|
"Washington's March" is an American reel in cut time and D Major in DDad fiddle tuning.
The parts are played AB or AAB.
Despite the title, the tune is played in reel tempo.
It may possibly be a very distant derivative of
"Washington’s Grand March"
although there were many melodies in America that carried the Washington name, an indication
of his influence even in backwoods areas. Betty Vornbrock notices a similarity in the
high part of Edden Hammons’ version and the ‘B’ part of the Shetland tune
"Sleep Soond i’da Moarnin'".
Allan Jabbour (in 1984 notes to Edden Hammons recording) says that this is one of the
tunes in the Hammons family repertoire that has special family associations, in that
it was considered to have been composed by early family members, “or at least uniquely
preserved by them”. The original 1947 field recorder, a folklorist named Louis Watson Chappell,
stated that Edden Hammons won the 1939 Greenbrier Valley fiddle championship playing
“Washington’s March” and that he had learned it “59 years ago and first played it on a
gourd covered by a deer skin” (quoted by Jabbour).
The banjo tablature is by John Letscher. His comment: First learned from Powell, Herrmann and O'Brien on their Songs from the Mountain CD. There's a great version by Gerald Milnes on Youtube.It was printed in Krassen's Masters of Old Time Fiddling (1983). It was recorded by Edden Hammons on The Edden Hammons Collection, vol. 2 (1984) and American Rural Classics 1927-37. |