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Muddy Roads
Traditional Old-Time, Breakdown, North Carolina.
ARTIST: Doc Watson From Frets Magazine; CATEGORY: Fiddle and Instrumental Tunes
DATE: Early 1900’s;
RECORDING INFO: Folkways FA 2366, "The Watson Family." Folkways FTS 31036, Roger Sprung- "Grassy Licks." Rounder CD 0371, Mac Bendord and the Woodshed All-Stars - "Willow" (1996. Learned from Gaither Carleton). OTHER NAMES: Related to “Tater Patch”
SOURCES: The Watson Family (North Carolina) [Brody]; Plank Road String Band (Virginia) [Spandaro]; Gaither Carlton (North Carolina) [Frets]; Ken Kosek [Phillips]. Brody (Fiddler's Fakebook), 1983; pg. 198. Frets Magazine, "Mike Seeger: Traditional Music," July 1987; pg. 66. Johnson (The Kitchen Musician: Occasional Collection of Old-Timey Fiddle Tunes for Hammer Dulcimer, Fiddle, etc.), No. 2, 1982/1988; pg. 8. Phillips (Traditional American Fiddle Tunes), Vol. 1, 1994; pg. 160. Spandaro (10 Cents a Dance), 1980; pg. 7.
NOTES: G Major ('A' part) & D Major ('B' part). Standard. AB (Frets, Phillips): ABB (Johnson): AABB (Brody, Kaufman, Spandaro). Kaufman (1977) credits "the late" Gaither Carlton (Deep Gap, N.C.) with popularizing the melody. Doc Watson remembers his father singing the following verses to it:
The way is dark and the road is muddy
Girls so drunk they can't stand steady.
Beans in the pot and the hoecake a-bakin',
Pickin' the banjo and the strings all a-breakin'.
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