"Sugar in the Gourd" is an old-time breakdown from Virginia, West Virginia, North Georgia, Alabama, Arkansas and Missouri in G Major (Brody, Perlman, Reiner & Anick) or A Major (Frets, Silberberg). The parts are played AB (Silberberg), AABB (Brody, Perlman, Reiner & Anick) or AA'BB'C (Frets). There are several "Sugar in the Gourd" tunes, related and unrelated. This version of "Sugar in the Gourd" is melodically related to "Turkey in the Straw" and historically predates it, the words having been printed in the 1830's (Charles Wolfe). There are a few explanations of the meaning of the title. Formerly it has been thought that ‘sugar in the gourd' might refer to a practice of hanging sugar-filled vegetable gourds around a dance floor—to ease the friction for dancers sugar would periodically be thrown on those sections of the floor where the traffic was the heaviest. Another explanation, not mutually exclusive, is that ‘sugar in the gourd’ is a sexual euphemism. "Sugar in the Gourd" is one of the tunes fiddlers would play to vie with each other in some older fiddle contests; the best version of "Sugar" and a few other 'universally' known tunes won the fiddler the prize. The title appears in a list of traditional Ozark Mountain fiddle tunes compiled by musicologist/folklorist Vance Randolph, published in 1954. Ken Perlman (1996) writes that this American southern tune was in circulation on Canada’s Prince Edward island in the pre-radio 1920's, although how it got there is a mystery. His P.E.I. collected version is similar to one printed by Reiner & Anick, from the playing of Georgia fiddler John Carson who recorded the melody in 1924, and it seems possible that this recording was obtained by an unknown P.E.I. fiddler who learned the tune from it. It was printed in Bayard's Dance to the Fiddle (1982)(contains two tunes under the "Turkey in the Straw" family, Brody's Fiddler’s Fakebook (1983), Frets Magazine, "Byron Berline: The Fiddle," October 1987, Kuntz's Ragged but Right (1987), Perlman's The Fiddle Music of Prince Edward Island (1996), Phillips' Fiddlecase Tunebook (1989), Reiner & Anick's Old Time Fiddling Across America (1989) and Silberberg's Tunes I Learned at Tractor Tavern (2002). It was recorded by Earl Collins on That's Earl, Ace Weems and the Fat Meat Boys, John Ashby on Down on Ashby's Farm, Kahle Brewer and Stoneman's Dixie Mountaineers on Old-Time Fiddle Classics, John McCutcheon on Barefoot Boy With Boots On (1981), Tweedy Brothers, Pete McMahon on Kansas City Rag, Fiddlin John Carson (1924), Gid Tanner and the Skillet Lickers on Hear These New Southern Fiddle and Guitar Records, Sidney Baglole on Fiddlers of Western Prince Edward Island (1997), Byron Berline & John Hickman on Double Trouble (1924) and Fiddlin' Cowan Powers, Howard Marshall & John Williams on Fiddling Missouri (1999).