Young Man Who Wouldn't Raise Corn: A Song History

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"Young Man Who Wouldn't Raise Corn" is one name for an American folk song more often called "The Young Man Who Wouldn't Hoe Corn."[1][2] The story turns on idleness: a youth neglects his cornfield, loses the crop, and later finds that the girl he courts will not have him.[1] The Traditional Ballad Index lists the song as Laws H13 and Roud 438, and it gives 1905 as its earliest date, citing the Missouri Folklore Society collection edited by Belden.[1] Collectors found it across much of the country, and the Index's references run from Vermont and New York to Ohio, Indiana, Iowa, North Carolina, Mississippi and Texas.[1]

Chalk sketch of a peasant seated on a slope, leaning forward on the handle of a hoe

Jean-François Millet, Seated Peasant Resting on a Hoe, fabricated black chalk, 1829–75. A French farmhand rather than an American one, shown for its subject; it has no connection to the song.

Columbia recorded it in New York on June 26, 1931, as "A Lazy Farmer Boy," and issued it on 15702-D under the names Buster Carter and Preston Young.[1][3] Sources differ on who plays: Mainly Norfolk, citing the booklet of Harry Smith's anthology, says Carter is not on the record and that Young and the fiddler Posey Rorer made it, while the Discography of American Historical Recordings lists Carter as the singer, with Young on guitar and Rorer on fiddle.[2][3] Smith reissued the recording in 1952 on the Ballads volume of his Anthology of American Folk Music for Folkways.[4] Edna and Jean Ritchie sang it on the 1958 Folkways album The Ritchie Family of Kentucky, on a track that pairs it with "I Wonder When I Shall Be Married."[2][5] Jean Ritchie recorded it again in 1971 under the "Raise Corn" title, on Clear Waters Remembered.[2] Pete Seeger's version is on American Favorite Ballads, Vol. 2 from Smithsonian Folkways.[6]

Atwater-Donnelly recorded "Young Man Who Wouldn't Raise Corn" on their 2001 live album And Then I'm Going Home.[7] Aubrey Atwater includes it, in DAG tuning, in Song By Song, Vol. II, her book of dulcimer tablature, which gives lyrics for many of its songs.[8]

Our book that contains the song "Young Man Who Wouldn't Raise Corn"

Sources

  1. Traditional Ballad Index: "Young Man Who Wouldn't Hoe Corn, The [Laws H13]".
  2. Mainly Norfolk: "The Young Man Who Wouldn't Hoe Corn".
  3. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Columbia matrix W151648. A lazy farmer boy / Buster Carter ; Preston Young".
  4. Mainly Norfolk: "Anthology of American Folk Music".
  5. Smithsonian Folkways: "The Ritchie Family of Kentucky".
  6. Smithsonian Folkways: "American Favorite Ballads, Vol. 2".
  7. Atwater-Donnelly: "CDs | Songbooks".
  8. Aubrey Atwater: "Song By Song, Vol. II".
  9. Image: Jean-François Millet, Seated Peasant Resting on a Hoe, fabricated black chalk, 1829–75. The Cleveland Museum of Art.

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