"Ida Red", also known as "Idy Red" is an American reel in 2/4 or cut time in A Major (Kuntz, Milliner/Koken, Phillips) or G Major (Krassen, Milliner/Koken, Titon). It is played in AEae or standard fiddle tuning. The parts are played AB, AAB or AABB (Krassen). Some players like to reverse the parts and play BA or BBAA. "Ida Red" is a melody widespread throughout the South and Mid-West, in both purely instrumental versions and versions with words. The words are usually a casual collection of floater verses to amuse the band while the dancers complete their figures. For that reason, I have included it in the Tunes section instead of the Songs section. The character 'Ida Red' is the subject of a somber song in Alan Lomax's collection American Ballads and Folk Songs (1934), in a section of 'Negro Bad Men', collected from an informant at a Texas prison farm. However, it has no relation to the "Ida Red" of the various fiddle tune couplets whose gender is feminine or androgynous and often comic. Jeff Titon (2001) believes the lyrics suggest an African-American or minstrel origin, but no direct antecedents have surfaced to date. The "Ida Red" tunes as a group vary widely in their melodic content even within geographic regions, although nearly all versions retain the distinctive cadence, with the majority played in 'A' major, often 'cross-tuned' (i.e.: AEae fiddle tuning). It was recorded for the Library of Congress by musicologist/folklorist Vance Randolph from Ozarks Mountains fiddlers in the early 1940's. Riley Pucket's (north Georgia) version of the tune, released in 1926, became the second best-selling country music record for the year. The banjo tablature is from John Letscher. It was printed in The Devil's Box, vol. 9, no. 1 (1975), Kaufman's Beginning Old Time Fiddle (1977), Krassen's Appalachian Fiddle (1973), Kuntz's Ragged but Right (1987), Milliner & Koken's Milliner-Koken Collection of American Fiddle Tunes (2011) (five versions), Phillips' Traditional American Fiddle Tunes, vol. 1 (1994) (two versions), Thede's The Fiddle Book (1967) and Titon's Old Time Kentucky Fiddle Tunes (2001). It was recorded by Dykes Magic City Trio (1927), Tommy Jarrell on Rainbow Sign (1986), Clayton McMichen on McMichen: The Traditional Years (1977), Double Decker String Band on Giddyap Napoleon, Gid Tanner and His Skillet Lickers (1934), Tweedy Brothers (1928), Jim Bowles on Railroading Through the Rocky Mountains (1994), Ernest V. Stoneman on Ernest Stoneman and the Blue Ridge Corn Shuckers (1978), Ed Haley on Forked Deer (1997), Pete Seeger on American Favorite Ballads: Songs and Tunes, Vol. 5 (1962), The Red Mules on The Marimac Anthology: Deep in Old-Time Music, Fiddlin' Powers & Family (1924) and The Hoover Uprights on Known by their Reputation (2005).