Red Wing: A Song History
"Red Wing" began as a Tin Pan Alley song, with music by Kerry Mills and words by Thurland Chattaway, and was published in 1907.[1] The sheet music came out in New York under the F. A. Mills imprint, and one edition carries the subtitle "An Indian Intermezzo";[2] the piece was also billed as "An Indian Fable," placing it within the vogue for Native American subjects that ran through American popular music in the 1900s.[1] Its words center on a young Native American woman.[1] The Traditional Tune Archive observes that the first part of the tune resembles Robert Schumann's "The Happy Farmer,"[1] No. 10 of his 1848 piano collection Album for the Young, Op. 68.[3] The sources consulted here do not confirm that Mills borrowed directly from Schumann.
L. Prang & Co., Red-winged blackbird, color lithograph, 1874. Library of Congress. No known restrictions on publication. The song is not about the bird; the print illustrates only the name.
The tune became a staple at old-time dances in northern Wisconsin. It was also a common dance tune in East Anglia, England, and its popularity reached as far as Australia.[1] Old-time recordings include a 78 by the Fox Chasers on the OKeh label and a version by Kyle Creed with the Camp Creek Boys.[1] Several other Mills compositions, among them "Georgia Camp Meeting" and "Whistlin' Rufus," also entered the American fiddle tradition.[1]
The melody found a second life when Woody Guthrie reworked its opening line into his union song "Union Maid."[1] Among mountain dulcimer players, "Red Wing" is one of the 75 tunes in Stephen Seifert's Join the Jam, a book of pieces popular at mountain dulcimer jams.[4]
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