Square Dance Medley

04. Square Dance Medley (Cripple Creek, Buffalo Gals, Old Joe Clark, Red Wing, Ida Red, Chilly Winds, Sandy Land)
(traditional, arr. Guthrie-Houston-Terry/Woody Guthrie Publications, Inc., BMI-copyright control)

Track 4 – Square Dance Medley (MASTER 1225)
While still a teenager in Pampa, Texas, Guthrie played in, or filled in, for bands furnishing the music for square dances in nearby wheat farming communities. There he learned dozens, perhaps hundreds of square dance tunes, each played over and over and over and over, through the set. Even more boring or mindless, he learned that fiddle players did not like band members to deviate in the slightest from thump-thumpthump chorded accompaniments, lest the fiddler be outshone.

The medley here is “Cripple Creek,” “Buffalo Gals,” “Old Joe Clark,” “Red Wing,” “Chilly Winds,” and “Sandy Land.”Woody does as those fiddlers commanded – to a point – while interspersing a handful of square dance calls.

This may be the most exuberant of the recordings in this collection: Houston plays guitar, Guthrie mandolin, and Terry adds harmonica comments here and there as he picked up the melodies. They are simply having great fun. This too is apparently a first release.