Pretty Polly- E. C. Ball (VA) 1937 Lomax REC
[Library of Congress Recording 1346 B1 & B3. Liner notes from Anglo-American Ballads I follow. Sung by E. C. Ball. Galax, Va., recorded by John A. and Bess Lomax, 1937. Apparently this is based on B.F. Shelton's 1927 Victor recording. The liner notes below say 1925 incorrectly. Also the text is different in 2 and 6 indicating that Ball's version is not based on the text of Shelton but rather the melody and instrumental style.
R. Matteson 2016]
FROM: AFS L 1: ANGLO-AMERICAN BALLADS
Recorded in various parts of U.S. by John and Alan Lomax and others, 1934-41. Edited by Alan Lomax.
A5-PRETTY POLLY
Sung with guitar by E. C. Ball at Rugby, Virginia, 1941. Recorded by Alan and Elizabeth Lomax. There is a general belief among certain American folklorists that ballads generally grow feeble in the process of communal transmission and re-creation. "Pretty Polly" is one of the many examples one could cite in refutation of this generality, for the broadside ballad from which it is probably derived ("The Wexford Murder") is as clumsy and dull and unpalatable a piece as the poets of Grub Street ever penned. In the mountains of the South all the circumstantial trappings of the original ballad have been cut away until the lines are as clear, direct and poignant as the best of classic balladry. The product of this process of folk editing "Pretty Polly"-is the "American Tragedy" in six brilliant stanzas (the same subject that occupies a ponderous volume in Theodore Dreiser- work of that name). The singer learned this tune and accompaniment from an excellent commercial phonograph record issued by Victor in 1925, now out of print. He has cleverly adapted the original banjo accompaniment of that record to his guitar. Here we have the phonograph record taking the place formerly held by the wandering ballad singer. Nowadays the radio performs a similar function. Folk singing has more than nine lives. For reference purposes see page 308 of John Harrington Cox, Folk-Songs of the South (Harvard University Press, 1925).
1. "Pretty Polly, pretty Polly, come go 'long with me,
Pretty Polly, pretty Polly, come go 'long with me,
Before we git married, some pleasure to see."
2. She got up behind him and away they did go,
She got up behind him and away they did go,
Over the hills to the valley so low.
3. They went up a little farther and what did they spy?
They went up a little farther and what did they spy?
A new-dug grave and a spade lying by.
4. He stobbed her to the heart, her heart blood it did flow,
He stobbed her to the heart, her heart blood it did flow,
And into the grave pretty Polly did go.
5. He threw somethin' over her and turned to go home,
He threw somethin' over her and turned to go home,
Leaving nothing behind him but the girl left to mourn.
6. Gentlemen and ladies, I'll bid you farewell,
Gentlemen and ladies, I'll bid you farewell,
For killin' pretty Polly will send my soul to Hell.