 2., County 547, LP (1978), trk# B.06 [1937/09/27]
Stanley Brothers. Stanley Brothers on the Air, Wango 115, LP (1976), trk# A.02b
Strange Creek Singers. Strange Creek Singers, Arhoolie 4004, LP (1972), trk# 2
Taylor, Earl; and the Stoney Mountain Boys. Folk Songs from the Blue Grass, United Artists UAL 3048, LP (1959), trk# A.06
Tottle, Jack. Tottle, Jack / Bluegrass Mandolin, Oak, Sof (1975), p 85
Tottle, Jack. Back Road Mandolin, Rounder 0067, LP (1976), trk# A.05
Travelers 3. Open House, Elektra EKS 7226, LP (1962), trk# A.05 (Black Girl)
Van Ronk, Dave. Gamblers Blues, Verve/Folkways FV 9007, LP (1965), trk# 3
Van Ronk, Dave. Dave Van Ronk Sings Ballads, Blues and Spirituals, Folkways FS 3818, LP (1959), trk# A.03
Walsh, Dock. Ballads and Breakdowns of the Golden Era, Columbia CS 9660, LP (1968), trk# A.04 [1926/04/17]
Walsh, Dock. Trischka, Tony (ed.) / Banjo Song Book, Oak, Sof (1978), p 24 [1926]
Walsh, Dock. Cohen, Norm (ed.) / Long Steel Rail. The Railroad in American Folksong, U. Illinois, Sof (2000/1981), p491 [1926/04/17]
Watson, Doc. Out in the Country, Intermedia/Quicksilver QS 5031, LP (1982), trk# 2
Longest Train [I Ever Saw] [Sh 203/Me II-AA 7a]
Rt - Ruben/Ruben's Train; In The Pines
Lomax, Alan / Folksongs of North America, Doubleday Dolphin, Sof (1975/1960), p541/#290
Gaster, Marvin. Uncle Henry's Favorites, Rounder 0382, CD (1996/1994), trk# 4
Hatcher, Charlie. Wolfe, Charles K.(ed.) / Folk Songs of Middle Tennessee. George Boswell, Univ. Tennesse, Sof (1997), p149/# 96 [1954/04/25]
Mainer's Mountaineers. Railroad in Folksong, RCA (Victor) LPV 532, LP (1966), trk# B.02 [1935/08/06]
Tenneva Ramblers (Grant Brothers). Bristol Sessions. Vol 2, Country Music Foundation CMF 011C2, Cas (1987), trk# B.01 [1927/08/04]
NOTES: In The Pines was collected by Cecil Sharp from Lizzie Abner in Kentucky on Aug. 18, 1917. The text is fairly standard:
Black Girl- 1917
Black girl, black girl, don't you lie to me...
Where did you stay last night?
I stayed in the pines, where the sun never shines
And shivered when the cold wind blows.
The study by Judith McCulloh of 160 texts concluded that "The Longest Train" cluster and the "In the Pines" cluster once constituted two different songs that have been joined together (See "Long Steel Rail," Norm Cohen, p. 493). Usually the song is about a man whose girl has left him (on a train) (to meet another) ("in the pines, in the pines, where the sun never shines, And I shivered the whole night through"). The girl, who rides the "longest train I ever saw," may die in a wreck and sometimes is decapitated.
Dock Walsh made the first country recording in 1926. This was followed by Darby and Tarlton's Lonesome in the Pines in 1927. Clayton McMichen recorded the song twice first under the alias of Bob Nichols as "Grave in the Pines." McMichen's lyrics as they appear in his 1934 songbook are rather unusal and are included as Version 2 in my collection. Curiously, McMichen and Bryant still receive royalties from their version though their lyric version is not well known.
I've included the song in my Fiddle and Instrumental Tunes becasue the melody is used as a fiddle solo and appears under the title "June Wedding Waltz" as a fiddle solo by Clayton Schultz (Clyton's Melody Makers) in 1930.
The Tenneva Ramblers first recorded the song under the "Longest Train" title at the 1927 Bristol Sessions. Some versions refer to "Joe Brown's coal mine" which dates back to 1873 thus the 1870s date reference in Wiki.
Walsh's text also later implies that a mining train was involved:
Oh, transportation has brought me here,
Take a money for to carry me away
Workers who signed up for the mines were given free transportation to the mine site, but had to pay their own way if they left.
Notes Ballad Index: This song became the basis of "Blue Diamond Mines" in the 1970s. -PJS. The elements in this song may vary widely, and it is best recognized by its form and the references to the pines. The plot described above is common but by no means universal.
Cohen briefly summarizes Judith McCulloh's Ph.D. dissertation ("In the Pines": The Melodic-Textual Identity of an American Lyric Folksong Cluster), which analyses over 150 texts she identified with this song. She seems to have identified three common textual motifs: "In the pines, in the pines, where the sun never shines" (118 texts), "The longest train I ever saw" (96 versions), and "(His/her) head was (found) on the driver's wheel, (His/her) body never was found." There is also a fairly characteristic tune. Still, the boundaries of this type are very vague; long versions almost always include very many floating verses and have no overall plot except perhaps a feeling of loneliness. - RBW The Marlow & Young [Burnett & Rutherford] recording is a conglomerate of floating verses; I put it here because the one that floated from this song came first, but it could as easily go under, "Goodnight, Irene" -- it has the "Sometimes I live in the country" verse. - PJS
Notes Wiki: In the Pines
"In the Pines", also known as "Black Girl" and "Where Did You Sleep Last Night?", is a traditional American folk song which dates back to at least the 1870s, and is believed to be Southern Appalachian in origin. The identity of the song's author is unknown, but it has been recorded by dozens of artists in numerous genres. A 1993 acoustic version by Nirvana introduced the song to many people at the end of the twentieth century. Kurt Cobain attributed authorship to Lead Belly, who had recorded the song several times, beginning in 1944, but the version performed by Lead Belly and covered by Nirvana does not differ substantially from other variants of the song.
Early history
Like numerous other folk songs, "Where Did You Sleep Last Night" was passed on from one generation and locale to the next by word of mouth. The first printed version of the song, compiled by Cecil Sharp, appeared in 1917, and comprised just four lines and a melody. The lines are:
Black girl, black girl, don't lie to me
Where did you stay last night?
I stayed in the pines where the sun never shines
And shivered when the cold wind blows
In 1925, a version of the song was recorded onto phonograph cylinder by a folk collector. This was the first documentation of "The Longest Train" variant of the song. This variant include a stanza about "The longest train I ever saw". "The Longest Train" stanzas probably began as a separate song that later merged into "Where Did You Sleep Last Night". Lyrics in some versions about "Joe Brown's coal mine" and "the Georgia line" may date it to Joseph E. Brown, a former Governor of Georgia, who famously leased convicts to operate coal mines in the 1870s. While early renditions that mention that someone's "head was found in the driver's wheel" make clear that the train caused the decapitation, some later versions would drop the reference to the train and reattribute the cause. Music historian Norm Cohen, in his 1981 book "Long Steel Rail: The Railroad in American Folksong," states the song came to consist of three frequent elements: a chorus about "in the pines", a stanza about "the longest train" and a stanza about a decapitation, though not all elements are present in all versions.
Starting the year following the 1925 recording, commercial recordings of the song were done by various folk and bluegrass bands. In a 1970 dissertation, Judith McCulloh found 160 permutations of the song. As well as rearrangement of the three frequent elements, the person who goes into the pines or who is decapitated has been described as a man, a woman, an adolescent, a wife, a husband or a parent, while the pines have represented sexuality, death or loneliness. The train has been described killing a loved one, as taking one's beloved away or as leaving an itinerant worker far from home.
In variants in which the song describes a confrontation, the person being challenged is always a woman, and never a man. The Kossoy Sisters folk version asks, "Little girl, little girl, where'd you stay last night? Not even your mother knows." The reply to one version's "Where did you get that dress, and those shoes that are so fine?" is "from a man in the mines, who sleeps in the pines." The theme of a woman who has been caught doing something she should not is thus also common to many variants. One variant, sang in the early twentieth century by the Ellison clan (Ora Ellison, deceased) in Lookout Mountain Georgia, told of the rape of a young Georgia girl, who fled to the pines in shame. Her rapist, a male soldier, was later beheaded by the train. Mrs. Ellison had stated that it was her belief that the song was from the time shortly after the U.S. Civil War.
Notable versions
Peg Leg Howell recorded a traditional blues version as "Rolling Mill Blues" in 1929 for Columbia Records; also performed with Eddie Anthony on fiddle and recorded as "The Rolling Mill Blues" in the late 1940s.
Bill Monroe's 1941 and 1952 recordings with his Bluegrass Boys were highly influential on later bluegrass and country versions. Fiddles and yodeling are used to evoke the cold wind blowing through the pines, and the lyrics suggest a quality of timelessness about the train: "I asked my captain for the time of day/He said he throwed his watch away". His rendition is slower than the versions performed by Lead belly and others.
Lead Belly recorded over half-a-dozen versions between 1944 and 1948, most often under the title, "Black Girl" or "Black Gal". His first rendition, for Musicraft Records in New York City in February 1944, is arguably his most familiar.
Nathan Abshire, a Louisiana Cajun accordion player, recorded a distinct variation of the song, sung in Cajun French, under the name "Pine Grove Blues." His melody is a hard-driving blues, but the lyrics, when translated to English, are the familiar, "Hey, black girl, where did you sleep last night?" It became his theme song and he recorded it at least three times from the 1940s onward.
Pete Seeger's version of "Black Girl" appears on the 2002 Smithsonian Folkways re-release of recordings from the 1950s and the 1960s entitled American Favorite Ballads, Vol. 1.
The Louvin Brothers' version appears on the 1956 album, Tragic Songs of Life.
The Kossoy Sisters recorded "In the Pines" in their 1959 session with Erik Darling.
Bob Dylan performed the song on November 4, 1961 at the Carnegie Chapter Hall in New York City. He performed it again on January 12, 1990 at the Toad's Place in New Haven, Connecticut. Neither of these recordings has been officially released.
The New Christy Minstrels, under the direction of Randy Sparks, recorded a version for their 1961 debut album on the Columbia label.
Joan Baez's version appears on Very Early Joan (performances between 1961 and 1963).
Doc Watson often performed the song, and a live recording exists, dating from the 1960s. He sang it faster than most other versions, accompanied only by his banjo.
Roscoe Holcomb recorded a version, available on The High Lonesome Sound.
Jackson C. Frank's version appears on the second disc of Blues Run the Game.
Clifford Jordan's 1965 jazz arrangement with singer Sandra Douglass.
The Four Pennies recorded and released "Black Girl" in October 1964, which reached No. 20 in the British charts.
The Pleazers recorded "Poor Girl" in 1965. It was originally recorded as "Black Girl," but changed due to it being viewed as racist.
Grateful Dead recorded the song on July 17, 1966. It appears as "In The Pines" on their 2001 box set, The Golden Road.
John Phillips' version of "Black Girl" appears as a bonus track on the remastered CD of John Phillips (John, the Wolf King of L.A.) recorded in 1969.
Long John Baldry's "Black Girl," a duet with Maggie Bell, appears on It Ain't Easy.
Dave Van Ronk's version appears on The Folkway Years 1959 - 1961.
Link Wray recorded two versions titled "Georgia Pines" and "In the Pines" on his 1973 folk-rock release Beans and Fatback.
The Osborne Brothers recorded a version for the album Up This Hill And Down (Decca DL-74767) in June 1966.
Gene Clark recorded the song for his 1977 album Two Sides to Every Story.
Charlie Feathers recorded a version in the 1980s in Memphis.
Mark Lanegan's version of "Where Did You Sleep Last Night" was recorded in August 1989, and appears on his 1990 debut solo album, The Winding Sheet.
Promo single from Nirvana's 1994 album MTV Unplugged in New YorkNirvana occasionally performed "Where Did You Sleep Last Night" during the early 1990s. Singer/guitarist Kurt Cobain was introduced to the song by Lanegan, and played guitar on the latter's version. Like Lanegan, Cobain usually screamed the song's final verse. Cobain earned critical and commercial acclaim for his acoustic performance of the song during Nirvana's MTV Unplugged appearance in 1993. This version was posthumously released on the band's MTV Unplugged in New York album the following year. A solo Cobain home demo of the song, recorded in 1990, appears on the band's 2004 box set, With the Lights Out. It does not feature the final screamed verse of later versions.
Dolly Parton's live version was recorded in 1994. It appears on her album, Heartsongs: Live From Home. "It's easy to play, easy to sing, great harmonies and very emotional," said Parton of the song, who learned it from elder members of her family. "The perfect song for simple people."
Odetta, the American folk/blues singer, recorded the song for her 2001 tribute album to Lead Belly, Looking For A Home - Thanks to Leadbelly.
R. Crumb performed "In the Pines" in Hamburg, Germany in 2003. The only known release of this live performance is on R. Crumb's Music Sampler that is included with the R. Crumb Handbook.
Ralph Stanley & Jimmy Martin's version appears on their album, First Time Together, released in 2005.
Smog's version appears on his 2005 album A River Ain't Too Much to Love.
Josh White's recording of "Black Girl" on New York to London (2002).
Appearances
In films
The song can be heard in the background of the Nicholas Ray film The True Story of Jesse James.
A few lines of the song are sung by Sissy Spacek, playing Loretta Lynn, in the 1980 film, Coal Miner's Daughter.
Lead Belly's version of the song appears in the 1997 horror film, I Know What You Did Last Summer.
In plays
The song appears in the 1958 play A Taste of Honey, by the British dramatist Shelagh Delaney. It is sung by the character Josephine, who replaces the lyric "black girl" with "black boy." The "black boy" in the play is her boyfriend Jimmy, a black sailor who impregnated her.
The song also appears in the 2009 play Breakfast at Tiffany's starring Anna Friel as Holly Golightly. Sung accoustically by Holly at the front of the stage with just a guitar.
In literature
The song is mentioned in Charles Frazier's novel Thirteen Moons. While writing of the progress of the railroad through North Carolina in the years following Reconstruction, the lead character, Will Cooper, reminisces of a song, "about pines and the head caught in the driving wheel and the body on the line, the narrator pleading to know where his woman slept last night."
IN THE PINES- THE LONGEST TRAIN (from Alan Lomax)
Collected by Alan Lomax (#290 in Folk Songs of North America). This version is a reflection of the black convict miners that were leased out by the state to work in Joe Brown's coal mine in Alabama. Lomax's notes on this song are very interesting, and he refers to the work of George Korson, "Coal Dust On The Fiddle", which described the conditions of convict slave labor.
The longest train I ever did see,
Ran around Joe Brown's coal mine.
The headlight passed at six o'clock,
The cab come by at nine.
The prettiest girl I ever did see,
Was on that train and gone.
Her eyes were blue, her cheeks were brown,
And her hair it hung way down.
That train it wrecked at the four mile hill,
And killed my Evaline.
Her head was found in the drivin' wheel,
Po' body ain't never been seen.
The longest day and the longest night,
Was the day Evalina died,
I walked the track the whole day long,
Hung down my head and cried.
The long steel rail and the short cross tie,
They carried me away,
Was transportation brought me here,
But I'll make it home some day.
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