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Audio Recording Arkansas Traveler

Arkansas Traveler

About this Item

Title

  • Arkansas Traveler

Names

  • Jabbour, Alan (Transcriber)
  • Jabbour, Alan (Collector)
  • Reed, Henry, 1884-1968 (Performer)

Created / Published

  • Reed family home, Glen Lyn, Giles County, Virginia, October 28, 1967

Headings

  • -  Instrumental music
  • -  Fiddle tunes
  • -  Folk music--Appalachian Region
  • -  Breakdowns
  • -  Reels
  • -  Ethnography
  • -  Music
  • -  Field recordings
  • -  United States -- Virginia -- Giles County -- Glen Lyn
  • -  United States -- Arkansas

Genre

  • Ethnography
  • Music
  • Field recordings

Notes

  • -  Key: D
  • -  Meter: 4/4
  • -  Compass: 15
  • -  Performed by Henry Reed, fiddle.
  • -  Strains: 3 (high-low-higher octave)
  • -  Rendition: 1r-2r-1r-3-2-(break)-1-3-1
  • -  Phrase Structure: ABAC QRQC UVUC (abcd abef qrss' uvwx uvef)
  • -  Spoken: ALAN JABBOUR and HENRY REED: [Laugh]/HENRY REED: That there is hard to play./ALAN JABBOUR: It is./HENRY REED: Do you play it?[after second performance]/ALAN JABBOUR: Which part did you mean, for the shuffle?/HENRY REED: Right over there in that chorus par
  • -  Recording chronology: 182
  • -  Duration: 2 minutes, 1 second
  • -  "Arkansas Traveler" seems to be American in origin and appeared in many nineteenth-century publications, both as a tune and in association with a comic skit popular on the stage, in which the lost traveler in Arkansas encounters a squatter playing half a tune and exchanges one-liners of stage banter ("You seem pretty stupid, fellow." "Well, I ain't lost.") before finally supplying the other half of the tune and gaining a full welcome. Some typical sets are Winner's Collection of Music for the Violin, p. 30; Winner's Dance Music, p. 26 (with dialogue) and p. 52; and One Thousand Fiddle Tunes, p. 4. Twentieth-century sets include Morris, Old Time Violin Melodies #1 "Arkansas"; Fillmore, American Veteran Fifer #29; Ford, Traditional Music of America, p. 46; Linscott, Folk Songs of Old New England, p. 83; and Randolph, Ozark Folksongs vol. 3, 22 (with dialogue). Henry Reed follows the Upper South predilection for beginning with the high strain. His third strain is the low strain raised to the upper octave, a variation that appears in some other sets (see for instance the Morris set).

Medium

  • Audio tape

Call Number/Physical Location

  • AFC 1969/008: AFS 13705B30

Source Collection

  • Alan Jabbour duplication project, part 2

Repository

  • American Folklife Center

Digital Id

Online Format

  • audio

Rights & Access

The Library of Congress is not aware of any U.S. copyright protection (see Title 17, U.S.C.) or any other restrictions in the material in this collection, except as noted below. Users should keep in mind that the Library of Congress is providing access to these materials strictly for educational and research purposes. The written permission of the copyright owners and/or other holders of rights (such as publicity and/or privacy rights) is required for distribution, reproduction, or other use of protected items beyond that allowed by fair use or other statutory exemptions. Responsibility for making an independent legal assessment of an item and securing any necessary permissions ultimately rests with persons desiring to use the item. See our Legal Notices for additional information and restrictions.

The Center asks that researchers approach the materials in this collection with respect for the culture and sensibilities of the people whose lives, ideas, and creativity are documented here. Researchers are also reminded that privacy and publicity rights may pertain to certain uses of this material.

Photographs in this collection produced by Carl Fleischhauer, Karen Singer Jabbour, and Kit Olson are reproduced here with their permission. Mr. Fleischhauer does not object to additional use of the photos he created provided he is credited as the photographer. Persons contemplating other kinds of uses or use of the other photographers' work should contact the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress.

Credit line

Please cite the source collection title, collection number, and repository, for example:

Alan Jabbour duplication project, part 1 (AFC 1967/007), American Folklife Center, Library of Congress

Alan Jabbour duplication project, part 2 (AFC 1969/008), American Folklife Center, Library of Congress

Fiddle tunes of the old frontier: the Henry Reed collection online presentation (AFC 1999/016), American Folklife Center, Library of Congress

Cite This Item

Citations are generated automatically from bibliographic data as a convenience, and may not be complete or accurate.

Chicago citation style:

Jabbour, Alan, Alan Jabbour, and Henry Reed. Arkansas Traveler. Reed family home, Glen Lyn, Giles County, Virginia, 1967. Audio. https://www.loc.gov/item/afcreed000251/.

APA citation style:

Jabbour, A., Jabbour, A. & Reed, H. (1967) Arkansas Traveler. Reed family home, Glen Lyn, Giles County, Virginia. [Audio] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/afcreed000251/.

MLA citation style:

Jabbour, Alan, Alan Jabbour, and Henry Reed. Arkansas Traveler. Reed family home, Glen Lyn, Giles County, Virginia, 1967. Audio. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/afcreed000251/>.