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Sal Went Down to Cider Mill/Down to the Cider Mill/Cider Mill/ Cider
See Also: Cider
Old-Time and Bluegrass Breakdown; Southeast US. Widely known
ARTIST: "Sal's Gone Down to the Cider Mill" Skillet Lickers 1930
CATEGORY: Fiddle and Instrumental Tunes
EARLIEST DATE: 1928 recording "A Serenade in the Mountains Pt. 1: Cider Mill" Ernest Stoneman
RECORDING INFO: Baugus, Riley (Alvin). Life of Riley, Yodel-Ay-Hee 038, CD (2001), trk# 9 (Cider)
Block, Allan. Alive and Well and Fiddling, Living Folk LFR 104, LP (197?), trk# 7
Camp Creek Boys. Camp Creek Boys, County 709, LP (1967), trk# 8
Carlin, Bob. Banging and Sawing, Rounder 0197, CD (1996/1985), trk# 15 [1982-85] (Cider)
Cockerham, Jarrell and Jenkins. Down to the Cider Mill, County 713, LP (1968), trk# 12
Deseret String Band. Utah Trail, Okehdokee --, LP (197?), trk# 3
Hooven, Greg. Tribute to Fred Cockerham, Heritage (Galax) 079C, Cas (1993), trk# A.02
Krassen, Miles. Krassen, Miles / Clawhammer Banjo, Oak, sof (1974), p25
Mainer, Wade & Julia. In the Land of Melody, June Appal JA 065C, Cas (1991), trk# 14
McNeil, Keith & Rusty. Coarse & Fine, WEM MC 250, LP (1977), trk# B.04 (Cider)
Molsky, Bruce. Soon Be Time, Compass 7 4432 2, CD (2006), trk# 11 (Cider)
Skillet Lickers. Skillet Lickers, Vol. 1, County 506, LP (1965), trk# A.02 [1930/04/14] (Sal's Gone to the Cider Mill)
Skillet Lickers. Old Time Fiddle Tunes and Songs from N. Georgi, County CD 3509, CD (1996), trk# 4 [1930/04/14] (Sal's Gone to the Cider Mill)
Stoneman, Ernest; and the Blue Ridge Corn Shuckers. Day in the Mountains, County 512, LP (196?), trk# 8a [1928/02/22] (Serenade in the Mountains)
RELATED TO: "Stillhouse," "Paddy Won't You Drink/Sip Some (Good Old) Cider;" "Down to the Still House to Get a Little Cider"
OTHER NAMES: Sal's Gone down to Cider Mill; Down to the Cider Mill; Cider Mill; Cider
SOURCES: Bruce Molsky with Bob Carlin [Phillips]. Phillips (Traditional American Fiddle Tunes), 1994; pg. 53. County Records, Tommy Jarrell, Fred Cockerham & Oscar Jenkins ‑ "Down to the Cider Mill." Living Folk LFR‑104, Allan Block ‑ "Alive and Well and Fiddling." Rounder 0197, Bob Carlin (with Bruce Molsky)‑ "Banging and Sawing" (1985).
Kuntz (Ragged but Right), 1987; pg. 328. County 506, The Skillet Lickers‑ "Old Time Tunes (Vol. 1)." Philo 1040, Jay Ungar and Lyn Hardy‑ "Catskill Mountain Goose Chase" (1977).
NOTES: Part of the Cider Mill [Me IV-D28] tunes that relate to "Stillhouse," "Paddy Won't You Drink/Sip Some (Good Old) Cider," and "Down to the Still House to Get a Little Cider"
Kuntz calls "Cider Mill" a "Blue Ridge dance tune, popular in Patrick County and the Galax, Va./Mt. Airy, N.C. areas." "Sal's Gone Down to the Cider Mill" is best known as a tune in the Skillet Lickers repertoire. Kuntz: Old‑Time, Breakdown. USA, north Georgia. D Major. Standard tuning. AABB. The ditty sung to the melody has to do with alcoholic beverages. Source for notated version: Jay Ungar (N.Y.) who had the tune from the Skillet Lickers (Ga.).
William Sydney Mount (1807-1868). Cider Making. Paul Tyler finds this vignette in W.H. Venable’s Footprints of the Pioneers of the Ohio Valley: A Centennial Sketch (1888): The old-time apple-cutting was an occasion of unbounded mirth. . . . After the apples were cut, and the cider boiled, the floor was cleared for a "frolic," technically so-called, and merry were the dancers and loud the songs with which our fathers and mothers regaled the flying hours. The fiddler was a man of importance, and when, after midnight, he called the "Virginia Reel," such shouting, such laughter, such clatter of hilarious feet upon the sanded puncheon floor, startled the screech-owl out of doors,
and waked the baby from its sweet slumber in the sugar-trough. . . . The apple-cutting was fifty years ago . . .
Kerry Belch notes: (banjo tuned A-DADE, key of D)
This melody, in essentially the form that Bruce Molsky plays it on Soon Be Time, currently can be heard all over the world. It was not that long ago that this melody, known by several related titles, was played solely in a quite small region. The charismatic and highly-musical personage known as Tommy Jarrell (1901-1985) probably is most responsible for its wide dissemination. When Tommy fiddled it on Down To the Cider Mill (County LP 713, released in 1968, recently reissued on CD also on the County label), the floodgates to its popularity and emulation were opened. Prior to its surge in popularity following its recording on vinyl, it could be heard primarily in Surry County, North Carolina – Tommy’s home turf – and across the mountain in Grayson and Carroll Counties, Virginia.
The first waxing of this catchy tune was made in Atlanta, Georgia on February 22, 1928 by a band from Galax, Virginia, Ernest Stoneman & The Blue Ridge Corn Shuckers, as part of a skit called A Serenade in the Mountains, Part One (Victor 21518), where they called it Down To The Stillhouse To Get A Little Cider. Ernest Stoneman sang and played guitar, George Stoneman and Bolen Frost were on banjos and the fiddling was provided by Galax resident Eck Dunford (ca. 1880-1950), who executed it with a very crisp, clear sound. I feel that had this been released independently as a full track and not merely as part of a skit, it might have become much more popular earlier, but it had to wait for its moment in the spotlight until Tommy unleashed it. Despite the LP title (modeled on this tune’s name), Tommy’s recording was was listed on the LP as Cider Mill. If you went to Tommy’s house to hear it or play along, he usually would call it just plain Cider, but I also heard people reference it there as Stillhouse.
A few others from that area straddling the Blue Ridge Mountains have recorded since Tommy put out his first recording, and the reader may be familiar with some of these recordings. Matokie Slaughter, of Pulaski, Virginia, in Pulaski County, north of Galax, put a rendition on More Clawhammer Banjo (County LP 717, issued in 1969; reissued on CD as County 2717) as Stillhouse. Her rendition developed an urban cult following no doubt due to some of its eccentricities. She played an even more interesting version on the fiddle. The Camp Creek Boys issued a torrid rendition of Stillhouse on their eponymously-named County LP (709, on CD as County 2719). They were from Surry County, primarily.. Sidna (1890-1972) and Fulton Myers (1894-1979), of Five Forks, VA, near Galax, recorded Stillhouse for Peter Hoover. This recording recently came out on the Field Recordist’s Collective CD # 504. Delmar and Calvin Pendleton, of Woolwine in Patrick County, Va. recorded Stillhouse in 1974 for Ray Alden, who put it on the Visits LP (Heritage 33).
Others of note and otherwise, and this is not an exhaustive list, who played it for collectors include: Norman Edmonds (1889-1976, as Stillhouse) of Hillsville, Va.; Fred Cockerham (1905-1980, Stillhouse) of Low Gap, Surry Co., NC; Luther Davis (1887-1986, Stillhouse) of Galax, Grayson Co., Va; Clovest Crotts (1913-1987, Stillhouse), of Cana, Va.; Taylor (1892-1979) and Stella (1894-1983, Stillhouse) Kimble of Laurel Fork, Carroll Co, Va; Earnest East (1917-2000. Stillhouse) of Surry Co., NC; Glen & Hurley Smith (Glen – 1888-1973, as Cider) of Grayson Co., Va; Bertie Mae Dickens (1903- , Going To the Stillhouse) of Ennice, NC; James Thompson (b. 1881, Stillhouse) of Meadows of Dan, recorded by Peter Hoover; Calvin Cole (b. 1908, as Cider) of Fancy Gap, Grayson Co., Va; Tinsley Clapp, of Glen Raven, NC, recorded it as Cider for Alan Jabbour in 1967; Ernest Stanley of Laurel Fork, Carroll, Co, VA as Stillhouse; and Rafe Brady of Surry Co, NC as Stillhouse. Every single one of them has some singular characteristics particular to the musicians playing it. Yet they are all the same piece, once a localized tune, now one for the world.
Here's SAL WENT DOWN TO THE CIDER MILL:
Sals Gone to the Cider Mill: Skillet Lickers
(Fiddle)
Sal’s gone to the Cider Mill
Mill sits up on the top of the hill.
(Fiddle)
Sal went down to the Cider Mill
She drank and drank ‘till she got her fill
I asked that gal to marry me
She said, “No” as quick as you please.
Boys and the gal’s went huckleberry pickin’
Paul fell down and Sal got a lickin’.
Sal went down to the field one day,
She got drunk and stayed all day.
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