Annotation:Old Christmas Morning (1)
X:1 T:Old Christmas Morning [1] S:French Carpenter (1899-1965, Clay County, W.Va.) M:C| L:1/8 N:AEae tuning R:Reel D:Kanawha 301, French Carpenter - "Elzic's Farewell" (1978. Originally recorded 1963) F:https://www.slippery-hill.com/recording/old-christmas-morning Z:Transcribed by Andrew Kuntz K:Amix g2e2a2+slide+g2|abag e2a2|(3fgf ed c2d2|BBBB ^G2B2| +slide+[A3A3](A, [A4A4])|g2e2a2g2|abag e2a2|+slide+g2 ed c2d2| BBBB ^G2B2|[M:3/4]+slide+[A6A6]|[A2A2][A2d2]f2|[M:C|][e4e4]-[e4e4]|[e2e2]{f}g2f/g/fed|cdcA E2Bd| cAB^GE2Bd|[c2e2][c2e2] ccd[de]|cdB^G A2Ad|[c2e2][c2e2][A,2E2]Ad| cAB^G [E2A2]Ad|[c2e2][c2e2] ccd[de]|cdB^G [A2A2]Ad|[c2e2][c2e2][A,2E2]Ad| cAB^G [E2A2]Ad|[c2e2][c2e2] ccd[de]|cdB^G [A4A4]|[A4A4]|
OLD CHRISTMAS MORNING. American, Air (cut time). USA, West Virginia. A Mixolydian/Major. AEae tuning (fiddle). AB: ABB'. This archaic tune, played at a moderate-to-moderately quick tempo, is somewhere between an uptempo air and a slow reel, and versions are ideosyncratic and non-standard, even between a mentor (French Carpenter) and his student (Wilson Douglas).
Old Christmas refers to the celebration of Epiphany, or Twelfth Night, on January 6, and was the date some old-time Appalachian communities celebrated Christmas (surviving into the latter half of the 20th century in isolated parts of eastern Kentucky) by lighting bonfires at night with much gun-play and fireworks. The custom was imported from North Britain, where the revelry of "Old Christmas" reached its climax in a rough and sometimes violent practice called stanging, in which a person was hoisted on a long pole and made to dangle in the air until he bought himself free (Fischer, Albions Seed, p. 745). In the Frank C. Brown Collection of North Carolina Folklore one old-timer is quoted:
In some parts of this county it is the custom to observe what is known as Old Christmas. Opinion varies as to the date; some believe it is the fifth and some the sixth of January. This day is believed by the people who keep it to be the real Christmas, the birthday of Christ. They say the Christmas we regularly keep is the "man-made" Christmas ... (Brown, I, 2416).
