"Oh, Hangman, Hangman,
slack up your rope.
Oh, slack it for awhile.
I looked down yonder, seen my father a-coming.
He has walked for a many long mile."
"Say father have you brought me any gold?
Any gold to pay my fee?
Or have you walked these many long miles
to see me on Hangman's tree?"
"No son, no son, I ain't brought you any gold.
No gold to pay your fee.
I've just come to see you hang,
swinging from that gallows tree."
"Oh, Hangman, Hangman,
slack up your rope.
Oh, slack it for awhile.
I looked down yonder, seen my mother a-coming.
She's walked for a many long mile.
"Say mother have you brought me any gold?
Any gold to pay my fee?
Or have you walked these many long miles
to see me on the Hangman's tree?"
"No son, no son, I ain't brought you any gold.
No gold to pay your fee.
I've just come to see you hang,
swinging from that gallows tree."
"Oh, Hangman, Hangman,
slack up your rope.
Oh, slack it for awhile.
I looked down yonder, seen my true-love a-coming.
He's walked for a many long mile."
"Say true-love, have you brought me any any gold?
Any gold to pay my fee?
Or have you walked these many long miles,
just to see me on the Hangman's tree?"
"Yes love, yes love, I've brought you some gold.
Some gold to pay your fee.
I have come to take you home,
so we can married be."
................................................................................
The older title of this ballad is "The Maid Freed from the Gallows"...and in
the most widespread version of the story, it concerns a maiden who is kidnapped
and held for ransom by corsairs or pirates. Family members fail, for various
reasons, but true love prevails, and pays.
I came to sing the version I have now under curious circumstances, and perhaps
relating them will cast some light on how and why a ballad can be chosen and
altered by a singer.
I learned a version of Hangman from Jean Ritchie years ago, usually playing it on the dulcimer as I had heard her do, to a jaunty tune with an odd rythmn. I hadn't planned on recording it...it just didn't strike a chord with me.
But when I began recording the ballads, I happened to mention to the recording engineer (Jody Kirkpatrick) that Led Zeppelin had recorded a version of a Hangman. "Oh, I love that song," he said, "I didn't know it was a ballad."
The reason that I had mentioned Hangman in the first place was that my nephew had recommended that I listen to a recording of "remixed" traditional music by a contemporary group (they will remain nameless here!) who had utilized samples from Alan Lomax's field recordings of traditional music made in the Southern United States during the late 50s. Amongst the samples were some fragments of Hangman, sung by Almeda Riddle...a really wonderful singer from the Ozarks.
Her rythmn and tune were, as always, simply marvelous. I wish I could say as much for the rudimentary instrumental ideas glommed onto it.
Anyway, the power of the downward series of notes in her melody stuck in my head, & before long I began to try to reconstruct her version of the ballad from a single musical phrase. I didn't, but I wound up with something different that I really liked. There wasn't enough of Almeda on the remix CD to reconstruct how her lyrics would have worked, so the words to this version are speculative in regards to tradition....I relied on Jean's version to supply the ending. This song is formulaic...you can add other relatives, brother, sister, etc., if you want to extend the pleasure of singing it.
As to the "remix"....I didn't object to the idea of constructing new music out of older, "sampled" sources...lets just say that Brian Eno (My Life in the Bush of Ghosts) did it much better years ago.