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Topic: Foot Prints in the Snow |
Randy Reeves
From:
LaCrosse, Wisconsin, USA
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Posted 25 Apr 2005 9:51 am |
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I love this Bill Monroe tune. for the life of me I cant figure out what the song is about.
did he lose his dog or his sweetheart ?
are either of them dead?
help. |
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Jeff Au Hoy
From:
Honolulu, Hawai'i
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Posted 25 Apr 2005 9:55 am
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I think he went to his girlfriend's only to find out from the mom that she'd gone out for a walk. He found the girl by tracing her footsteps, which he found in the snow.
Apparently she died at some point, so he's singing to her memory. But I don't think she died that day in the snow.
At least that's what I remember.
Oh... Big Mon's dead now too.[This message was edited by Jeff Au Hoy on 25 April 2005 at 11:02 AM.] |
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Gerald Ross
From:
Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA
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Posted 25 Apr 2005 10:06 am
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Did she die or did he kill her? This is a pre-war Bluegrass tune ya know. Lot's of tunes in that genre about killing the one you love (i.e., "Banks Of The Ohio" & "Knoxville Girl"). Pretty creepy tunes. Bill Monroe covered both of them.
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Gerald Ross
'Northwest Ann Arbor, Michigan's King Of The Hawaiian Steel Guitar'
Gerald's Fingerstyle Guitar Website
Board of Directors Hawaiian Steel Guitar Association
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Dave Giegerich
From:
Ellicott City, MD, R.I.P.
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Posted 25 Apr 2005 10:52 am
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| And how about "The Little Girl and The Dreadful Snake"? |
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Gerald Ross
From:
Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA
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Peter Jacobs
From:
Northern Virginia
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Posted 25 Apr 2005 11:00 am
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You beat me to it -- the last time I saw Monroe and the Blue Grass Boys, he played "Footprints" and "Dreadful Snake" back. Who said you can't play a said song on the banjo -- this was mortifying.
Peter
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Ed Altrichter
From:
Schroeder, Minnesota, USA
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Posted 25 Apr 2005 11:50 am
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The songs (circa 1920's) of country music's first star, Vernon Dalhart, were almost all songs about tragedy. "Where is my boy tonight", "The baggage coach ahead", "Little Marion Parker", etc.
One was a pro-lynching song about a factory owner who was accused of killing a little girl who worked there. It was found out later that he didn't do it. |
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Earnest Bovine
From:
Los Angeles CA USA
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Posted 25 Apr 2005 11:55 am
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| So gangsta rap is country? |
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Randy Reeves
From:
LaCrosse, Wisconsin, USA
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Posted 25 Apr 2005 12:12 pm
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Bob Stone
From:
Gainesville, FL, USA
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Posted 25 Apr 2005 12:32 pm
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| I thought it was "The Dreadful Girl and the Little Snake." |
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Ian McLatchie
From:
Sechelt, British Columbia
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Posted 25 Apr 2005 12:48 pm
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"This is a pre-war Bluegrass tune ya know. Lot's of tunes in that genre about killing the one you love (i.e., "Banks Of The Ohio" & "Knoxville Girl"). Pretty creepy tunes."
In the case of the two songs you mention, Gerald, these are definitely "pre-war" tunes, as in pre-Revolutionary War, at least. "Knoxville Girl," for one, was apparently exported to the U.S. from Great Britain in the early eighteenth century and began life as "The Berkshire Tragedy;" it's also known as "Oxford Girl,"
"Waco Girl" and "Yonkers Girl," among others.
I don't know the genesis of "Footprints in the Snow," but it's a safe bet it has a history stretching far beyond the birth of Bill Munroe. On record, Cliff Carlisle's version pre-dates Munroe's by more than a decade and its influence on Munroe is unmistakable. And yes, Jeff, you remember correctly: the narrator meets Nellie after he traces her whereabouts by her footprints when she's lost in a snowstorm; he eventually marries her and now is looking back on their life together. "Now she's up in heaven, she's with an angel band/Some day I'll go and meet her in that happy land..."[This message was edited by Ian McLatchie on 25 April 2005 at 07:30 PM.] |
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Gary Anwyl
From:
Palo Alto, CA
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Posted 6 May 2005 9:54 am
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I just happened to run across a reference to "Footprints In The Snow" in the book
Rural Root of Bluegrass by Wayne Erbsen. It's a pretty credible source of information about the roots of bluegrass songs.
The author says that before it was a bluegrass song it was an English music hall song called "Footmarks in the Snow". He tracked down some sheet music for it that was dated 1880.
The book contains the music for the original song. The original lyrics are about the same as the Monroe version. The melody is slightly different, but it's obviously the same tune.
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David L. Donald
From:
Koh Samui Island, Thailand
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Posted 6 May 2005 10:48 am
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| Great old tune, I used to play it in NYC with two guys who could sing it right. |
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Bill McCloskey
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Posted 6 May 2005 11:08 am
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| Interesting thread. I have often discussed Footprints in the Snow with people trying to disect the lyrics and I believe that it can be read many different ways. It is purposefully vague. You can interprete that he found her dead, that he found her alive and she died later or that he stalked her and killed her. There is nothing in the lyric that would say definitively or not. That's is why I think it is one of the spookiest and weirdest songs ever written. |
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David L. Donald
From:
Koh Samui Island, Thailand
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Posted 6 May 2005 1:05 pm
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I think they were in love,
but the family didn't approve.
Dispondant she ran from the home
in her nightgown
Just before he came to her cabin
and was told she was gone
and he went to find her.
He founder her alive but too cold to survive
but she died in is arms
and he has mourned her ever since.
At least this is the take I got, after playing 100+ times or so. |
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Bill McCloskey
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Posted 6 May 2005 1:54 pm
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So how do you explain the line " That Blessed and happy day when ? lost her way"
Why is the day so blessed if she was found dead? that's part of the weirdness in the song. |
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