Tugboat
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Transcription: by Darryl D. Bush
"Tugboat" is an old time breakdown known in West Virginia, Virginia, Nebraska, Oklahoma and<br> Texas in G Major. The parts are played AABB (Christeson, Phillips) or AA'BBC (Frets).<br> Charles Wolfe (1997) states Kanawha County, West Virginia, fiddler Clark Kessinger<br> (1896-1975) first recorded the tune (in 1929 for Brunswick with his nephew and accompanist,<br> Luches Kessinger, on guitar. The duo was billed as the 'Kessinger Brothers' by the label.)<br> Other fiddlers learned the tune from Kessinger’s recording, among them Texas fiddler<br> Benny Thomasson, who was instrumental in inserting the melody into the Texas contest tune<br> repertoire where it remains a popular piece. The tune was also in the repertoire of West<br> Virginia fiddler Edden Hammons.<br> The tune is related to "Ladies on the Steamboat", "Sandy River Belle", "Jullianne<br> Flannigan" and "Sally will You Marry Me".<br> It was printed in R.P. Christeson's Old Time Fiddlers Repertory, vol. 2 (1984),<br> Frets Magazine: "Byron Berline: The Fiddle," June, 1988,<br> Phillips's Traditional American Fiddle Tunes, vol. 1 (1994). <br> It was recorded by Kessinger Brothers (1929),<br> Bob Walters (1889-1960) on Drunken Wagoneer,<br> Edden Hammons on The Edden Hammons Collection, vol. 2.,<br> Byron Berline & John Hickman on Double Trouble.<br>
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