Pretty Polly- Lee Sexton (KY) 1959 Cohen REC
[Incomplete version from: Mountain Music of Kentucky; SFW40077, 1960. Recorded in 1959 by John Cohen. Bio from Wiki follows.
Sexton's version seems to be incomplete-- the ending is missing and the last line of the 4th verses does not match.
R. Matteson 2016]
Lee Sexton (born 1928, in Letcher County, Kentucky) is an American banjo player from Letcher County, Kentucky. He began playing the banjo at the age of eight and is proficient in the two-finger picking and "drop-thumb" (clawhammer) traditional styles of east Kentucky. He also sings. His Whoa Mule album includes recordings from a 1952 home recording with fiddler Fernando Lusk to recordings made in 2001. Four solo songs also appear on Smithsonian Folkways album Mountain Music of Kentucky. In 1999 Kentucky governor Paul Patton presented Lee with the Governor's Award in the Arts.
Pretty Polly- sung by Lee Sexton of Letcher County, KY, 1959.
[banjo intro]
"It's Polly, oh Polly, oh yander she stands,
And it's Polly, oh Polly, oh yander she stands,
Gold rings on her fingers and lily-white hands."
"Well I've traveled through mountains and valleys so deep,
Well I've traveled over mountains and valleys so deep,
And at last Pretty Polly began for to weep."
"And it's Willie, my darlin' I bid you adieu,
"And it's Willie, darlin' I bid you adieu,
Now [you] love somebody who can't love you."
"Well I love you my darlin', it isn't fair
Well I love you darlin', it isn't fair,
Well I dug on your grave the most part of last night."[1]
Well I stepped a little bit farther and what did I spy,
Well I stepped a little bit farther and what did I spy,
A new dug grave with a spade lying by.
1. How can you kill a poor girl who loved you so dear?"