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Wang Wang Blues
Old-Time and Jazz song; Words and music by Henry Busse / B. Johnson / Gus Mueller / Leo Wood
ARTIST: Bessy Smith
CATEGORY: Fiddle and Instrumental Tunes
EARLIEST DATE: 1920 recording; Published circa 1921
RECORDING INFO: Wang Wang Blues
Hensley, Violet. Traditional Fiddle Music of the Ozarks. Volume 1, Rounder 0435, CD (1999), trk# 26
Paul Whiteman & His Orch. (Instr.) - 1920
Red Mountain Trio 1928
Sid Harkreader Blythe Poteet 1928
Carver Boys 1929
Jungle Band Duke Ellington 1930
Bob Wills 1935
Benny Goodman Sextet (Instr.) - 1941
Spike Jones & His City Slickers (vocal: Del Porter) - 1943
The Ames Brothers - 1951
Bennie Krueger Orchestra -
SOURCES: Meade; Folk Index; Kuntz
NOTES: Kuntz: WANG WANG BLUES. Country Blues Tune. USA; Georgia, North Carolina. F Major. Standard tuning. The tune was recorded in Atlanta by the Scottdale String Band, named in honor of the mill village of Scottdale, near Atlanta, and home to the band members (Wayne W. Daniel, Pickin’ on Peachtree, 1990). Their first recording was made for the OKeh studios on October 28, 1926, and between that date and 1932 the group recorded nearly thirty sides (all but two—released by Paramount—for OKeh). Bill Rattray wrote about the group in Old Time Music magazine (“Scottdale Boys,” OTM, Summer, 1971) and said the group’s records sold “well, or at least fairly well,” and that “their instrumentation was profoundly different from that of the other, more well-known Georgia bands like the Skillet-Lickers, and gave their music a more sophisticated sound that that of the ‘rough North Georgia’ school.” The groups repertoire varied more than usual for string bands from the region, and included “a wider range of material including tunes used chiefly by the jazz bands…the more traditional breakdowns, songs and ballads are hardly featured at all.” [quoted by Daniel]. The melody was in the repertoire of the late North Carolina Piedmont fiddler Lauchlin Shaw.
WANG WANG BLUES
(Henry Busse / B. Johnson / Gus Mueller / Leo Wood)
I got the bluest blues (He's got the bluest blues)
I'm just as blue as can be (He's got the blues)
Just got the awful news (He's got some awful news)
My sweetie sweet has left me (She left him flat)
I love her so (He loves her so)
And now I know (And now he knows)
This awful blow (That awful blow)
Will lay me low (Will lay him low)
Oh Lordy, Lord, what she did to me (Lord, what she did to he)
I'm just as sad as can be (Oh, sad is he)
I got those Wang Wang blues (He's got the blues)
Those awful Wang Wang blues (Those dirty blues)
Oh brother I never knew I'd be so blue
Until she went away (Oh, mercy me)
I got those Wang Wang Blues (As blue as blue)
Those lonesome Wang Wang Blues (So sad and blue)
I wish my sweet sweetie would come back
And chase away those Wang Wang Blues
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