Darling Cora: A Song History

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"Darling Cora," also sung as "Darling Corey," "Darlin' Cory," "Little Cora" and under other spellings and titles, is an Appalachian song whose author is unknown.[1] In it, revenue officers are coming after Corey's still, and the song follows her life as a moonshiner through to her death and burial, which some versions present as a dream.[1] The earliest dated text listed in the Traditional Ballad Index comes from Cecil Sharp's 1918 Appalachian collecting, where it is printed under the title "The Gambling Man" alongside a fragment of a different song.[1]

Photograph of an early banjo with a round body and a long fretless wooden neck

William Esperance Boucher, Jr., Banjo, wood, gourds, sheepskin, ca. 1840. Shown for its subject; it has no connection to the song.

Buell Kazee recorded "Darling Cora" for Brunswick on April 20, 1927, and it was issued on Brunswick 154 backed with "East Virginia."[2] On July 29 of that year, at the Victor sessions in Bristol, Tennessee, supervised by Ralph Peer, B. F. Shelton recorded it singing to his own banjo, and it came out on Victor 35838.[3] Encyclopedia Virginia counts the solo banjo records of Shelton, a musician from Corbin, Kentucky, among the standout traditional performances captured at Bristol.[4] On October 15, 1937, Maynard Britton sang it with guitar for an Alan Lomax recording at Big Creek in Clay County, Kentucky, and the Library of Congress owns the original recordings,[5] while the Lomaxes printed a version in their collection Our Singing Country.[1]

Later recordings include the Monroe Brothers' 1936 Bluebird release and versions by Pete Seeger, Roscoe Holcomb, and Doc Watson.[1] Don Pedi includes it in Simply Old Time Dulcimer, a book of 29 old-time tunes in dulcimer tablature with demonstration audio, using five tunings, with "Darling Cora" set in DAC.[6]

Our book that contains the song "Darling Cora"

Sources

  1. The Traditional Ballad Index: "Darling Corey".
  2. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Brunswick 154 (10-in. double-faced)".
  3. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Victor matrix CVE-39737. Darling Cora / B. F. Shelton".
  4. Encyclopedia Virginia: "Bristol Sessions (1927)".
  5. Alan and Elizabeth Lomax Kentucky Recordings: "Darling Cora (part 1)".
  6. Don Pedi: "Simply Old Time Dulcimer".
  7. Image: William Esperance Boucher, Jr., Banjo, wood, gourds, sheepskin, ca. 1840. The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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