"Grand Picnic" is an old-time breakdown or reel in D Major. The parts are played AABB. The tune is usually attributed to Joe Politte, a fiddler from the Old Mines, Washington County, area of Missouri, south of St. Louis. Politte was one of the few remaining fiddlers of his time who derived from the old French fiddling tradition from settlements along the mid-Mississippi valley. It is on Missouri fiddler Charlie Walden's list of "100 essential Missouri fiddle tunes". Gordon McCann (2008) suggests the tune is of French origin and very old, perhaps from the old French settlers who formed communities in northern Missouri in the early 18th century. The banjo is from John Letscher. It was printed in Beisswenger & McCann's Ozarks Fiddle Music (2008), Christeson's Old Time Fiddler's Repertory, vol. 2 (1984), Old Time Herald, vol. 4, No. 5, Phillips' Traditional American Fiddle Tunes, vol. 1 (1994), Silberberg's 93 Tunes I Didn't Learn at the Tractor Tavern (2004) and Songer's Portland Collection (1997). It was recorded by Joe Politte on I'm Old But I'm Awfully Tough (1977) and Skip Gorman and friends on Fiddles in the Cow Camp (2011).